Do the Word

Most discipleship problems are the result of inadequate or anemic concepts of salvation. That is to say, one of the inherent problems with the Sinner’s Prayer is that it sets the stage for a very therapeutically-oriented, self-focused form of discipleship–a contradiction in terms since, as  Augustine, Luther, and Barth noted, “homo incurvatus” (the inwardly bent human) is the very essence of sin.

John Wesley described this self-oriented kind of salvation in a single word: vulgar.

By salvation I mean, not barely (according to the vulgar notion) deliverance from hell, or going to heaven, but a present deliverance from sin, a restoration of the soul to its primitive health … the renewal of our souls after the image of God in righteousness and true holiness, in justice, mercy, and truth

As you proclaim the Gospel, therefore, strenuously resist the temptation to feed the inward curvature of the hearer. That inward curvature will tempt you to define and describe salvation as God’s effort to meet their particular felt need.

Remember: Salvation is what the Scripture says it is, not what the hearer needs it to be. What the hearer needs more than anything, though he or she cannot realize it (and though often we don’t recognize it), is to be catapulted out of the fatal orbit-around-self and into the life giving orbit-around-God. That’s what proclaiming the Gospel is all about.

Salvation is big. Don’t introduce it to sinners by handing them the wrong end of the telescope. Otherwise, even if they say yes to what you offer, you can expect to soon see your  telescope tossed haphazardly into their inwardly-curved toy box right alongside all the other self-help therapies with which they dabbled and have grown bored and disenchanted.

A modest proposal for using the Lord’s Prayer rather than the Sinner’s Prayer when leading people to Christ:

• Of the two prayers, the Lord’s Prayer is the one that actually appears in Scripture as an actual prayer.
• Of the two prayers, the Lord’s Prayer is the one Jesus commands us to pray, especially as we are learning how to. That gives it the “Great Commission” edge, i.e., Jesus directs us to teach everything he commanded us, and the Lord’s Prayer, unlike the Sinner’s Prayer, is on that list.
• The Lord’s Prayer has all the important elements that people like in the Sinner’s Prayer–e.g., us addressing God as our Father; us ending our rebellion (“hallowed be your name”) and submitting to his rule and reign (“for thine is the kingdom”); us confessing our sins (“forgive us our sins”)–but without the individualism and egocentricity of the Sinner’s Prayer. That is to say, the Lord’s Prayer is far more focused on God. If you’re unconvinced, just count the number of times “I” and “you” appear in each prayer. Or, to say it a little differently,
• It is possible to pray the Sinner’s Prayer sincerely and remain entirely absorbed in your own life. It is, however, impossible to pray the Lord’s Prayer sincerely and remain entirely absorbed in your own life.
• Even the way forgiveness is addressed in the Lord’s Prayer reminds us that asking for God’s forgiveness when we are not willing to recognize our need to forgive others is a bit, you know, hypocritical, self-serving, and insincere.

So as you proclaim the Gospel this month, and as you lead people through the process of repentance, baptism, and discipleship, try replacing the Sinner’s Prayer with the Lord’s Prayer at the front end of the process. You’ll find that while the Sinner’s Prayer typically leads the one praying to a big sigh of relief and to lots of good intentions to check into this church stuff, the Lord’s Prayer is nothing less than the express on-ramp to a Christian life of Whole Life discipleship.

Of course, if you don’t like using the Lord’s Prayer for this purpose, you can always try the Tax Collector’s Prayer: “Lord, be merciful to me, a sinner.” Unlike the Sinner’s Prayer, that one’s actually in the Scripture, too.

My peacemaking hat is off to Rev. David Platt who, after getting ear-boxed at the recent Southern Baptist Convention for raising concern about the use of the Sinner’s Prayer, ended up voting for a resolution affirming the use of the prayer and–in the weeks following–repeatedly emphasizing his support for it.

What has surprised me about this iteration of the Sinner’s Prayer discussion and debate is that it has been primarily cast as a repudiation of Calvinist soteriology. As Platt notes, the implication is that what would cause people to disdain the use of the Sinner’s Prayer is that they “don’t want the hopelessly condemned thinking they are saved or joining churches when they actually have no chance for life in Christ.” Platt of course notes that nothing could be further from the truth.

I have of course never been accused by anyone at any time of being a Calvinist, and yet as an evangelical Wesleyan type I am steadfastly opposed to the urging of the Sinner’s Prayer as a response to the Gospel proclamation. My reason why is tied to what may be the ultimate irony of this year’s Southern Baptist Convention, namely, that the same convention that affirmed the use of the Sinner’s Prayer also approved the adoption of “Great Commission Baptists” as an acceptable alternative name for its churches to use.

As much as it sometimes makes my fellow evangelicals uncomfortable to hear this, the Great Commission given by Jesus is not to bring sinners to salvation through a personal  relationship with Jesus. It is instead to, in the words of Jesus,

go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you.

Now it is of course possible to make a case that the Sinner’s Prayer is the “repent” portion of the “repent and be baptized” tandem that appears so often in the New Testament when people seek to respond to the Gospel.

The real challenge, however, is that we evangelicals are so focused on making sure people don’t think they can earn their salvation that we want to stress that the Sinner’s Prayer, prayed with the right heart attitude, is necessary and sufficient to lead you to salvation. Thus, we end up saying things like, “Baptism is not necessary for salvation.”

The great big problem with this, however, is that it overlooks an obvious point:

Baptism is necessary for the fulfillment of the Great Commission. So is discipleship.

This point was so important to Jesus that in the Great Commission he does not mention us leading people to a personal saving relationship with him–which is obviously a pretty important task–but instead mentions us baptizing and discipling people. Why do you suppose that is?

Because while it is absolutely categorically impossible to baptize and disciple people rightly without repentance, it is quite possible and in fact very common–as modern evangelicalism proves–to lead people to repentance without them being baptized and discipled.

So what is the solution? Just this:

Never undertake a method that permits the compartmentalization of repentance as separate from baptism and discipleship.

And a vital corollary:

Never lead someone to pray the Sinner’s Prayer before you work together with them to make definite, clear, and specific arrangements for their baptism and discipleship.