Why the Private, Personal “Sinner’s Prayer” is Completely Unbiblical

Posted on March 7, 2012 by Pastor Foley

Part IV of our series on Opening Your Home

Becoming a Christian is often described in terms of hospitality—e.g., “accepting” Christ or “opening your heart” to Christ. We read in Revelation 3:20, “Behold, I stand at the door and knock,” and we add in the words, “at the door of your heart.”

The whole transaction is described as a private, personal experience—the “sinner’s prayer.” Here’s a sample version from www.sinner-prayer.com:

“Lord Jesus, I know that I am a sinner. I believe you died for my sins and rose again. Please forgive me of my sins. I am trusting you, and you alone, to take me to Heaven when I die. Thank you for saving me. In the name of Jesus I pray, Amen.”

In fact, people praying this kind of “sinner’s prayer” are often told to pray it “with every head bowed and every eye closed” so that the individual can focus completely on what is happening inside.

The problem is, such a concept is absolutely, completely, emphatically unbiblical. Nowhere in the Scripture is accepting Christ portrayed as something that happens privately, in your heart.

Remember the spirit/soul/body diagram? In the Bible, the way that you receive Christ into your spirit…is to receive him bodily. We receive Christ by hosting him and those who he sends in the real, live, flesh and blood world. (Remember: Christianity is a physical religion!) The Bible makes clear that if we do not accept Christ “in the flesh,” we cannot accept him “in the spirit.”

If we wanted to do a biblical “sinner’s prayer,” we’d do it something like this: We’d shake the person and tell them to keep their eyes open and say to them, “Now, stay awake! Be ready! You do not know the hour or the day he is coming. Stay awake! Be ready! For the Lord will be visiting you soon!” And through the Scriptures we’d show them the “guises” the Lord most often travels in, and the messengers he most often sends in his name, and we’d say: “Now keep an eye out for such, for to receive them is to receive the Lord personally. The Lord will be coming to you soon; be ready to receive him!”

In other words, receiving Christ is a physical act of hospitality that changes you spiritually, not a spiritual act of will that changes you spiritually.

Last week we talked about prevenient grace—how God surrounds his creatures moment by moment with his love, wooing them and creating within them the capacity to respond to him even through their spirits are dead and enslaved to sin. Well, the grace of justification is an extension of that prevenient grace. Christ comes to us “from the outside in,” and we are enabled to receive him, in real life, in the real world.

That’s what happened at Christmas: Christ came in the flesh! He didn’t come into the world through the spirit, but through the body. And it is the consistent witness of Scripture that this is the way Christ still comes to us today.

Are you awake and ready for the Lord’s visit today? You sure?


Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , | 4 Comments

The Host-Like Grace of God

Posted on March 5, 2012 by Pastor Foley

Part III of our series on Opening Your Home

In our last post, we noted how the central story of the Bible is God’s hospitality.  We concluded that post by pointing to Romans 1:18-23 which teaches us that God’s hospitality is apparent in nature as well.

The knowledge of God in nature (e.g., the sunshine, the rain, our ability to live and move and breathe) is called natural theology. But it is not only God’s goodness in nature that shows his hospitality. It is his all-around goodness (God shows his love and care to all humans, not just those who believe in his son, Jesus) that comprises his hospitality.

When you think about it, God answers a lot of prayers, not just those of Christians. And he does a lot of miraculous things for people who do not know (or who do not love) Jesus.

We have a name for this hospitality of God—the host-like grace of God that he shows to all human beings, which often gives us an awareness of God even before we come to see that we are sinners and Christ is our savior. We call this prevenient grace. 

Here is how The United Methodist Book of Discipline (2004) defines prevenient grace:

 …the divine love that surrounds all humanity and precedes any and all of our conscious impulses. This grace prompts our first wish to please God, our first glimmer of understanding concerning God’s will, and our ‘first slight transient conviction’ of having sinned against God. God’s grace also awakens in us an earnest longing for deliverance from sin and death and moves us toward repentance and faith.

God’s prevenient grace is what makes it possible for us to respond to his grace in Christ. Remember: because of original sin, there is no good thing in us—our spirits are born dead and captive to sin. As a result, we would have no way to respond to his grace unless he showed us grace from the “outside in”—God’s hospitality which we can see in the goodness of creation, and God’s goodness to us even in the depths of our sin.

Prevenient grace is what makes it possible for us to respond to God’s offer of grace, even when our spirits are incapable of hearing or sensing him inwardly.

Which is why this month, as part of hearing and doing the Work of Mercy of opening our homes, .W Church is singing Charles Wesley’s hymn “Sinners, Turn: Why Will You Die?”

Charles wrote hymns not just for singing but also for learning theology. He wrote them to be used as “daily devotionals.” That’s why his hymns have so many verses! So I want to commend this hymn to you to learn and sing.

Think deeply on the theology. This is God the host speaking, through creation and through his consistent, persistent good to all human beings. His question: Sinner, why do you insist on clinging to sin and death when you can see evidence of my hospitality all around you?

Sinners, turn: why will you die?
God, your Maker, asks you why.
God, who did your being give,
Gave Himself, that you might live;
He the fatal cause demands,
Asks the work of His own hands.
Why, you thankless creatures, why,
Will you cross His love, and die?
Sinners, turn: why will you die?
 
God, your Savior, asks you why.
God, who did your souls retrieve,
Died Himself, that you might live.
Will you let Him die in vain?
Crucify your Lord again?
Why, you ransomed sinners, why,
Will you slight His grace and die?
 
Sinners, turn: why will you die?
God, the Spirit, asks you why;
He, who all your lives hath strove,
Wooed you to embrace His love.
Will you not His grace receive?
Will you still refuse to live?
Why, you long sought sinners, why,
Will you grieve your God, and die?
 
Let the beasts their breath resign,
Strangers to the life divine;
Who their God can never know,
Let their spirit downward go.
You for higher ends were born,
You may all to God return,
Dwell with Him above the sky;
Why will you forever die?
 
You, on whom He favors showers,
You, possessed of nobler powers,
You, of reason’s powers possessed,
You, with will and memory blessed,
You, with finer sense endued,
Creatures capable of God;
Noblest of His creatures, why,
Why will you forever die?
 
You, whom He ordained to be
Transcripts of the Trinity,
You, whom He in life doth hold,
You for whom Himself was sold,
You, on whom He still doth wait,
Whom He would again create;
Made by Him, and purchased, why,
Why will you forever die?
 
You, who own His record true,
You, His chosen people, you,
You, who call the Savior Lord,
You, who read His written Word,
You, who see the Gospel light,
Claim a crown in Jesus’ right;
Why will you, ye Christians, why,
Will the house of Israel die?
 
Turn, He cries, ye sinners turn;
By His life your God hath sworn;
He would have you turn and live,
He would all the world receive;
He hath brought to all the race
Full salvation by His grace;
He hath not one soul passed by;
Why will you resolve to die?
 
Can ye doubt, if God is love,
If to all His mercies move?
Will ye not His Word receive?
Will ye not His oath believe?
See, the suffering God appears!
Jesus weeps! Believe His tears!
Mingled with His blood they cry,
Why will you resolve to die?
 
Dead, already dead within,
Spiritually dead in sin,
Dead to God while here you breathe,
Pant ye after second death?
Will you still in sin remain,
Greedy of eternal pain?
O you dying sinners, why,
Why will you forever die?
 
What could your Redeemer do
More than He hath done for you?
To procure your peace with God,
Could He more than shed His blood?
After all His waste of love,
All His drawings from above,
Why will you your Lord deny?
Why will you resolve to die?
 
Turn, He cries, ye sinners, turn;
By His life your God hath sworn,
He would have you turn and live,
He would all the world receive.
If your death were His delight,
Would he you to life invite?
Would he ask, obtest, and cry,
Why will you resolve to die?
 
Sinners, turn, while God is near:
Dare not think Him insincere:
Now, even now, your Savior stands,
All day long He spreads His hands,
Cries, you will not happy be!
No, you will not come to Me!
Me, who life to none deny:
Why will you resolve to die?
 
Can you doubt if God is love?
If to all His vowels move?
Will you not His Word receive?
Will you not His oath believe?
See! the suffering God appears!
Jesus weeps! Believe His tears!
Mingled with His blood, they cry,
Why will you resolve to die?
Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

The Central Story of the Bible: God’s Hospitality

Posted on March 2, 2012 by Pastor Foley

Part II of our series on Opening Your Home

It is no exaggeration to say that references to God’s hospitality saturate each page of Scripture. For example, we know that…

And the central story of the Bible? God extending hospitality to the most alienated people of all—the Israelites—and, through them, to the whole human race.  The Old Testament identifies the Israelites as alienated people who are dependent on God’s hospitality (Psalm 39:12; see also Heb 11:13). God graciously received the alienated Israelites and met their needs.  He redeemed them from Egypt and fed and clothed them in the wilderness (Exod 16; Deut 8:2-5).  He guided them as sojourners into His own land (Lev 25:23), where He offered them health, long life, peace, and fertility (Deut 11).

Note that on earth, God extends his hospitality to all people, regardless of whether they deserve it or not. As Jesus says in Matthew 5:45, God “causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous.”

We usually misunderstand this. We get confused when good things happen to bad people. We expect that God should send good things to the good and bad things to the bad.

But that is not God’s character. On earth—the “home” to which God has invited us—God is always a gracious host. He gives good things to all of his guests, even the ones that behave badly.

Because he is a generous host.

When Jesus talks about “reward,” it is for the life to come, not this life. Look up Matthew 5:12 and Luke 6:23. Where do they say we receive our reward?

We really need to understand this: this present life is not a life of rewards and punishments. Sure, there are consequences of sin in this lifetime, and the Bible even talks about God chastening those he loves. But we misunderstand God’s character when we look at what happens to people in this life and say, “God is rewarding them” or “God is punishing them.” In this life, what we receive is God’s gracious hospitality, regardless of whether we deserve it or not. That is the fundamental meaning of grace—God’s undeserved favor.

It is in the next life that God holds us accountable for the hospitality we are receiving from him presently, in this life.

So when people ask, “Why do the wicked prosper?” what is the answer? The wicked aren’t really “prospering;” instead, they are receiving—and abusing—the grace of God, for which they will be held accountable in the life to come.

God’s gracious hospitality is also the basis on which Paul says that all human beings are held accountable by God in the life to come—even those who have never heard of Christ in this life. Paul writes in Romans 1:18-23:

18 The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of people, who suppress the truth by their wickedness, 19 since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. 20 For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse. 21 For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. 22 Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools 23 and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like a mortal human being and birds and animals and reptiles.

In the language we are using this month, we could phrase Paul’s thought this way: God’s hospitality is evident to everyone. God has made it obvious to everyone that they are being hosted. It is obvious that they receive gifts and goodness that they do not deserve.

As a result, they have no excuse not to acknowledge their host.

However, many do not acknowledge God as host. Instead, they think of other things—nature, animals, fake gods, even other people—as their hosts or benefectors. Or they just credit their own abilities.

And as they worship these things, everything about their understanding of the world (and of themselves!) becomes foolish.

If thankfulness to God keeps our minds from futility, how futile (i.e., bereft of thanks) is your thinking today?

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , | 2 Comments