How Common Is It to Give an Altar Call without Preaching the Gospel?
It grieves me to say this, but it seems to me that the norm in Pentecostal and Charismatic churches is to give altar calls without explaining the Gospel. My question is this, how often does this happen in the Church of God denomination?
In many churches, Assemblies of God, Foursquare, etc. the pastor will give an altar call and have people repeat a prayer. I know some Pentecostals in the Southeast don’t do the ‘repeat after me’ prayer approach at an altar call. I saw it quite a bit in Gereja Bethel Indonesia, which is the Indonesian group within the COG.
It grieves me to see that so many professing Christians, preachers even, seem to think that someone is saved by repeating a prayer after the preacher, when he hasn’t even told the audience that Jesus died on the cross for their sins and rose again from the dead.
If you do not believe me, pay attention to sermons. Pay attention to whether the cross is explained. Has the preacher explained who God is, what sin is, who Jesus is, that Christ died for our sins, and that He rose again from the dead.
Believing that Jesus died on the cross is not enough. Caiaphas believed that.
Here is a brief summary of the Gospel.
I Corinthians 15
1 Moreover, brethren, I declare to you the gospel which I preached to you, which also you received and in which you stand, 2 by which also you are saved, if you hold fast that word which I preached to you—unless you believed in vain.
3 For I delivered to you first of all that which I also received: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, 4 and that He was buried, and that He rose again the third day according to the Scriptures, 5 and that He was seen by Cephas, then by the twelve.
(NKJV)
I don’t believe I’ve seen this in COG. I have on TV. Most attending in states know of the cross. Those that don’t would ask.
When were you in Indonesia
That’s Bible. But sometimes we may be in a service and God starts moving in a different way. We might singing in the choir and God really starts moving in a great way. And the alters fill up before we get down from the choir. The thing is God doesn’t always move in the same way. That’s why we need to pray for discernment to know when God is moving. You flow with the Spirit. And always pray for sinners that come to the alter while he is feeling drawn to come to the Lord. If you waited until he preached. He may not feel that drawing. And go home without repenting when he felt the drawing. Something could happen that he never gets saved. Sometimes the Lord might move on him and he says I feel like someone needs to move now. And most of the time might get saved before preaching. You just need to learn when the Holy Spirit is moving and move as The Holy Spirit Moves. But most of the time the preaches first then the alter call. But if it is God moving differently. By all means. Follow The Spirit. We let people pray on their own. Of course we pray with them until they feel the burden of sin is gone. If they don’t understand how to pray. Then we have them pray after us. But God is a big God. And Ge can move any way he wants to. Because He sees your need. And we follow God.
Link Hudson, do you think there maybe theological reasons?
I observed for more than a year Adrian Rogers and no one could do altar calls like him.
But once he had a Nazarene preacher fill in and without preaching a “gospel message” the isles were filled cause there was no room in the altar. He preached about the family. I never had seen an altar service that effectual.
As far as altar calls go, that’s a cultural thing, not a Biblical one. The Bible doesn’t mention altar calls. An altar in the Bible is a place of animal sacrifice rather than just a bench or set of stage-stairs to pray on.
If a church wants to shuffle unbelievers into a room or arrange prayer some other way other than altar call or have the whole congregation stand in a circle and pray, it’s okay.
I filled in for a missionary Baptist preacher once whose worship leader thought it was very important to have an altar. He kept referring to the box covered in carpet, patting it, talking about important the altar was. I kept thinking that wasn’t even a Biblical altar. I didn’t see any blood stains.