Whenever I go to a Protestant church, the part of the service I like least is the altar call. It seems that at the end of every service it is a requirement to have an altar call. Why? Because standard Christian belief is that one must believe in Jesus and his death for our sins to be saved. Therefore, convincing people to believe and make a public statement of that belief is the top priority for a church.
But if, as this blog maintains, salvation is the renovation of our soul so it becomes like God then a change in people’s lives should be the church’s first priority, not altar calls. What would a church be like whose primary mission was to move people to become more God-like? An example is Rosaria Butterfield’s conversion to Christianity that we discussed in the last blog. Her conversion was not the result of attending a church; it was not because someone recited the Four Spiritual Laws to her. Her conversion was because someone lived Christian principles. After she wrote an opinion article, she received “the kindest letter of opposition I have ever read” from a pastor. The pastor and his family started a relationship with her, not with the idea of converting her. She said: “This was not friendship evangelism but friendship”. [1]
There is a place for altar calls in church just as there is a place for the rite of baptism. Both are a public expression of a commitment to follow the teaching of Jesus. When we place these rites above the task of becoming more like God, then there is something wrong with our belief system.
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[1] Bill Sherman, “TU community gracious to ex-lesbian speaker”, Tulsa World, November 21, 2015, p. A11.
