This is a Question sent in through the Ask Aaron Anything link:
Ive heard you say bad things about the so called magic jesus prayer. where Churches think once you say a little prayer everythings ok. but trully a majority of Christians came to Christ through these little “Magic Jesus Prayers”. We know that through belief in Christ we receive his spirit and if we have his spirit we will exibit the traits of the spirit. And then we are able to fulfill Gods will in our lives, and at our deaths enter the Kingdom of God. But the qualification of entrance into heaven is Faith alone, so a prayer of acceptance of Christ and faith may not be the end result, but i believe it should be the beginning point. And since we receive His spirit after our faith, then shouldent we disciple our people after they receive his spirit. The only thing im comfused about, i dont see many oppurtunities to receive Christ in our daily church rotine. It seems like were saying, ok you should believe in Christ, lets go disciple that into you. When really it should be, ok if you want to accept Christ heres an oppurtunity, now lets get you plugged into discipleship so that God can use you better in your life. My question is why dont we have times where people can except Christ as savior? either through prayers or praying with elders. We are not saved through disicpleship, that is the end result of our faith. But it seems like if someone comes to our church whos an unbeliever, they have to get plugged into a connection group and through discipleship he will come to salvation? So I just want to know what is the plan or whatever for people who come to our church to be saved, and why dont we have prayer times where that can happen?
My Response:
WOW! I know you put a couple question marks but I get the feeling this is not a question. I will take a shot at explaining what I can over a blog all though if you really want to discuss ecclesiology, the doctrine of repentance and faith in Jesus, and some principles of discipleship, then we may need to sit down and look at some scripture and some study-helps.
Ok let me tackle some of the points, questions, comments, or critisms that you have;
(1) What must we do to be saved? I will just inform you on what I know scripture says and why I believe that people may not be saved just because they say a prayer. First and foremost, Jesus is the one who paid the price for our sins and it is by grace that we are saved through faith not of ourselves; it is a gift of God. I do believe in the finished work of Jesus and that he is the only way to a restored relationship with our father. I believe that within the preaching of the Gospel the Holy Spirit does His work; regenerating us and imparting new spiritual life within us. Now with this knowledge, what does scripture say we need to do to receive this gift? Not once does it say repeat this prayer after a leader and you are saved. Basically the bible calls us to two things which are really the same; Repentance and Faith. Conversion means to turn. This is why it is important to understand that when God calls us to faith in Christ he is calling us turn from our sin or to repent and put our faith in Jesus as our savior and Lord. The problem with the doctrine of saying a prayer that automatically gets you into heaven is that most people believe when they say the prayer they are saved, but they never turn away from their sin or turn towards Jesus. We give people a false sense of security when say, “hey if you want to receive Jesus you can quickly say this prayer and you are going to heaven.”
(2) Church or ecclesiology – Church is not just a service on sunday morning. It is a group of redeemed people who are following Christ and living in community everyday. So your idea that we do not give people an opportunity in our daily church routine to say a prayer for them to receive Christ is completely based upon your perception. If by daily church routine you mean Sunday services then you are half way right because we do not make time on sunday mornings for a “magic Jesus prayer”, but we do invite people to talk to a leader or a elder just as I did on this previous sunday. In this last week alone we had 3 people who heard the gospel inside of relationships with people in the church body and decided to turn in repentance and put there faith in Christ. We also had another guy who heard the gospel and decided not to make the decision to follow Christ on the spot, but he heard it none the less. I just got done reading 11 testimonies of people who have given their lives to christ over this last year, all of which who have had a radical life change and have the fruit of salvation evident in their lives. I will let you know that watching someone being born again is amazing and is apart of LCC’s church culture. Unless you are involved in the house groups you probably are not in the birthing rooms so therefore you are missing the excitement. We do not use the pulpit most of the time to have people corporately repeat a prayer for salvation, instead we direct those in need of salvation to meet with a leader or Elder who will share the gospel with them and give them a opportunity to repent and put their faith in Jesus (We do have them say a prayer at that point).
(3) At one point you wrote, “we are not saved through discipleship it is the end result of our faith”. I disagree with you on that statement. It is our calling to be disciples and to make disciples. The end result of our Faith is not discipleship. Leaving the world behind in repentance and following Christ is the initial response of hearing the gospel. Turning from sin, putting our faith in Christ, and following Him is discipleship. I think one of the best definitions of faith is to follow. Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God. We hear God and act on what we hear and not by what we see, because faith without works is dead. So we do what he tells us to do, testing times arise, and within the times of the testing of our faith He matures us. We will always see the fulfillment of what God spoke. So simply when we put our faith in Him we are following Him, which is exactly what it means to be a disciple. The first call from Jesus to his disciples was “follow me”. They dropped everything (repentance) and followed Him (faith in Christ). The point that I am getting to is that discipleship is not the end result of faith, instead discipleship is the first response to our faith in Christ. I think Dietrich Bonhoeffer says it best, “Christianity without Discipleship is always Christianity without Christ.” Without Discipleship christianity does not exist.
Praise the Lord for discipleship. Ever since I’ve been coming to LCC I have seen so many people whose lives have been changed through discipleship. I talked to a few myself and they all said I’ve said a” Jesus prayer” but I can honestly say I didn’t live like I was saved. If we value salvation (belief in Christ) to a said “magic” or not “magic” prayer then has that person truly met the Savior. All through scripture people who truly encountered Christ(repented) their lives were never the same. My life was changed through repentance and then choosing to follow Christ as a disciple(discipleship). I believed in Christ but my life didn’t show it because of an unrepented heart. There was no discipleship in my life. I could keep sinning with no regard because I said a “magic prayer” and that should be good enough right? WRONG….NOW God’s Spirit is evident and able to allow me by His grace to do His will. Opportunities of salvation are present everyday, every moment. In fact two of my employees need salvation. I tell them exactly what it means to be saved and the new life they can have. But they haven’t accepted yet. Not because they lack faith but because of what they’ve seen from the church, a bunch of “saved people” who have said a “magic Jesus prayer” yet their lives have not changed nor reflect Jesus one bit. I believe the only way they will accept Christ and follow Him is when they see true saved people(repented) living like Jesus did(discipleship).
I wish I was more experienced in discipleship. The Lord always brought me up and i was always on my own in the faith. I still have not really been in discipleship, just starting, but i know that Gods spirit works, in any situation. Here i am a product of Gods calling, not of discipleship,(YET)but that is also why im not fully ready for ministry. Though I pray my life will be a great symbol of discipling others. And I pray that the men God has placed in my life will disciple me that i may learn from those who are wiser and older than me.
I’ve been to a grip of churches that have rolled out the, “If that’s you… no one’s looking… raise your hand and repeat this prayer..” and then they bust out the prayer. Nothing wrong with praying, or repeating.. however, after that, NO ONE connected with the people afterwards. They just left and went to Old Country Buffet for lunch.
I love what we’ve got going on at LCC because it’s biblical, it’s real, it WORKS! And I tell you, nothing I have ever seen, the first snow fall, flowers budding in the spring, a sunset or sunrise, a newborn baby, the most amazing piece of art, nothing is as glorious as watching someone turn their life to Christ and be discipled. It is so, so beautiful. I’ve seen the dirtiest hearts and lives be made clean and begin radiating pure love! I also was once a nasty little thing.. now completely restored. Not by a time when a couple in Mesa told me I could repeat after them in their living room, but the day I knew I was going to leave EVERYTHING behind and follow Christ.