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Linda Twaddell's avatar

I will be honest that I never prayed the sinner's prayer either, as David mentioned. I did pray though, on a late October night in my bedroom when I was but 5 years old. I remember it like it was yesterday. I never heard the "sinners' prayer" but heard in Sunday School to ask Jesus into my heart. Why did it come out so different then? I asked for Jesus to accept me, not the other way around. And yes, I felt it, I knew it, at that very tender age. I ran out to my mom who was doing the dishes and told her as tears streamed down my face. I knew I was accepted! My request granted! We danced past bedtime to Southern Gospel songs together. What a wonderful memory!

I grew up in the Church and began to wonder why love was missing all around me and if that sinner's prayer that read like a recipe was real, genuine, or even accurate. Maybe you have heard it, the A,B,C's of salvation - that is the recipe I am referring to. Accept, Believe, Confess - what about love? Anyone? It is the greatest after all.

And as I was involved with Child Evangelism Fellowship it seemed like those words made the head count worthy of the list called "salvations". It seems more like a game of tag where if you say these words, that fire insurance is yours and off we go to the next word speaker. Don't forget the dunk in the tank to get it all signed off and official! It is crazy, I know and maybe sound very skeptical but add "once saved always saved" you get a mix for zero follow up. No discipleship is done - no need - you are in - and if you doubt, you never had faith to begin with. All of this called me out of those theological messes to passages like this, Isaiah 53 - where the prayer patterns Jesus given when he told us to "pray like this". It is no wonder that the "OSAS" word speakers believe the seat in the pew, reserved by the "member only privilege" gains them entry into heaven. The wolves assume your seat says it all. You wouldn't be there if you weren't saved, right?

But why do those sitting in pews THINK they have it and even study it all but know nothing? (Let's not forget what they learn on Easter Sunday!) Remember that script - and the work that goes into convincing them it is FACT - no - matter - what. What does this mean? Do Pastors think that a flock that really isn't saved reflects on them and makes them a failure? Ezekiel 34 and John 10 says just that.

I sat with a lady after her husband died, and she told me how he was at peace in heaven. Yet she has no assurance, especially after sharing what a terrible husband and father he was. She is actually relieved he is dead - to which I kind of go, "already then." Her assurance is based on how the OSAS words did it - off to heaven we go without a day lived like it.

It isn't enough when it makes no impact - the greatest LOVE of all that makes you say "HE DID THIS!"

We need this message you have written here in the hands of everyone giving the message of salvation. It is easy to TELL Jesus how we accept all he has but a different story when we have to have the conversation regarding that cost.

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David Bergsland's avatar

This is the entry prayer done much better than normal, using Isaiah 53. I've never prayed a sinner's prayer. But the Lord will use whatever access He's given.

I was bouncing from one occult practice to the next. Then I knew I had to check out the Jesus thing and the Bible. I have no idea how that happened, and I had no real idea what it was. But as an Anglo Catholic, my father who had become a perpetual deacon in his late forties, brought me along to his daily evening Bible study. He went to seven a week. This one happened to be Roman Catholic. But they were all Charismatics.

They did the catholic thing and asked me to renounce the world, the flesh, and the devil. Which I did out of obedience. I knew when you got into a new spiritual practice you needed to follow the rules. So, I did. They had me ask Jesus to be my Lord, and then they all laid hands on me to be baptized with the Holy Spirit. They told me I had done my part and that Jesus would do the rest. I was stoned out of my mind. But, it worked.

My Dad started me out with meat. Plus, I had a voracious need to read scripture. I didn't learn the milk for a while, and then just in passing as part of what we were studying. But I was born again, filled with the Spirit, and completely transformed within six months. Alleluia.

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