Altar Calls? (Part 2)

Welcome to No Compromise Radio, a ministry coming to you from Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston. No Compromise Radio is a program dedicated to the ongoing proclamation of Jesus Christ, based on the theme in Galatians 2, verse 5, where the Apostle Paul said, "'But we did not yield in subjection to them "'for even an hour, so that the truth of the gospel "'would remain with you.'".

In short, if you like smooth, watered-down words to make you simply feel good, this show isn't for you. By purpose, we are first biblical, but we can also be controversial. Stay tuned for the next 25 minutes as we're called by the divine trumpet to summon the troops for the honor and glory of her King.

Here's our host, Pastor Mike Abendroth.

Why Altar Calls Are Not Biblical

Welcome back to No Compromise Radio ministry. This is Mike Abendroth, I'm your host. And basically what we're going to do today is follow up part two on altar calls. What does the Bible teach about altar calls?

If you're an evangelical and you've been saved one year, 10 years, 20 years, you've seen altar calls. And if like me, you sat there watching them and you're involved in them, even though you might be saved, you still get sweaty palms.

I feel like if I ever go to a church and they've got one, sometimes the preacher is so good with his words, with persuasion, with the way he speaks, I feel like I've got to go up and I think I'm a saved man.

I think I'm regenerate. I think I'm different than I used to be. I think I have a new mind and new heart and new affections and new longings. And I still feel like I want to go. So my question to you is when the pastor at the end of the service and at the end of the sermon calls you up and tries to encourage you to come forward, if you need to have your sins forgiven, or you need to make a decision for Jesus, you need to accept Jesus in your heart, is that biblical?

It's one of those things that in life it's so common, we just assume it's biblical. And you would say, well, I think we sing songs at the church service because they're biblical. It's biblical to do. God likes singing.

It's scriptural to have Bible reading. Jesus likes to have his word read. He likes preaching and he must like invitations. And so, as I said last time, I don't think these are biblical. I think there's nothing in the New Testament that talks about it.

And I'm wanting to give a bunch of reasons why I thought that altar calls should not be practiced. And so today we're coming up to number four. But just in review, why no altar calls? I'm gonna try to convince you why you shouldn't have altar calls.

And again, if you're at a church, they have altar calls. I don't want you to run up to the pastor and tell him he's a lying heretic dog. If he is a lying heretic dog, then you ought to say that. But if it's a real church, even if it's an Arminian church, even if it's a maturing church, you ought to be very careful in the way you approach your pastor.

Altar Calls Confuse Repentance, Faith, and New Birth

Number one, why you shouldn't do altar calls. There are no commands in the New Testament for you or your pastor to do them. It's not there. Burden of proof is on those who say, oh, this is why we do them.

If you say, well, we like people saved, then preach the gospel. Well, we think every sermon you need to invite people, then preach the gospel. Invite them to Christ. They don't need to go anywhere. Number two, altar calls confuse an outward act with an inward new birth.

I don't care what you say, coming up won't save you. It's still a confusing thing. So why try to confuse people? Just tell them to repent from sin and believe in Christ Jesus. That's Mark 115. I think I'll go with what the Bible says.

Salvation is a work of God, a work from God, not some kind of meritorious aisle walking or praying some prayer, every head bowed, every eye closed, no one looking around. I think I played that game when I was a kid in elementary school.

We just called that seven up, heads down, thumbs up. But that's another subject. People are not saved because they do anything. They're saved because God has done it all. If you're a Christian, you are a Christian because God has renewed your heart, enabling you to believe fully in Jesus Christ.

And we would believe what Denevon would say, quoted in Strong Systematic Theology, only the Holy Spirit can soften and pulverize the soil of the heart. B .B. Warfield said, sinful man stands in need, not of inducements or assistance to save himself, but precisely of saving, and Jesus Christ has come not to advise or urge or woo or help him to save himself, but to save him.

You ought not to do alter calls because they give superficial views of, number three, repentance, belief, sin, depravity, and conversion. Number four, why should you not do alter calls? Why does your church do alter calls?

Why do nine out of 10 churches do alter calls? Number four, don't do them because alter calls put the focus off of the divine commands and put the focus onto the commands of the preacher himself. In other words, if the divine commands are repent, believe, follow, forsake, abandon, turn, there's all kinds of Old Testament and New Testament commands for the unbeliever.

Why do we want to replace those with things like this? Come up to the front, come talk to me after the service, comply with what I say, raise your hand, look at me, every head bowed, look at me in the eye, sign the card, come to the front.

Why would I want to replace biblical commands with those? And you say, well, I give both. Well, I only want you to give one. I want you to give the biblical commands. Why would you do something less than that?

Why would you do something more than that? And I say less than that because when you give more, it turns it into less. When you give more, it actually subtracts from it. So why call people to do what I say when I'm the mouth person, the mouth spokesperson for God and God says, repent, believe.

I don't want to do these finny new measures somehow that I'm trying to get you to comply with what I want and if you do one little step for Christ, and maybe you'll really believe that's what I'm after, some kind of little step of the will.

I don't want to somehow make anyone think this is what I want you to do. This is God speaking through a fallible, sinful, although regenerate preacher. You don't need to come up anywhere. Actually, you need to sit in your seats and repent.

That's what you need to do. Don't get out of your seats. Don't stir an inch, as Spurgeon would say. Number five, why don't we do altar calls and why ought you not to do altar calls? Why don't you not do altar calls?

Altar Calls Give False Assurance

Number five, it gives people false assurance. It gives people false assurance. Oh, you might save coming to the front and raising your hand and meeting me, meeting your, having your eyes meet my eyes won't save you.

But can you blame the person for equating one with the other? Come to Christ, believe, repent, and then now at the end of the sermon, come to Jesus right now, come as you are, he'll receive you, walk up here.

Of course, it's confusing. Of course, they begin to equate these things. I don't want people having false assurance that somehow they temporarily believe the gospel and went out and then lived their life according to their own whims, wills, and desires, and then somehow say, yes, but I know I'm going to heaven and I have hell insurance because I went to the front.

Well, that's not true. Well, yes, it is true. The preacher said, come up here, you'll have eternal life. Come to Christ and then come here. You know, again, you can have people respond and come to the front and they're not saved at all.

External, emotional, and even temporary spiritual movement cannot, does not always imply internal conversion. You are confusing people to base their assurance on a one-time event, coming to the front, coming to the altar, coming to the anxious beat, anxious seat, anxious beat.

That sounds like the English beat. By the way, our intro music for NoCompromiseRadio .com is the English beat, Mirror in the Bathroom. I like that saxophone, so that's why you put it on there. English beat.

Back to the subject at hand. You can email me, by the way, at info at NoCompromiseRadio .com. And this is a very visceral issue. Some people say, well, I got saved because of an altar call. No, you didn't.

You got saved because somebody preached the gospel. And then sadly, they did the altar call too, but you didn't get saved because you went up. You got saved because the God of the universe opened your heart to receive the things that were true, like Lydia, and you responded to God's great salvation.

You got saved because God saved you. Your name's not Jesus. Only one name is Jesus, the Savior, Jesus of Nazareth, and Jesus saves. Don't confuse people to base their assurance on a one-time event. First John makes it clear.

Read chapter two, three, four, five. Are you believing in Jesus right now? And if you're not believing in Jesus right now, you're not a Christian. It's not, oh, I went on an altar call and I went up to the front.

No, we can't do that. This is some kind of modern revivalism that's still here. When will it die? I'd like to see it die out yesterday. I'd like to see it die out last week. Well, listen to what Gabney said about Phineas.

We have come to coolly accept the fact that 45 out of 50, or even in a higher ratio, will eventually apostatize. What's Gabney saying? We know most of the people that come forward at a Billy Graham crusade, they aren't gonna be real believers.

By the way, those that do come forward at Billy Graham crusade are, some of them are people who are planted. That is to say they are affiliated with our Work for Billy Graham organization, and they've been told when Billy gives the altar call, you all go up because you've got to kind of prime the pump a little bit.

I mean, how man-centered is that? How horrible is that? I remember Lloyd-Jones, Martin Lloyd-Jones, when Billy Graham wanted to come, I think in 1955, to England, and have Lloyd-Jones be the church in England that would help support the ministry of the American evangelist Billy Graham.

Lloyd-Jones said to Billy Graham, I will help you under two conditions. Condition number one, no altar calls. Just call people to Christ. You believe by hearing the word of Christ preached. Romans chapter 10, verse 17.

No altar calls. And number two, I don't want to have Roman Catholics sitting up on stage. Somehow you're affirming them as one of us, and people who are in the prayer rooms behind the scenes and the prayer counselors after you come up to the front are told that if you ask the person, do you go to church now?

Yes, I do. You have a home church. Yes, I do. Is that church the Roman Catholic church? Yes, it is. Then they tell you to go back to that church. And so Lloyd-Jones said, these are the two qualifications.

And sadly, Billy Graham said no, and so Lloyd-Jones did not help in the endeavor because he did not want to help give Roman Catholics false assurance. It's one thing to know you're going to hell. It's another horrible thing to think somehow you're going to heaven.

And then as John Bunyan says in Pilgrim's Progress, to recognize and to notice and to experience the porthole to hell that is right in front of the gates of heaven. And so we don't want to give people false assurance, and that's exactly what happens.

I'd rather preach the real gospel with a high view of God, like the wonderful man in New England, Asahel Nettleton, who died in 1844, and he did not use the invitation system. He just preached the gospel, and he did not have the 45 out of 50 fallout rate.

He didn't have the false conversions because if God really converts through real preaching, they're going to stick. You look back at Finney, and when he was older and he reflected on what he did, he knew many of his converts lived godless lives.

Well, more to say about Finney another time. That'd be a good show, but we could burn Finney books, by the way, too. But number six, why should you not do the altar calls? Number six, because altar calls delude Christians into inviting unbelievers to church instead of evangelizing them.

Altar Calls Replace Evangelism and Church Order

Altar calls make you think, if you're a Christian, I want my friends saved. How do people get saved? They get saved by going to the front of the church for the altar call, and so I want my friend saved.

I better invite my friend to church so that he could go up to the front to get saved. That's wrong. There's nothing in the Bible about inviting unbelievers to church. Oh, they're welcome, be nice, give them some cookies, give them a Bible, preach the gospel to them.

Of course, but the church is for the church. Worship is for believers. Unbelievers, note this, they don't worship. They blaspheme. They might worship something else, but even that is blasphemy. They don't worship, and so we don't invite unbelievers to church to get them saved.

Never, ever, ever, ever, ever invite an unbeliever to church until you've preached the gospel to them. Say, well, you know, I'm not very good at that. Well, good or not, maybe it'd be a nice time to begin to get better at it.

Good or not, that is your job, that is your responsibility, that is your duty, that is your privilege to preach the gospel to unbelievers. It's not the pastor's job. It's the pastor's job, according to the Bible, to feed the sheep on Sunday.

Say, well, I wanted the pastor to give an evangelistic message today, but he taught on giving instead, and my friend was offended. Well, friend, I want your friend to be offended that Christians would say we have all our money from God, the ability to make money is from God, and we like to give money to God as an act of worship.

I hope they are offended by that, but what I'm more offended by is for you thinking that you can bring your friends to church without you preaching the gospel to them. Of course, I want unbelievers in the local church service, especially around Christmas and Easter, and I might even change my message so I directly address the unbelievers at that time.

There is such a thing as an outreach, but day in and day out, Lord's day in and Lord's day out, the saints gather to be edified. And of course, we preach the gospel to the Christian saints as well, and if unbelievers are there and they hear it and repent and believe, we'll all be very, very joyful and happy like angels who are in heaven rejoicing when one sinner turns from the error of his or her ways.

But proper ecclesiology, proper church doctrine is that the church gathers to be edified, and then it scatters to evangelize. We don't gather to evangelize short of some kind of outreach concert or Christmas and Easter for the CEO Christians, Christians and Easter only.

We don't want to somehow give our people the false assurance that there's sacred space in the church, and there's not sacred space in the living room of your house where you preach the gospel to your friends and they could get on their face right there and believe on the Lord Jesus Christ.

I don't want you to think somehow that you've got to come to church to get saved. Number seven, why we don't do altar calls, why you ought not to do altar calls, why people for 1 ,800 years never did altar calls.

Baptism, the Lord's Supper, and the Public Confession of Faith

Number seven, altar calls replace the significance of baptism and the Lord's Supper. Some have called this the third sacrament, the altar call. The third sacrament, people walking down the aisles, coming forward is now just as important as baptism and Lord's Supper, our communion.

What do you think about these verses from Jesus in Matthew chapter 10? Therefore, whoever confesses me before men, him I will also confess before my Father who is in heaven. But whoever denies me before men, him I will also deny before my Father who is in heaven.

Those verses have nothing to do with the altar call, nothing to do with walking in front of a crowd, somehow getting converted. It is not a public declaration of faith, no. Baptism is the public confession of faith.

If walking the aisle is the public confession of faith, then what right do we have to say people should be baptized to proclaim their faith publicly to the church and if the world is looking to the world?

No, we don't want to do that. There are two sacraments, two ordinances, if you will, and only two and forever two. Roman Catholics think there are seven, Arminians think there are three, Lord's Supper, baptism, and the altar call.

That is not true, there are two. Baptism, when you get saved, you get baptized to show you have been saved by God, and then the Lord's Supper where the church often gets together and celebrate Christ's life and death and waiting for his soon return.

Preaching as the Pinnacle of Worship

Number eight, why don't we do altar calls? Why ought you not to do altar calls? Because altar calls distract people away from the pinnacle of the New Testament worship service. By the way, what is the pinnacle of the New Testament worship service?

Worship is giving, of course, worship is singing, worship is prayer, worship is Lord's Supper, worship is baptism, worship is Scripture reading, but the time that we see the pinnacle of the New Testament worship service is what most people have for the majority of the time because they understand this is the pinnacle, and that is preaching.

Oh yes, I think it's amazing that God would have a preacher preach, that is a sinful preacher preach his word, but we love and long to hear from God, to have God speak to us, the God who is not required to say anything to his sinful, rebellious creation, yet he says things, he speaks.

As Al Mohler says in his book, Words from the Fire, pagans, you can see them, pagan gods, but they don't speak. The God of the Bible, you can't see him, but he talks. That's an amazing thing. The pinnacle of the worship service is not the altar call.

I know there's a church around here, and for about 20 minutes there's preaching, in 20 minutes there's the extended altar call. That's sending the wrong message. The pinnacle of the New Testament worship service is God speaking through his word.

Why Faithful Preachers Reject Invitation Systems

Number nine, why shouldn't you do altar calls? Number nine, because this is maybe a more personal reason, but altar calls are not practiced by hardly anyone I respect. Well, maybe you have a friend who does it, a pastor, maybe you're a pastor and you respect yourself, I don't know, but I look back at preachers, MacArthur, Lloyd-Jones, Spurgeon, Sproul, Boyce, the list can go on and on and on.

You're gonna look at 1 ,800 years of church history where nobody has done it, and then a few hundred more years of church history, Whitefield and Wesley included, Edwards. Doesn't mean if you're Arminian you do them.

These days that pretty much does, but in the old days Wesley didn't do them. Would you think John Wesley was an evangelist? Whitefield didn't do them. Would you think he was an evangelist? How about the missionaries?

When missionaries went overseas, William Carey, Adenauer and Judson, did they go over, preach the gospel, and then give a call to the altar? No, they went over, preached the gospel, and called people to the Savior.

He is the one. He is the one. Preach the gospel, and then we just have to say to ourself, I wonder what God will do. And if you really think that the God of the Bible is showing himself powerful through preaching in his word, you would have to resort to those things.

Conversely, I think if you have to do altar calls to get people saved and to have a full ministry, you underestimate the power of God's word. I don't think you're convinced that God's word is really that powerful.

Christ did not send me to baptize, Paul said in 1 Corinthians 1 .17, but to preach the gospel. And the gospel was not, you come up here, come to Christ by coming up here, no. How will he believe without a preacher?

Answer is preach, so preach the word. Maybe there's some Arminians that I would end up respecting if I thought about it long enough, but off the top of my head, I can't think of anyone. Maybe my old pastor at Calvary Chapel, I still respect him, but I sure wish he wouldn't do that.

I sure wish he wouldn't have to do altar calls. Number 10, altar calls confuse the pastor with Jesus, the mediator. Come up here and talk to me, come to the prayer room, come up and talk to the anxious bench.

I'm no mediator. There's one God and one mediator also between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, who gave himself as a ransom for all, the testimony given at the proper time. You don't have to talk to me after the service to get saved, you don't have to talk with the elders.

No, you talk to Jesus, he's the only mediator. We argue with Roman Catholics because we don't believe there's some priest, there's no such thing as a priest short of Jesus Christ. He is the only priest, he is the only mediator.

You want to go to God, the Father, and you have to go through God, the Son. That's the issue. You say, well, I wanna go to inquiry room. Spurgeon said, I dare say you would, but we are not willing to pander to popular superstition.

We fear that in those rooms, men are warmed into fictitious confidence. Very few of the supposed converts of inquiry rooms turn out well. Go to your God at once, even now where you are. If I could add to Spurgeon, you don't need a mediator except Jesus.

Cast yourself on Christ now at once, ere you stir an inch. Lots of times Spurgeon would say something like this. Here's an exact quote. God has not appointed salvation by inquiry rooms. For the most part, a wounded conscience, like a wounded stag, delights to be alone that he may bleed in secret.

So we wanna tell people to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. If you think of invitation as inviting people to repent and believe the gospel and summarizing the gospel so they might believe, I'm with you.

But if you think an invitation is, now you come up here and do X, Y, and Z, I think you're causing confusion at best. Invite people to Christ? Of course. Exhort, command, plead, beg, persuade. But you don't have to say, here's man's invitation system.

Say, well, yeah, but lots of people get saved that way. No, they don't. First of all, pragmatism doesn't validate truth. Say, well, I got saved that way. No, God saves by Christ through faith alone. How can anyone be saved if you don't do an altar call?

I think you should probably ask John Knox and Roland Hill and many others. You gotta strike when the iron's hot. If God makes it hot, Spurgeon said, it'll stay hot. You don't need to do altar calls. Your pastor doesn't need to do altar calls.

Pray that he would preach Christ and Christ alone and Christ risen and Christ resurrected. You don't need altar calls because the Bible doesn't need altar calls.

God alone saves. No Compromise Radio with Pastor Mike Abendroth is a production of Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston. Bethlehem Bible Church is a Bible teaching church firmly committed to unleashing the life transforming power of God's word through verse by verse exposition of the sacred text.

Please come and join us. Our service times are Sunday morning at 1015 and in the evening at six. We're right on route 110 in West Boylston. You can check us out online at bbchurch .org or by phone at 508 -835 -3400.

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