Two church services I recently attended concluded with the familiar “every head bowed and every eye closed” invitation. The pastor pled with those in the congregation who didn’t know Jesus to raise their hand and repeat a simple prayer in order to be saved. I felt something inside of me cringe at this point in each service, and it took me a while to put my finger on what exactly I found disturbing. It certainly wasn’t the fact that the pastor was inviting people to become followers of Christ…so why my hesitation?

After much pondering, I figured out what was troubling me. I see a danger in this routine. The danger is this: if we are only willing to admit that we need Christ when it is “safe” (a.k.a. when no one is looking) then what happens when it isn’t safe to be a follower of Christ? What happens when the whole world is watching?

I wonder if instead of creating a “safe” environment for people to silently acknowledge their need for Christ, we should encourage people to boldly and courageously step out in faith and declare that they will give their life to Him fully and unreservedly. After all, isn’t that what Christ demands of us? To confess Him before men? To boldly declare that He is Lord of our lives; that we have died and that He lives in us? Isn’t that cause for a wild celebration? So why do we quietly slip our hands up in a service and then silently walk out the door of the church with only the pastor knowing of our “decision”? Where in the Bible does it talk about keeping our faith private and concealed?
Matthew 5:14-16 says “You are the light of the world. A city that is set on a hill cannot be hidden. Nor do they light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a lampstand, and it gives light to all who are in the house. Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven.” I think we have to ask ourselves; are we teaching people to shine from a lampstand or to hide under a basket?

My second hesitation is this: if we tell people that all they have to do is pray a “simple prayer”, we make following Christ sound easy and simple – something to be checked off of a to-do list. We rarely communicate to people the gravity of the decision they are making. I mean, sure, we give them all sorts of information about hell and why they should want to avoid it, but how much information do we give in a sermon or an invitation about what it means for someone to give their life to the Lord? How many times do we declare from the pulpit that “this is the most difficult thing you will ever choose to do?” Oh but that would scare people off and prevent us from getting people to make decisions that we can write into our church reports! Why would we want to tell people that? Seriously?

This is the danger. We are sending the message to people that Christianity is as easy as praying a prayer and moving on without anyone else seeing their hand go up on a Sunday morning. Jesus called His disciples with a simple “follow Me” and they dropped what they were doing and went with Him. Wait, did you catch that? They dropped everything…their jobs, their families, their homes…they laid it all down to pursue the One who called them to follow Him and their lives never looked the same.

I wonder if our invitation scenario stems from a wrong focus. I fear that we as the church focus too much on getting “decisions” rather than making “disciples.” Jesus commanded “go and make disciples of all nations.” He didn’t say, “go get people to raise their hands in a service.” I’m not saying that a person’s heart won’t be changed because of a sermon brought from a pulpit. I’m not limiting God to say that He doesn’t change hearts in the course of a Sunday morning. Of course He does! What I am saying is that God is relational, and He created us as relational beings. He created us to pour into others and to be poured into by others. We are created for relationships and for community.

So, what if this was the scenario instead: what if the pastors, elders, mature families and couples in the church sat around the dining room tables and living room fireplaces of the people who sit beside them in the pews every Sunday and simply lived their lives as an example of what it means to follow Christ? What if instead of trying to win people over through rapid-firing scripture at them, we as the church simply lived the Word in our everyday lives? What if “decisions” to follow Christ flowed out of decisions made by believers to invest in, teach and disciple others? What if…?

I think that we are afraid of what that would actually look like. We are afraid to let people get so close to our personal lives that they will see the real us: the good and the bad. The parts of our lives that don’t line up with scripture. We know that it is far easier to preach at someone than to live a life of integrity before them.

Please don’t mishear me in all of this. Making a decision is important. In fact, making the decision to follow Christ is the most important decision a person will ever make! But if the environment in which we encourage people to make a decision is one in which no one else is looking, how are they going to learn to live their faith on a day to day basis? Will they shrink back in fear when they realize the world is watching? We should be preparing people for a relationshipwith Christ – not pressuring them to make a decision. Is the decision important? Absolutely. But let’s stop focusing on pushing people to make decisions and start to focus on making disciples.

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I realize that this blog asks a lot of “what if” questions. In this journey I find that I often have to wrestle the questions for a long time, and I always have more questions than answers. So…I want to hear your thoughts on this…what does it mean to “make disciples,” and how does that play out in your church? In your life?