Thursday, November 7, 2019

Peter Masters (Reformed) on the Dangers of the "Invitational Model" of Evangelism


It is common for Evangelical Protestant preachers to invite people to “accept Jesus” at the end of an evangelistic service (the “altar call”). Peter Masters, a Reformed preacher, listed the following problems with this technique:

1.     The invitational is not in the Bible
2.     The invitational seems to give the seeker ‘executive power’ for salvation
3.     The invitational never tests or questions a person’s approach
4.     The invitational gives false assurance
5.     The invitational imposes a physical act on a spiritual transaction
6.     The appeal system was originally devised to suit extreme free-will theology
7.     The invitational takes no account of how easily false decisions may be taken
8.     The invitational suggests a lack of faith in God’s power
9.     The invitational produces thousands of cynical ‘ex-Christians’

Here are his comments for nos. 1 and 8:

1. The invitational is not in the Bible

The most significant caution is the fact that the invitational is a human technique. Nowhere in the Bible does the Lord command His servants to do anything even remotely like it. The Lord Jesus, our perfect example, never called for ‘decisions’ or public professions of the kind seen today, attaching a physical act to a spiritual matter, and nor did the apostles operate such a system. For that matter, neither did any other known messenger of the cross throughout the history of the Christian church, until the nineteenth century. Efforts to trace the invitation system earlier than this have been wholly unsuccessful. Calling for decisions was completely unknown to such preaching and revival worthies as the Wycliffites, the Reformers, the Puritans, the Wesleys, and Whitefield. After it had arrived on the scene, notables such as C.H. Spurgeon resolutely opposed it.

Bible texts which are used in support of the appeal technique really have nothing to do with walking on the front of a public meeting. Verses such as ‘Whosoever therefore shall confess me before men, him will I confess also before my Father which is in heaven,’ quite clearly refer to a believer’s witness for Christ in daily life, not to a public act at the end of an evangelistic sermon. Anyone who looks objectively at the range of texts traditionally used to justify ‘appeals’ must agree that these texts are pressed out of their reasonable, plain-sense meaning. Many ardent advocates of the system candidly admit that it is not to be found in the New Testament, and this is a sobering thought. However, biblical methodology is vital, especially in a matter as critical as spiritual midwifery . . .

8. The invitational suggests a lack of faith in God’s power

Why should preachers be so anxious to ‘clinch the deal’ by bringing people to decisions and public professions before they leave a service? Why must they insist on knowing ‘right now’ what the spiritual result of their preaching has been? In the case of some evangelist it is because they have a ‘commercial’ need for success-statistics in order to promote their work. But why should better-motivated preachers be so anxious to see conversions on the spot?

Could it be that there is within us a residual urge to trust only what can be visibly seen? Do we not have faith to believe that the Holy Spirit can continue His work in the heart of a sinner after he has left an evangelistic service? Many preachers say that they must strike while the iron is hot, but this suggests that conversion is entirely a human work, not involving the Spirit of God.

Take the case of two believers who had been taking an unsaved friend to their church, where there was an excellent and persuasive gospel ministry. After a time they grew concerned that their friend, though much affected, had made no clear response. There happened to be a church in their town where the preacher made appeals, and they thought that the invitation would bring their friend to a ‘crisis’. There lurks in the heart of many a tendency to think that there is something we can do to expedite the conversion of a soul. Some simply cannot leave it to the Holy Spirit.

Once the gospel has been faithfully and persuasively presented, and sinners have been urged to repent and believe, the Holy Spirit must be trusted to continue His own work in the hearts of hearers, and we should not trespass into His sovereign territory. We should not do what the invitational attempts to do, and take over the sinner’s response. Bunyan’s Evangelist cried, ‘See that shining light?’ But the invitation system picks the seeker up and carries him bodily through the wicket gate, and so often into a spurious experience of salvation. (Peter Masters, Physicians of Souls: The Gospel Ministry [London: The Wakemen Trust, 2002], 232, 238-39)

While common, the “invitational model” is fraught with problems, including compromising the Protestant doctrine of Sola Scriptura.

Of course, one disagrees with Masters’ theology (Calvinism). On this, see, for e.g.: