Preach Magazine Issue 5 - Preaching to the unconverted | Page 33
FEATURE
33
THE DECISION BEFORE
THE DECISION
THE PREACHER PREPARING
THE PEOPLE
PREACHING FOR OTHER
DECISIONS
The mechanics of inviting people
to make a decision are not nearly
as important as the decision of
the preacher to dare to call people
in the first place. This requires
courage. It begins in the presence
of God with the preacher’s call
from God. Isaiah was called, and
said, ‘Here I am, send me’. He was
then told that people would be ever
hearing but not understanding: it
was to be a costly call. Jeremiah
was to have a forehead harder
than flint. He was told: ‘Fear them
not, nor be dismayed at their
looks’. This is good advice to the
one who preaches for a decision
as the congregation’s ‘look’ may
indeed dismay her or him at times.
I remember having the privilege of
being in a small seminar once with
Billy Graham in which he explained
that the few minutes of ‘invitation’
was ten times more draining in
terms of emotional and spiritual
cost than all the previous thirty
minutes of preaching, and it left
him completely depleted.
It helps to let people listening know
at the start of the talk that you will
be calling for a decision, and how
that will be presented. If they will be
asked to come forward or to raise a
hand or to pray a prayer or to meet
a ministry team member, it will help
people to know at some point early in
the message that that is where you
are headed. Then do what you have
said you will do and see what happens.
There is no escaping the preacher’s
need to lean on God and to expect
God to be at work. It is said that a
preacher once asked CH Spurgeon for
help because not many people were
coming to Christ in his preaching.
Spurgeon asked: ‘But you don’t expect
people to come to Christ every time
you preach, do you?’ ‘Well, I guess no’,
came the reply. ‘There you are then’,
said Spurgeon ‘that is exactly the
reason you see little fruit: you have
little expectation’.
Surrender is needed when it comes to
preaching and calling people forward
for other radical decisions. The Bible
is a record of the choice to follow God
being followed by several decisions
to stick at it despite difficulty. We can
think of God’s word to Abraham: he
was called to move his whole family
and leave his comfort zone and follow
God’s call. Later, he is called to move
his flocks to the oaks of Mamre;
he is called to ‘consider the stars’
and then ‘believe God’ concerning
his descendants. Sometimes these
decisions were excruciatingly difficult,
such as when he was called to decide
to be willing to sacrifice his only son.
To invite people to make a decision
we need to know that we have the
word of the Lord. We need to have
heard him and be a man or woman
with a message that is burning
in our hearts. We need the love of
God to be constraining us. We need
compassion for people and the
conviction that to take a decision
will really help them. Rather like
exhorting someone to go to the
doctor for treatment of a terminal
disease, we need compassion and
conviction. Rather like a fireman
calling people to leave a house
that may burn down we need
authority. Rather like a platoon
leader asking people to enlist and
make a decision to join up, we need
to be practical and explain what is
involved.
Preaching for a decision involves
the preacher’s surrender: his or her
life of prayer and life with God is
exposed as the decision is called for.
EM Bounds describes the reason for
much fruitless preaching: ‘The great
hindrance is the preacher himself.
There may be no discount on their
orthodoxy, honesty, cleanness, or
earnestness; but somehow the man,
the inner man, in the secret places has
never broken down and surrendered
to God, his inner life