NOT OUR METHODS, BUT HIS.

My thoughts have been around the thieves on the cross and the prodigal son.

Hopeless and dying, the thief on the cross found a path to save his soul. His words “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom”. There was no altar call, no recitation of the salvation prayer, and no “12 Steps to accepting Jesus into your life”.

The story of the Prodigal Son is a story of a man who did altar call for himself. His point of repentance was the struggles of life and the remembrance that his father could treat him better. It was not in a crusade setting or some powerful “weekend revival” program.

And yes, the Ethiopian Eunuch. His total Christian experience was defined by a few hours teaching by Stephen in a chariot. One moment he was reading Isaiah, and the next he was being baptized by Stephen. Christian history says that he probably shared his faith with Africans when he returned to Ethiopia. In essence, he received all he needed to be a “Pastor” in a single travel. His experience beats our arranged system of compulsorily going through 5 years to know God more. 

The way we have arranged and presented church, none of this is repentance and anyone who had such experience would hardly be accepted in our churches definition of accepting Jesus.

For me, accepting Jesus wasn’t a one moment hit that happened after some hot blowing sermon, it was a gradual process which began after I lost my mother. The “decision” day was a Saturday when I sat behind the hostel build and wept for the struggles and the future. Sadly, although I made the decision that day, I didn’t believe that I had been accepted by Jesus, I waited for Sunday before reciting the sinner’s prayer in the chapel. Accepting Jesus behind the hostel building was not the “ideal acceptance”, I had to do it in a church setting with an altar call. Anything other than that did not fit into my definition of accepting of Christ.

What this has done to me and to many Christians are that we do not consider the possibility that anyone could be saved except they follow these patterns that have been laid down by our churches, thereby making it almost impossible for us to consider the possibility that people can come to Christ without any of these.

These methods are not bad. That is not my point. My point is that we need to accept that Christ does not get into people’s lives ONLY BY THESE METHODS. We have hinged our Christian message on, “You must be born again”. In every crusade, service, evangelism or Christian outreach the phrase is harped on as though it is the key to the person’s heart. Surprisingly, Jesus used the phrase only once. His only sermon to Zaccheaus was visiting his house, and Zacchaeus became a totally transformed man; his only sermon to the woman caught in Adultery is “Where are your accusers? Go and sin no more”; his sermon to others was miracles and his sermon to some was the beatitudes. The central message of Jesus, salvation for mankind through repentance in His name, was never lost in all that He did and said yet he was not as monosyllabic as we were. Our monotone means of sharing the gospel has bored our listeners, especially in societies such as Nigeria. Almost everyone in major cities across Nigeria has heard the message that “You must be born again”, it is not new to those outside the faith at all and hence they will likely not pay attention to it anymore.

Jony @Unsplash.com

Our approach must be different. And we must open our minds to the possibility that only God knows how to reach the person’s heart, hence we can only what He says and not what we’ve seen done over the years. For some, it is the Nicodemus words, for others, it is the woman caught in Adultery words and for others, it is the prodigal son experience. Let us live considering the possibility that some men came to Christ in unpredictable ways- like Zaccheaus, or Joseph of Arimathea or Peter or Paul. Don’t limit God.

And by the way, are we not to small to say that this must be how God get into the lives of people?