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 Having
spent many years trying to bring men to Christ, and pondering
repeated failures, I have drawn a few conclusions from
experience. We may have trusted the story of the “cross” too
little, and our teaching ability too much. We have relied
heavily upon the assumption that if we could teach men what to
do, they would do it. There is something to do all right, but
there will be little doing (and none that is valid) until
the subject is made aware of a need, believes in a remedy, and
desires the result of doings Information may be adequate, but motivation
may be lacking.
Motive
is ‘that within the individual, rather than without, which
incites him to action.” Peter’s sermon on Pentecost made the
hearers aware of circumstances which produced self-judgment —
”we have killed the long-awaited Messiah. What shall we do?”
Under these conditions the answer can be brief and to the point.
There was no need for charts, diagrams, and argumentative
sermons on baptism.
This
is no indictment of defense and proclamation of doctrinal
details. Where such
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differences exist, and are the
determent to full obedience, they must be thrashed out. But in
many cases if we would expend greater efforts to convince men of
their true status before a righteously indignant God, we would
not have to press so fruitlessly the details of His will. A man
who realizes he is drowning does not argue about the color of
the life buoy thrown to him.
We
strive for men’s hearts: casting down man’s evil
reasonings, his pride, and bringing into captivity his thoughts
(2 Cor. 10:4-5) to the obedience of Christ. If we are more
interested in winning an argument than in saving a soul, we will
certainly fail in the latter, and probably in the former. We are
trying to win a man, not whip him.
To
change the attitude of others, so that they will be open and
receptive to the gospel of Christ, we may first have to revise our
attitude. We must somehow become one with the Lord Jesus, who loved
and sacrificed Himself for mankind; not because we
were lovely, but “while we were sinners.”
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