We begin with one word: debacle. To be precise, we begin with a complete collapse or failure that, to state the sad fact, few seem to recognize. The collapse occurred in the aftermath of a well-known Easter (better yet, Resurrection Sunday) play.
The play is a marathon rivaling "Gone With the Wind" in running time--around 3 and a half hours. (I've never seen GWTW because I've always fallen asleep somewhere in its progression.) The play features a great deal of music which consumes some of those 3.5 hours. It's just too long for my tastes. But, that's just me, one of my quirks that pronounces some movies, plays, or books as too long. As I've heard, if one were to read "Moby Dick," to complete the book would take the average reader almost 8 hours and he would have to swim through many, many pages before the great white whale first shows up.
The play is all about the words and works of Christ, climaxing with the death and resurrection. Then after the play came the pastoral exhortation to the audience to "Stay in your seats, stop moving around, and listen to me for the next few minutes." It was then that the Easter debacle ("failure" and "collapse") began with what's called, "The invitation."
He kept telling the congregation to stop and sit down. He said, "If you keep moving around, some people may go to hell." (No one will be able to use the excuse, "You can't send me to hell because people were moving around." They will be, in the words of Paul in Romans, "Without excuse."
The collapse was immediate as the speaker began ti address the unsaved who had just seen the play, "If you're here tonight and you haven't submitted your life to Jesus Christ and you want to begin that journey tonight, could there be a better time? It's time to give your life to Jesus Christ. We want you to give your life to Jesus Christ. He continued.
"Friend, if you want to make it right with God, I want you to pray this prayer and really mean it with all your heart. Let me be clear; this prayer doesn't save you. Your faith in Jesus saves you.
"So when you pray this prayer and you really mean it with all your heart, and you're ready to submit your life to your Lord Jesus Christ, I want you to pray this prayer and meant it with all your heart: 'Lord Jesus, I'm a sinner and Lord Jesus, I'm sorry for my sins, I'm so sorry for my sins, I'm asking you to forgive me of my sins. I know you died for me; I know that I'm a sinner. Lord Jesus, save me,would you save my soul and forgive my sins, Lord Jesus, help me, help me to live for you, Lord Jesus, save me' "
After that, he asked those who had done that to raise their hands with every head bowed and every eye closed.
The difficulties abound. The pastor began with, "If you're here tonight and you haven't submitted your life to Christ .. ." What goes unnoticed by the assembled is that "submit" isn't a requirement for eternal life in a verse they all know, John 3:16: "For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whosoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life." Where is "submit?"
Without their realizing the pastor as added four words to the verse so that it reads, ". . . . whosoever believes in Him and submits to Him has everlasting life."
The Easter debacle continued with the pastor's requirement that to be saved, a person must be "sorry for my sins, so sorry for my sins. This idea is there because he thinks the word "repent" means "feel sorry for" but it means "to change one's mind." When a person does believe as John 3:16 says, he has "changed his mind."
The failure didn't stop there. Next, the pastor tells the person to ask Jesus for forgiveness so he can be saved. "Believing" is in John 3:16, "asking" is not. Asking comes across as pleading or begging.
There are many things this congregation hasn't noticed, and a major one was right there in front of them when we rewind the tape and go back to what the pastor said two minutes earlier: "This prayer doesn't save you. Faith in Christ saves you." That IS in John 3:16, only a better way to biblically say it is that we're saved THROUGH faith. In reality, Christ saves us through faith. But my point isn't that; my point is that he's just said, "faith saves you." But then he contradicts that statement by saying, "Submission" saves you. Asking Jesus to forgive you sins saves you. Then giving your life to Jesus saves you."
Where are all those words, "give your life to Christ," "I'm sorry for my sins, really sorry," "submit," "ask Jesus to save you," and "help me to live for you," in I Corinthians 15:3-4? John 3:16? And Acts 16:32:3?
Those words are not there.
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