Are Altar Calls Biblical?
Are altar calls biblical? If they aren’t, then why are so many evangelical churches doing them? The altar is mentioned often in the Scriptures, but there’s no mention of an altar call. Then again, we’re not told that the 3,000 who were saved on the day of Pentecost came forward to some sort of ‘altar’ or place of prayer. The problem I have with modern-day altar calls isn’t so much the call to come forward as with all the trimmings that come with it – music to stir the emotions, counselors coming forward to encourage a response (and to stop the preacher from looking stupid if there’s no response). Add to that the fact that many altar calls aren’t calling people to repentance, but to a happier life-style, and it’s easy to see the damage that is being done to the cause of the gospel.
Preach sin and Christ to sinners not altar calls. As Spurgeon says,
No sinner looks to the Saviour with a dry eye or a hard heart. Aim, therefore, at heart-breaking, at bringing home condemnation to the conscience and weaning the mind from sin. Be not content till the whole mind is deeply and vitally changed in reference to sin. (The Soul Winner)
For more on this subject, see the Trust’s booklet The Invitation System by Iain Murray.
Latest Articles
The Death-Bed of John Knox: A Poem, by Anne Ross Cousin February 18, 2025
Anne Ross Cousin is best known as the authoress of the hymn, The sands of time are sinking. Its nineteen verses (in its original form) are based on the death-bed sayings of a remarkable seventeenth century Scottish preacher, Samuel Rutherford. What is not so well known is that Anne Ross Cousin put into verse some […]
First Things First January 6, 2025
The following article from the pen of A. W. Pink appeared in the January 1978 issue of the Banner of Truth Magazine, no. 172. It was the New Year message from Studies in the Scriptures, January 1939. The dawning of a new year is a fresh call unto each of us to put first things […]