Stand Aside For God’s Work

A few weeks ago, our pastor spoke about “blessed assurance,” and we sang the beloved Fanny Crosby hymn of the same title.

Afterward, I began to think of a couple I visited as the Bonner Community Hospice spiritual adviser.

The husband was in the last stages of dying, and two friends came by to visit his wife. A short time into the visit, they began to ask the very tired wife things like “Are you a Christian?” “Do you and your husband know Jesus as your personal Savior and Lord?” Fighting back her tears, the woman also swallowed her anger long enough to quickly answer their intrusive questions.

Having completed their mission, the “friendly visitors” abruptly departed, though not before they left a small salvation tract with her.

As she told this story to me, I was angered by the arrogance and presumption of these so-called friends. It’s like they had memorized the “Manual for Theological Intrusion on the Spiritually Vulnerable,” written by Eliphaz, Bildad and Zophar, Job’s “who-needs-enemies” friends.

For the record, the couple’s pastor was also offended at this insensitive aggression by people so determined to push their religion in such a way that God’s grace is stomped on. It’s very fortunate that God’s grace is infinitely more resilient and forgiving than we are.

This wasn’t the first time I had heard of such an encounter between salvation pushers and vulnerable people. My reaction has been consistent when each person’s story has been told: anger and pity.

I get angry because people who are on a salvation mission of this kind seem to forget that every person’s spirituality is a very intimate experience.

And because spirituality is intimate, there’s a kind of spiritual abuse when someone unexpectedly confronts a physically and emotionally worn-down, vulnerable person with questions of eternal salvation.

To put it bluntly, it’s none of these people’s business whether this lady is a Christian unless she chooses to share that information with them!

I can get very angry at this kind of spiritual intrusiveness and manipulation! God doesn’t act like this. Why should God’s followers?

Could it be they don’t really trust God’s ways to be radically hospitable?

But I also pity these visitors and others like them. They have a wonderful message that is often twisted by their misguided passion to share it.

Do they really believe that since they’re satisfied, God must be satisfied, too? Is God truly satisfied with treating the spiritually vulnerable like this? I don’t think so!

They presume to do something that is well beyond their capability. They presume to do God’s work!

It sounds a little backward to me. I thought God did whatever actual saving was necessary.

Besides, if God is into a numbers game, my guess is she’s more concerned with the number of people we have loved, not “saved.”

A corollary principle of this method seems to be this: If salvation pushers don’t get someone to profess a belief in Christ, God will condemn the person to hell. And that would be a blemish on their conscience, if not eternal record. Baloney!

If their God is so dependent on their salvation work, I’ll go shopping for another God, thank you! In fact, I know the God of Jesus is more willing than I am to offer the warm and eager arms of the forgiving father as he welcomes his prodigal child home.

No strings attached, no lectures. Just joy and love and a radical hospitality that both receives me and challenges me to be as divinely human as God made me in the first place!

Did the prodigal son have anyone come to his pigpen and play with his mind? It doesn’t look that way.

“He came to himself,” presumably by himself. (Of course, God was working with him even if the young man didn’t realize it.)

A hard-pressure sale doesn’t ensure salvation. All it may ensure is a “yes” answer just to get rid of the hard-pressure seller.

Remember the thief on the cross? Jesus loved people into the arms of God. He didn’t use fear to drive them there.

So why do some who claim Jesus as Lord and Savior decide their tactics are more effective than those of Jesus? Perhaps they’re more afraid of the God Jesus called Father than he was. Perhaps they know another god.

If so, I would suggest it’s a much lesser god.

Maybe we could gently introduce them to Jesus’ God when they show up next time! His God really does offer assurance that is blessed.

xxxx

The following fields overflowed: CREDIT = Paul Graves The Spokesman-Review