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Pastoral evangelism PDF

204 Pages·1962·3.361 MB·English
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Samuel Southard Pastoral BROADMAN PRESS Nashville, Tennessee © 1962 • BROADMAN PRESS Nashville, Tennessee All rights reserved International copyright secured Fifth Printing 422-177 Scripture quotations are from the Revised Standard Version of the Bible. Copyrighted 1946 and 1952 Library of Congress catalog card number: 62-15327 Printed in the United States of America 2.5MH69KSP Foreword Pastoral evangelism is the greatest need of this hour. Without pastoral evangelism, there will not be much of any other kind. Many of us who labor in the field of evangelism are happy to help introduce a book with a fresh approach, like the one written here by Samuel Southard. Many of the books today which deal at all with the psychologi cal approach to conversion leave out entirely the place of the Holy Spirit in the whole matter. To them, it is only a natural thing, but I am happy that Dr. Southard has shown the work of God in conversion. Every pastor who reads this book will find many helpful and profitable suggestions to assist him in his pastoral ministry. The author has labored tirelessly to present a mature and well-rounded conception of the challenging field of pastoral evangelism. He has called attention to the need of it and has offered timely suggestions as to how to perform it. This book should be of priceless value to those who take advantage of it. C. E. AUTREY Director, Department of Evangelism Baptist Home Mission Board Preface In pastors' conferences I have sometimes been asked: "What does pastoral counseling have to do with the salvation of souls? This book is an attempt to show how the spirit and methodology of one type of pastoral psychology may be used in personal inter views with individuals who have not made a commitment of faith in Christ. As I was beginning to gather material for this manuscript, an experienced pastor and professor told me: "I don't believe that many of our modern pastors have given much thought to the real meaning of conversion." This led me to a historical and theological study of evangelism and conversion. I found that creative evangelists like Whitefield, Edwards, and Finney, plus many pastors of individual congregations, built upon a founda tion of pastoral care and church fellowship. This I have called "personal evangelism." But unimaginative imitators in the twentieth century have intensified the promotional aspects of earlier revivalism and ignored the personal spirit of the work and message. The streamlined, compact product is "instant evangel* ism." In my attempts to demonstrate that pastoral evangelism was the practice of the patristic church and pioneer American con gregations, I am greatly indebted to the following authorities in evangelism, theology, church history, and pastoral care, who have read the manuscript, made corrections, and offered sug gestions: C. E. Autrey and C. Y. Dossey, Division of Evangelism, Southern Baptist Convention; Robert Ferm, Billy Graham Evangelistic Association; William McLoughlin, Brown Univer sity; Sabin Landry, W. Morgan Patterson, Dale Moody, W. W. Adams, William Hull, Raymond Brown, Henlee Barnette, Wayne vii viii PREFACE Oates, Swan Haworth, Southern Baptist Theological Seminary; Franklin Segler, Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary; Charles L. King, First Presbyterian Church, Houston, Texas; John Claypool, Crescent Hill Baptist Church, Louisville, Ken tucky; David Stitt, Austin Presbyterian Seminary, Austin, Texas. Also, I am indebted to Mrs. Mildred Moon, Tifton, Georgia, for her corrections of style and grammar. SAMUEL SOUTHARD Contents 1. Stillborn Men . . .. 1 2. The Characteristics of Conversion . 3. Instant Evangelism . . .. 24 4. Personal Salvation . . . .41 5. A Pastoral Theology of Evangelism . 6. The Evangelism of Children . 7. Pastoral Care of New Converts . 8. Pastoral Aspects of Revivalism . 9. Individual and Social Change . 10. The Training of Evangelists . Appendix . . . .186 Bibliography . . . .190 Index . . .. 197 1 Stillborn Men It is the fourth night of a revival in an open country, one-room Baptist church. Mary Bell and her family are there for the first time during the revival. She is sitting with other teen-age girls. Immediately after the benediction, the visiting preacher be gins to go down the line of girls, asking each one if she is saved. All answer yes except Mary. The preacher asks that the pastor of the church join him in witnessing to this girl. As the three of them talk in the sight of everyone, Mary begins to cry. The preacher asks her to sit down and says: "Are you a sinner and do you want to be saved?" "Yes," she answers. The preacher opens his Bible, reads Scripture passages on God's plan for man's salvation, and pauses. The book is placed so that she can see all the pages. "Do you understand these, Mary?" She nods. "Do you believe you are a sinner?" She nods. "Do you believe that God is ready and willing to save you?" "Yes." "Will you repent and ask the Lord to save you right now?" Mary puts her face in her hands and begins to cry again. The preacher continues: "Now, Mary, say after me, 'O Lord, be merciful to me, a sinner.' " Hesitatingly she does. "Now say, T am now trusting Jesus as my Saviour. Amen.' " Mary slowly re peats the words. The visiting preacher immediately rises from his knees and says, "Now, sister, you are saved because the Bible says that 'whosoever calleth upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.' " Mary wanders out of the church building. 1 2 PASTORAL EVANGELISM The pastor who stood by tells the rest of the story: "Mary Bell went home that night and neither she nor her parents (both members of the church) have been back since. "The next day after that service, I called at Mary's home. I related the experience of the previous night to Mrs. Bell because she had already gone out of the church house when Mary's ex perience took place. She seemed very satisfied and pleased that Mary had made a profession. She apparently had not talked to Mary about it very much, if any. "Mary then came in and I talked with her, explaining that the next step a Christian ought to take would be to be baptized and join a church. After a prayer I left. "Although I have visited them many times since then and every time they tell me they are going to get started back, they never have. They seem to be glad to see me and I can detect no resentment or bad feeling toward me or anyone at our church. Since this past Christmas the children occasionally have attended Sunday school at a church which is within walking distance of their home. "During my last visit to their home, which was about a month ago, Mrs. Bell and her sons were there. During the conversation she told me that Mary had told her that she just did not want to join our church. She said that she held nothing against us, but that she just did not want to join there. Not knowing how to proceed, I just nodded my head and said nothing more about it. "Of course you can see that I don't agree with, or like, the visiting preacher's witnessing technique. I personally think he has done more harm than good and has retarded my chances of ever working very effectively with this family. It may be though, that I am using him as an excuse for my own failure to make effective contact with Mary or her family." Did this girl ever have a real chance to become personally acquainted with and accept the forgiveness of Jesus Christ? Are Good Intentions Enough? In answering the question about Mary, one might say: "Oh, I'm sure that the visiting evangelist had the best of intentions!" STILLBORN MEN 3 This comment could be granted as true in many cases. Our dif ficulty is often not with our intentions but with our ignorance. We want to lead people like Mary to a saving knowledge of Jesus Christ, but how? Without a sympathetic knowledge of personal ity we may be frustrated on many occasions. Mary will be sub missive in the meeting, but when the social pressure is removed, she retreats from a public commitment to Christ. To win Mary, an evangelist needs more than good intentions. He must com bine an understanding of individual motivation with the rich re sources of Christian faith. No matter how much the evangelist wishes Mary to be saved, this will not come about because he desires it. The great chal lenge of witnessing is to relate the concrete experience of each man to the saving call of God in Christ. The power that quickens does not reside in the persuasive impulses of the evangelist, but in the Holy Spirit. We are the spiritual attendants (John 3:1-7; 2 Cor. 3:6; 1 Cor. 15:45; Rom. 8:26), the human assistants of God, in this great drama of rebirth. True faith in Christ is a gift. It is donated to the sons of God by adoption, through the Spirit of Christ. It is his Spirit that convicts of sin, leads to repentance, and gives new life. If the evangelist who witnessed to Mary was asked about this, he would surely say "amen." But his practice is not in keeping with his profession. In Mary's case, he ran ahead of the Spirit of God. The Word may have been sown through the sermon, but no one knows if it took root. Instead, men (two of them) trampled it under foot through their mishandling of this sensitive girl. How may we avoid such mistakes in the future? Stillborn Men Church surveys testify to the repeated failure of present-day evangelism. In a 1953 study of inactive and nonresident Baptists, C. E. Matthews concluded that "48.4 per cent of the entire mem bership of Southern Baptist churches is lost to the cause of Christ." 1 As secretary of evangelism for the Home Mission Board, his judgment is impressive: "The most justifiable criti cism that can be made of all that Southern Baptists are doing to- 1A Church Revival (Nashville: Broadman Press, 1955), p. 103. 4 PASTORAL EVANGELISM day is their failure to conserve the results of their evangelistic efforts." 2 The swift slogans and manipulative methods of popu lar evangelism still may satisfy our pride in sudden statistical success. But there is growing unrest among laymen and unsatis fied longings among pastors for more personal and permanent witnessing. One reason for uneasiness is the streamlined reception of converts into the church. A ten-second questioning by the pastor has replaced the month-long agonizing of Puritan New England and the congregational examinations of frontier Kentucky. How can church membership mean anything when a walk down the aisle of a church is the only visible requirement of conversion? J. L. Dagg, in an early Southern Baptist manual, stated the prob lem: "To receive any one on a mere profession of words, without any effort to ascertain whether he understands and feels what he professes, is unfaithfulness to his interests, and the interests of religion." 3 Another cause for unrest is the manipulative attitudes and techniques of some evangelists. The coercion of children is espe cially resented. As one pastor put it: "I'm not going to have another evangelist who empties every row in the Junior depart ment. I've had parents and Sunday school teachers on my neck for months about that. I don't blame them. The kids didn't know what hit them." Statistically, the age of conversion has been steadily dropping in the past two hundred years. Adults were the usual converts in colonial America. In the nineteenth century, adolescence seemed to be the storm and stress period of salvation. By 1959, pastors in western Kentucky could report that most of their converts were between the ages of six and twelve. Today, churches that nomi nally assent to believer's baptism only are receiving children at an earlier age than that which is acceptable for full member ship in churches that sprinkle infants. A third danger sign is the unfruitful living of those who are 2 Ibid., p. 102. 8 A Manual of Theology, Second Part, a Treatise on Church Order (Charles ton: Southern Baptist Publication Society, 1859), p. 269.

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