Quick Prayerism

I read this article from Brother Cloud this morning and thought that I would post it on my blog.  I believe way to many churches and christians have gone this route and have damned many souls.  This verse comes to my mind when I think of this quick prayerism movement:

Matthew 23:15 Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye compass sea and land to make one proselyte, and when he is made, ye make him twofold more the child of hell than yourselves.

BEWARE OF QUICK PRAYERISM (Friday Church News Notes, October 28, 2011, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - Quick Prayerism is an evangelistic methodology that is quick to get people to pray a sinner’s prayer after a shallow gospel presentation which typically does not include any hint of the necessity of repentance. It is quick to pronounce the people saved and give them “assurance” and to try to baptize them even if they barely show an interest in the presentation and even if they give no biblical evidence of having been born again. Frequently, Quick Prayerism incorporates psychological salesmanship manipulation. In Quick Prayerism, an empty “sinner’s prayer” has too often replaced Holy Spirit conviction and miraculous regeneration. Quick Prayerism is characterized by soul winning reports that are grossly exaggerated, since the number of real conversions are minute compared to the overall statistics. We call it “prayerism” because it focuses on a prayer. We call it “quick prayerism” because it specializes in quick presentations and quick decisions and an overall shallowness of spiritual and biblical depth. An example of this was communicated to me some time back by a friend who had the following experience at a prominent independent Baptist church which operates a large Bible college. The soul winner in question is a veteran Independent Baptist missionary to Japan, a man with considerable influence in the Independent Baptist movement. “We went out with their staff on Saturday morning for soul winning. We were immediately partnered up with some of the veterans. The first door we went to, we spoke to a friendly Catholic guy and to my surprise, the guy got ‘saved’ before my very eyes as ------- took him from a few scripture passages to the sinner’s prayer so smoothly that I was caught off guard. I caught myself and while ------- was recording this man’s contact details and writing it down, I asked the man whether (1) he believed that he was a good person and (2) that it is possible to go to Heaven by being a good person. This man who had just got ‘saved’ told me ‘YES.’ I looked around and the other two men beside me said nothing and did nothing. We went to a few more places and eventually reached a home with a Roman Catholic young lady who came to the door. She said she was a professing Christian. Even though she said that all churches were the same ------- gave her assurance of salvation by quoting 1 John 5:13.” The churches that have adopted this unscriptural method of evangelism have produced millions of false professions throughout the world and have given a false hope to this multitude. There are many churches that can show only a handful of new creatures in Christ for every hundred converts they claim. Repentance and soul winning methodology are not minor issues that can be treated as “non-essentials.” Quick Prayerism is death in the pot for any church that practices it.