The Sinner's Prayer

Is the sinner's prayer found in Scripture?

Millions have been told to pray a short prayer to receive Christ; the question is whether the Scriptures teach it, and where it came from.

A prayer of repentance and faith

Salvation is by grace through faith, and faith calls on the Lord: whoever calls on the name of the Lord will be saved. The sinner's prayer simply puts repentance and faith into words — a cry for mercy like the publican's, opening the door to Christ who knocks. Baptism follows as the first obedience of someone already forgiven.

Faith, repentance and baptism

When people in the New Testament asked what to do to be saved, they were told to believe, repent and be baptized for the remission of sins; calling on the Lord's name is joined to baptism, not put in its place. No convert in Acts is led in a set prayer. The prayer is a later practice that has taken the place Scripture gives to baptism.

An expression of faith, not a requirement

What saves is the repentance and faith God works in the heart, not any words or moment. A prayer can honestly voice that faith, and many have prayed one sincerely, but Scripture never prescribes it, and assurance should rest on Christ and a changed life rather than on having prayed a prayer.

When converts in Acts asked what to do, what were they told?

Where forgiveness is promised to repentance or to faith, what follows?

What does it mean to call on the name of the Lord?

What do the verses used to invite the prayer say in context?

An Alarm to the Unconverted

fall down on your knees and spreading forth your hands towards heaven open your heart to the Lord in these—or the like words

An early precedent for giving the unconverted a set form of words: in his directions to the unconverted, Alleine supplies a long covenant prayer of repentance and surrender to Christ, and advises making it "not only in heart—but in word; not only in word—but in writing" and signing it. It is far longer and weightier than the later short prayers. (The linked text is a modernized edition. Date: the linked Grace Gems edition heads the work "Joseph Alleine, 1671.")

Lectures on Revivals of Religion, Lecture XIV: Measures to Promote Revivals

In the days of the apostles baptism answered this purpose. The gospel was preached to the people, and then all those who were willing to be on the side of Christ were called on to be baptized. It held the precise place that the anxious seat does now, as a public manifestation of their determination to be Christians.

Finney defends the "anxious seat" — a seat where the anxious come forward to be addressed, prayed for and spoken with — as the public step of decision, and says plainly that in the apostles' day baptism held that place as the public declaration of a determination to be Christians. The public act of coming to Christ moves from the water to the front of the meeting.

it was during the 1954 London Crusade that Charlie Riggs developed four remarkable steps and titled them “Steps to Peace With God.”

The steps were written, the BGEA says, as a tool for training "volunteers who prayed with inquirers at the end of a Crusade meeting": the crusade invitation, a short repeatable presentation, and prayer with the inquirer.

Have You Heard of the Four Spiritual Laws?

The presentation then provides a suggested prayer by which readers can thoughtfully invite Jesus Christ into their lives according to our Lord’s promise in Revelation 3:20.

Bright's own account of the booklet: a printed presentation, written in the 1950s for anyone to use, ending in a suggested prayer grounded on Revelation 3:20. By Cru's estimate about three billion copies had been printed by 1999.

Talk at the Verge conference, as reported by Christianity Today

Should it not concern us that there is no such superstitious prayer in the New Testament?

A Southern Baptist pastor challenges the practice from inside the churches that use it most: the prayer, he argues, has given many people false assurance. Platt later said that praying a prayer is not in itself bad; his question was what kind of faith is being called for.

An Affirmation of a “Sinner’s Prayer” as a Biblical Expression of Repentance and Faith

repentance and faith involve a crying out for mercy and a calling on the Lord (Romans 10:13), often identified as a “sinner’s prayer,” as a biblical expression of repentance and faith

Southern Baptist messengers defend the prayer from Scripture: the gospel's command to believe and receive Christ (Mark 1:15; John 1:12; 6:25-52; Acts 17:30), the necessity of repentance and faith (Acts 20:20-21), sinners who cried out for mercy and were heard (Luke 18:13; Acts 16:29-30), confession with the mouth (Matthew 16:16; Romans 10:9-10) and calling on the Lord (Romans 10:13). They also warn, citing Matthew 6:7 and 15:7-9, that the prayer "is not an incantation that results in salvation merely by its recitation."

Peace With God — 4 Steps

Through prayer, invite Jesus Christ to come in and control your life through the Holy Spirit.

The teaching in current use: step four quotes Revelation 3:20 and Romans 10:9, suggests a prayer asking Jesus "to come into my heart," and then asks the reader, "Did you pray to receive Jesus Christ and begin a relationship with him?"

Study

• List what each person in Acts 2, 8, 16 and 22 was told to do, or did, when they turned to Christ. Where does prayer appear, and where does baptism?
• Peter (Acts 2:21) and Paul (Romans 10:13) both quote Joel. After quoting it, what does Peter tell the crowd to do?
• Saul had seen the Lord and was praying (Acts 9:9-11). What was he still told to do, and why (Acts 22:16)?
• In Acts 10:43-48 the Holy Spirit falls before anyone is baptized. What does Peter later say God did for these Gentiles (Acts 15:8-9), and what did he command them next (10:48)? What does each fact tell you?
• Read Revelation 3:14-22 as a whole. Who is on the other side of the door in verse 20?
• Finney wrote that the anxious seat held "the precise place" baptism held in the apostles' day, "as a public manifestation of their determination to be Christians." Is a public declaration all that baptism is in Acts 2:38 and 22:16? What is lost when another public step takes its role?

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