When I was a young man, churches often held revival services. Those services could be characterized by having an evangelist deliver a “fire and brimstone” sermon followed by what seemed like 20 minutes of haranguing sinners to come to the altar and repent. I assume they called it a revival because they thought the influx of new believers would revive the spirit of the church. I know there are evangelists out there who can draw thousands to each service and seem to get hundreds to respond to the altar call, but in most of the revival services I have attended they would have been lucky to get even 1 percent of the audience to respond.
One of the biggest needs I see in the church today is the need for those people already in the church to get more serious about their relationship with the Lord. If more of us lived what we say we believe outsiders would be drawn to the church the way a magnet attracts iron filings.
I do believe in the power of the altar call. When anyone makes a commitment to follow Jesus, Satan will immediately start giving them dozens of reasons why they don’t need to follow through on it. If that commitment was made in a public manner, such as responding to an altar call, we are much more likely to be able to resist the temptation to forget about it.
I also believe there are a high percentage of people who attend church regularly who have never invited Jesus to truly be Lord of their life. Those folks would be unlikely to respond to the old fashioned “sinner repent” kind of altar call for fear of what other “church” people would think.
The altar call I use is to invite people to make a commitment to taking a new step forward in building a stronger relationship with the Lord. Some will know immediately what that step should be because the Lord has already been working on their heart. For others it will be a commitment to start seeking what that step should be. For those seekers, I have developed a resource titled Spiritual Practices where I outline some general principles and summarize seventeen spiritual practices that Christians have found helpful for thousands of years. In the experience I have had with this kind of altar call, a large percentage of the audience responded. This helps those who are making a first time commitment more willing to respond as well.