In Matthew 13:24-43, Jesus tells the parable of the weeds, also known as the parable of the wheat and tares. Thankfully, The Lord also offers an explanation of the parable, explaining that the weeds sown among the wheat are sons of the evil one, whom the devil has planted in the church. So this parable indicates that there sadly will be those who may claim to be Christ followers in the church but are really not and who only bring strife and division instead. God's angels will winnow out the weeds into the eternal fires of hell in the end. In light of this passage, there is legitimate reason to be concerned about the possibility of false converts in the church. Of course, this parable also indicates that the church should minister to everyone, preaching the Gospel to all, and let God sort it out in the end.
In relation to this, I know there are a number of pastors and evangelists who claim that saying the "sinner's prayer" is unBiblical. Many seem to think that many who said this prayer declaring their faith in Jesus to save them from their sins were not really sincere and thus are merely false converts. They tend to have a strong emphasis on the need for repentance and sometimes makes it seem like they are really preaching a reliance on works along with God's grace. And I also at least sometimes get the feeling like they're speaking with assuredness that they can't possibly be one of those false converts.
To be fair though, there are other times when these evangelists are speaking where they make it very clear they believe we are saved by grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone. And I don't doubt the sincerity of their faith in Christ or their zeal to see others come to salvation. I praise God for that! I am just stating the impression I get at times.
I think the point is to emphasize that we can't just flippantly say a prayer that we don't really mean, claim our fire insurance policy and just go on living life as we please.
Of course we have to be careful of that- Jesus warned us in Matthew 7 of the many who will call to Him "Lord, Lord" who never really knew Him.
But if we confess with our mouths, "Jesus is Lord" and believe in our hearts that God raised Him from the dead, we will be saved. (See Romans 10:9) That sounds a lot like the "sinner's prayer" to me.
If we invite Jesus metaphorically into our hearts to be Lord and Saviour, then we invite Him to metaphorically and literally in some sense as well to rule our lives. We invite Him not only to forgive us of all our sins that left us dead in our trespasses but also to make us into the people He intended us to be all along and do the good He wants us to do. (Ephesians 2:8-10)
We invite Him into our minds because He gives us the mind of Christ. We don't seem to often think of it in these terms but it's the antithesis of demon possession. Remember that even the demons acknowledge Jesus is Lord but clearly they aren't saved. They lead people to do evil things that hurt themselves and others. Jesus leads us to do good things that help others before ourselves. Ephesians 5:18 commands us not to be drunk with wine for this leads to dissipation but in contrast to be filled with the Holy Spirit.
If the Holy Spirit is possessing and filling us, then we do as He leads. We become God's extensions on earth to do the righteous deeds He desires that bring Him glory. (To be clear, we don't become a god or God Himself, of course- but we do become His sons and daughters. And children imitate their mother and father, just as we imitate our Father. Thus, His children will look and act and talk more and more like Him every day.)
Now kids are often given chores to do around the house and maybe they do them to earn an allowance. But they never to do them to earn the love of their parents (or shouldn't anyway) because their parents always love them and they are their children no matter what! Nothing they can do can ever change that!
Once God adopts us through our faith in Christ, we are no longer servants but sons! Anyone who sins is a slave to sin. The slave doesn't stay in the house forever but the son stays in the house forever! So if the Son sets us free, we are free indeed! (See John 8:32-36)
We rest in the Son's completed work at Calvary and the empty tomb! The slaves in the Old Testament in Israel had the 7th. year as the Year of Jubilee when they were set free. Jesus is our Jubilee! (Thanks to Michael Card for that line. :-)) Jesus is our Sabbath rest! (See Hebrews 4)
And out of gratitude to Him and love for Him, we obey His commands willingly. It makes such a world of difference when we are obeying because we want to out of love and not out of fear.
As a librarian, I often describe my job as tricking kids into reading books. :-) (Really- I do every contest and promotion I can and so forth to make reading look like a fun game and pastime.) Now, I'm happy to some small degree for kids reading even begrudgingly because their teachers made them. What a HUGE joy it is instead though to see kids who genuinely want to read on their own amd who grow to love reading to the point that they are constantly hounding me about getting their book requests in so they can have more to read! :-)
This is the same kind of response God wants to see in us with Jesus. We read The Bible because we want to hear from Him not because our pastor made us. We pray because we want to spend time with Him, not because it's like a courtesy call our parents made us make to our grandparents.
We go to church, tithe, love our neighbours as ourselves, sacrifice to help the least of these, speak the Truth in Love and share the Gospel with others- not because we have to do all these good deeds to earn our Cub Scout merit badges but because Akela has already made us one of the pack and the call of the Wild in our souls drives us to do these things to show we are His and to please Him. Ultimately, these actions and attitudes are all reflections of the fact that with our transformation by the renewing of our minds, we are conformed to Christ and our calling is confirmed in Christ by these good works, which are done to show that we love God with all our heart, soul, mind and strength.
The motivation is always key. We do it because He has saved us- NOT in order to get saved. The latter brings only exhaustion and frustration; the former brings rest, peace and trust.
I say all this as things I have learned from God's Word and Spirit as one who has struggled numerous times throughout life wrestling back and forth, worrying if I have really been saved. I say it as one who said a sinner's prayer about the age of 5 or 7 and who has sought to follow Jesus ever since. I say it as one who has fended off attacks from the devil to make me doubt at times when I felt I was doing well- and as one who has been hit with accusations when I know I'm in sin.
Christians, sadly, often still choose to sin and thus continue to struggle with temptations through the sanctification process. This doesn't mean that we have lost our salvation when this happens. It means we've lost our fellowship with the Father temporarily, just like kids who know they've done wrong shrink in fear from their father who has the belt at the ready for discipline. We fear the rod of correction but we need not ever fear that we have made our Daddy too angry to love us anymore. The same is true with God. We don't need to ever fear that we have pushed His patience too far and that He's lost that loving feeling. We might lose that feeling of being loved but God never loses the feeling of giving love because He is love. It's more than a feeling, whether in Boston or anywhere else in the world. It's the Love of God that unconditionally reaches out to us and holds us forever!
This doesn't mean that we sin so grace may abound- by no means! Grace is not a license to sin, like it seems James Bond holds. But we trust that God's Word is His bond and He who does not lie keeps us stirred and not shaken. (Titus 1:2, Haggai 1:14, 2 Thessalonians 2:2, Hebrews 12:26-29) We got salvation for free from Yeshua with love! We can find way more than just a quantum leap of solace in knowing the Superman of Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow never dies (again) and because He lives forever, we will live forever with Him! And we continue to use all the Spirit's gifts like Q's Inspector Gadget-gadgets on His Majesty's secret service!
Though of course, while we do keep acts of generosity secret and our Father who knows all secrets and sees what's done in secret rewards us, we should be in the open about letting people know that the reason for the Love, faith and hope they see in us is Jesus!
And we have this all because we are resting in His completed work and none of our own! (Matthew 5:17 and 11:25-30) And when Christ becomes our all consuming passion, His commands are not weary or burdensome. We delight in doing them because we want to please our loving, Saviour, Lord and Friend.
And that's where I rest. I trust that God is true and that He really does love me. He really loves everyone with an everlasting love! He longs for us all to be reconciled to Him if we'll let Him do it. He has forgiven all my sins because I have asked Him to do so by confessing my faith in Jesus and His death and Resurrection. I have repented of my sins and seek to follow Him but I often mess up and keep repenting of my sins and keep following Him. He picks me back up and keeps me going. As I said before, I have doubted a number of times but I've doubted myself more than I've ever doubted God. I think that was part of the point of praying the sinner's prayer 50 million times over to make sure I was really sincere like Linus' pumpkin patch that time. After spending times literally kneeling naked in the bathroom reading all of 1 John aloud and weeping and praying to God and claiming His promises yet again, I somewhere along the line realized that His promises are true and I really didn't have to try so hard. I believe He heard me the first time as a kid. Those many times of recommitment revealed and reconfirmed to me again how great my sin truly is and how infinitely greater His grace is as well. His grace is far greater than all my sin.
I ran the 400m and 110m hurdles events on the Track and Field team in high school. Thankfully I didn't knock them down and subsequently fall down myself too often. If it does happen in a race though- it's okay. You can knock every single one down and as long as you get up and keep running and get to the finish line first, you can still win the race. It doesn't count against you in any way. You don't lose your place on the team. When we sin and fall down, Jesus picks up again when we come back to Him in Godly sorrow and repentance and He puts us back on track to run the race with perseverance. (1 Corinthians 9:24-27, Hebrews 12:1-2) We never lose our place on His team!
When we are assured of our faith in Him, we can move forward in faith to be all He made us to be. He is still working out His plan for us. Keep trusting Him, keep fighting the good fight in the one day ending war on sin, and enduring and sharing His love with others! As the song says, 'til He returns or calls me Home, here in the power of Christ I'll stand. I love Him because He first loved me. May all I say, think or do bring Him glory. :-)
)