Soulwinning: Spiritual Crisis Intervention

People usually behave according to their self-perceptions and the way they understand their various roles in life. It is normal for the same person to act dif­ferently when he/she fulfills different roles. For example, a man behaves one way as a subordinate to his boss, another way as a fellow worker with others in the office or factory, another way as a husband, another way as a father, another way as a neighbor, and so on. A woman acts differently with her daughter than with her mother. She treats a casual acquaintance differently than she treats a close friend. Each of us acts out a “script” in terms of the way we think it is written.

We have already seen that false models, or scripts, exist for soulwinners. Such models may have had a measure of success. Given different times and circumstances, they probably worked sometime for somebody or else they would not have survived. In our vastly altered social and spiritual environment, we must rewrite our scripts. The new, freshly-conceived scripts must re-establish Bible principles and truths of soulwinning. In addition, they must reflect the needs of our times. It is said of David that he served his generation. We must also serve our own generation, not that of a bygone era. This does not mean compromise. It does mean, however, that we should strive to be relevant, effective and achieve our maximum level of excellence.

The soulwinner is a paramedic.

In our day, we must perceive of soulwinning as spiritual crisis intervention. The role model that best describes the soulwinner is the para­medic. Emergency caregivers called para­medics stay on call. When the call comes, they rush to the scene of an accident or to the side of a heart attack or stroke victim with the right equip­ment and the medical know-how. Their main objective is to stabilize the patient, secure him/her from further injury, perform any emergen­cy treatment that must be done to save a life, and transport the patient to an emergency room as quickly and safely as pos­sible. Para­medics are usually not trained as surgeons or special­ists. They simply provide immediate care on location in order to save lives. They know that a complete diag­nosis, surgery and long-term health care is the province of other workers.

These observations about paramedics tell us important things in terms of their attitude about their job. They do not worry about rejec­tion, about their ability to persuade injured people to cooperate with them, or whether or not the victim will like them. The priorities of the paramedic are clear: to know where the patient is, to get there as quickly as possible, and to keep him/her alive until proper treatment can be ad­ministered. If the victim makes the job difficult, the para­medic understands and does not take it personally.

The spiritual para­medic tunes in to signals coming from people in pain. He remains sensitive to the voice of God so he/she will know who to help, when to help and how to go about it. Numerous scriptural examples illustrate this role:

“And the angel of the Lord spake unto Philip, saying, Arise, and go toward the south unto the way that goeth down from Jerusalem unto Gaza, which is desert.  And he arose and went: and, behold, a man of Ethiopia, an eunuch of great au­thority under Candace queen of the Ethiop­ians, Was returning, and sitting in his chariot read Esaias the prophet.  Then the Spirit said unto Philip, Go near, and join thyself to this char­iot.” Acts 8:26-29.

“And there was a certain disciple at Damascus, named Ananias; and to him said the Lord in a vision, Ana­nias. And he said, Behold, I am here, Lord. And the Lord said unto him, Arise, and go into the street which is called Straight, and enquire in the house of Judas for one called Saul, of Tarsus: for, behold, he prayeth, “And hath seen in a vision a man named Ananias coming in, and put­ting his hand on him, that he might re­ceive his sight.” Acts 9:10-12.

“And suddenly there was a great earth­quake, so that the foun­dations of the prison were shaken: and immediately all the doors were opened, and every one’s bands were loosed.  And the keeper of the prison awaking out of his sleep, and seeing the prison doors open, he drew out his sword, and would have killed himself, supposing that the prisoners had been fled.  But Paul cried with a loud voice, saying, Do thyself no harm: for we are all here.  Then he called for a light, and sprang in, and came trembling, and fell down before Paul and Silas,  And brought them out, and said, Sirs, what must I do to be saved?   And they said, Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved, and thy house.” Acts 16:26-31.

People in pain will cry for help. If they are unable to cry, God will speak to one of His ministers about the need. As a caregiver, you should listen for either the cry of the victim, or to the voice of God, and then respond to whatever need you find. A lifeguard does not need to learn a sales pitch to save a drowning man from the water. A paramedic needs no public relations courses to apply a tourniquet to a bleeding arm. Caring, compassionate people need not learn clever tactics to show genuine love, concern and friend­ship.

Train­ing is important, but training must consist of more than how to brush your teeth so your smile will look good, or how to shake some­one’s hand in order to convey the right feeling of con­fidence and self-assurance, or how to project your voice to duly impress sophis­ticated consumers of spiritual products. Training must go beyond how to organize a canvassing campaign, how to fill out visitation or enrollment cards, or how to enter names into a computer. Training should concentrate on the spiritual aspects of ministra­tion of hope to the hope­less, pouring in the oil and wine of love and grace to those who are bruised and bleeding, and show­ing people how the gospel will al­leviate their pain, guilt and loneli­n­ess.­

The sinner is the patient.

The most crucial factor in the heal­ing model of evan­gelism is to recognize the sinner as a patient, vic­timized by Adam’s fall and Satan’s conspiracy. Our tradi­tional view of evil and guilt strongly influences us to assume a judgmental at­titude toward the sinner. We tend to assign to him blame and culpability, as though his respon­sibility for his sinful con­dition makes him unforgivable. Yet, Jesus manifested supreme love and grace toward the victims of the world. His harshest words were re­served for the hypocrites and religious pretenders.

Again, let us look at the scripture. “To wit, that God was in Christ, re­conciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them; and hath com­mitted unto us the word of recon­ciliation.” II Corinthians 5:19.

Examine this phrase closely: “Not imputing their trespasses unto them.” Looking at this in terms of our model, notice that Jesus did not blame the diseased person for contracting the disease. What does this imply? First, the disease of sin is lethal. Regard­less of who gets blamed, if the victim is not cured, he will die. Second, the afflicted person may not be aware he has the dis­ease, or that he will eventually die from it. If this is the case, he is deceived. Once he knows, he will want to get rid of it.

Third, the reconciliation process must begin in the heart of the soul­winner before it shows up in the life of the victim. This runs counter to our religious culture, which has transmitted to us a bias against the sinner. Conven­tional, cultural wisdom tells us that the sinner must make his move first. He must leave the filthiness of his sins behind and come toward Christ. At that point, we will “bear witness” of his sincerity and reach out to him. But the scriptures tell us quite a different story. “To wit, God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself.” Also, “But God commen­deth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sin­ners, Christ died for us.” Romans 5:8. God took the initiative to start the healing process within himself.

Salvation is, above all else, God’s plan to restore man to a right relationship with Himself.

Viewing the sinner as the patient determines our at­titude toward him. If we blame him, our approach will be condes­cen­ding. If we feel he is choosing to sin and delib­erately destroy­ing his life, we will condemn him. If we think he is stupid for continuing in sin, we will berate him. If we believe he is in control of his desires, we will try to the control away from him by salesmanship or high-pressured tactics.

The truth is that sin is a moral and spiritual disease. Inherited through the fall of Adam, this disease negatively affects man’s judgment, his values, his behavior, and his rela­tionship to God. Pain, guilt and loneliness followed the origi­nal infection and continue to plague all of crea­tion. The symp­toms of sin serve to compound the devas­ta­tion, and multiply its evil. Thus, sin causes pain, which causes hatred (for exam­ple) which causes strife which causes mur­der which causes pain, ad infinitum. Spread throughout history, it is not surprising to see such turmoil as exists in the world today.

Our task is to locate the inner pain.

Focus On the Sinner Self-Centered Statements : “You know, you really shouldn’t be doing that.” “You don’t know your Bible very well, do you?” “I have the truth and you need to listen to me.” “My church is a lot better than your’s.” “You had better quit what you are doing.” “You’re just being foolish.” Sinner-Centered Statements : “Tell me about your problem.” “Are you getting relief from the pain?” “I can only imagine what you are going through.” “You look like you could use a friend.” “I like you.” “What can I do to help you?”

Four vital concepts emerge in the pro­cess of locating inner pain. First, we must develop sinner-cente­red­ness. The soulwinner must approach his task with his mind centered on the victim, not on himself. If we confront a person with the mindset, “I’ve got truth and you don’t,” or “I know exactly what you need to do,” we are almost certain to be rebuffed. Even if we try a milder approach such as, “Why don’t you just give this a try?”, we are setting ourselves up for a rejection. Can you ima­gine a paramedic tentatively walking up to an accident victim and saying, “How about a ride in MY am­bulance?” These openings result from self-centered­ness instead of sinner-centered­ness. The soulwinner must keep his focus away from himself and his own knowledge until he has assured the sinner that he cares about him first. John Maxwell says, “No one will care how much you know until he knows how much you care.”

Second, the soulwinner must give priority to the sin­ner’s pain. From the sinner’s perspective, hurt obsesses him. Most likely, he leads a pain-filled life that gets progres­sively worse. Without hope, without answers, without pur­pose, panic rises in his stomach. He feels that no one listens to him. No one really cares. Once he hears the well-meaning soul­winner doing all the talking, he clicks off the switch in his brain and says to himself, “Here we go again. Everybody wants to talk. Nobody wants to listen.”

Prospective soulwinners must ask themselves the ques­tion, “Do I really care about this person? Am I trying to get self-esteem by demonstrating my knowledge of the Bible? What moti­vates me to witness?” Again, imagine a paramedic wasting pre­cious time by explaining to a patient why one style of bandage is better than another, or giving the victim a lecture on ambulance mod­els! Ridiculous, of course. But many hur­ting, bleeding sinners have died while some­one preferred to discuss the views of a post-tribulation rapture position, or explained why the independent churches are much better than those tied to an organization, or even analyzed whether or not Grandpa actually made it to heaven! Strong doctrinal teaching is important, but it must be placed in perspective. Postpone all biblical or doctrinal talk until the patient is stabilized. The pain of the sinner must have the pri­ority.

Third, we must possess a vulnerability to the sinner’s pain. We must feel the hurt so strongly, it is as though we were actually entering into the sinner’s world of pain. Only here does the spiritual caregiver experience empathy and generates true compassion. Vicariously, we weep with those that weep, mourn with those that mourn, and suf­fer with those who suffer. “He was touch­ed with the feelings of our infir­mities.” Christ identified with sinners so comple­tely in His redemp­tive plan that it cost Him His life. Jesus was the only perfect sacri­ficial lamb, but we must still be creatures of feeling.

The purest motive for those entering the medical pro­fession is compassion. Likewise, compassion must motivate the soulwinner. Those spirit­ual tech­nicians, conquerors, pronouncers, salesmen and statis­ticians who have something else as their driving force operate out of an inferior mindset. Christ, in contrast, emptied himself out and acted solely upon ministering grace to the sinner.

Fourth, soulwinning must be done in the context of time. Time is a scarce commodity. Most people want to spend their free time with a select few of their own choos­ing. Busy schedules and the hurried pace of life trample many under­foot. But meaning­ful soul­winning cannot be done in a hurry. We win souls through the slow proces­ses of care, love, trust and building credi­bility. These qualities only mature over time. Woun­ded people tend to distrust motives and ques­tion the sin­cerity of others. Only time allows the solid building blocks of such traits to come to be. Lis­tening takes time. Bible studies take time. Going to lunch or dinner takes time. Time is the most important gift we can give. It is this gift that is most likely to convince people of the soulwinner’s genuine con­cern.

Requirements for Soulwinners: Sinner-Centeredness Priority of the sinner’s pain. Vulnerability to the sinners pain. Time.