Manipulation

"And my message and my preaching were not in persuasive words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power." -1 Cor 2:4

According to psychologist William McGuire, there are essentially five steps in the process of attitude change¹:

• ATTENTION
• COMPREHENSION
• YIELDING
• RETENTION
• ACTION
  

If we apply these steps to the process of evangelism, we should see that it is the Church's duty to get the attention of non-Christians, to get them to listen. It is also our duty to communicate the truth of the Good News in such a way, that it leads to comprehension. But this is where the Church's work ends, because repentance, or yielding, is not the Church's job. Repentance should be the work of the Holy Spirit, not the work of human beings. Furthermore, one cannot have true repentance without the comprehension of truth. Without the presentation of truth, scripture, or an argument, all that is achieved is manipulation.

The same goes for situations within the Church. Many preachers today mistakenly believe that their job is to achieve yielding. They are more concerned with "making the sale", than with communicating truth. In many churches, good expositional teaching has given way to emotionalism and hype. The cause for this seems to be our exposure to television and advertising.

We are bombarded daily by thousands of ads. The advertising industry spends millions of dollars, including the hiring of psychologists, in order to create mind-numbing ads that encourage us to buy on impulse and emotion. Advertisers want us to buy, not to think. I'm afraid that the Church is moving in the same direction.

In what is commonly referred to as an "altar call", you may see the preacher jumping and stomping, pounding the podium, talking about your need to surrender or yield to God. Perhaps this is after a telling of a sad story. Then, the mood music starts to play. They may even tell you personally beforehand, "We have all of these people that we start down the aisles, just to prime the pump, because it gets a flow going and people get caught in the flow." This is clearly manipulation. People who are not being truly converted get sucked in. In this case, emotions and group compulsion have more to do with the person's decision than the work of saving truth.

I can't think of a more prevalent tool of manipulation in the Church than music. Music is everywhere. We play it at the beginning of the service, at the end of the service, and sometimes in between. At many church services, the scene is typical; you will start to hear a guitar, piano or organ slowly playing a familiar, sentimental song. As the song starts to build, the worship leader will tell everyone to stand up. You will hear people telling you to raise your hands, or to come down the aisle. You will hear songs being played and played and played, repeated over and over again. Vocal improvisations will start. They will tell you, "There is a heaviness in the room, the presence of God is here!", and "Keep pressing in, break through!"

Or, I have recently heard about a Christian rock band who has a high-pressure "altar-call" at the end of their concerts. The lead singer warns, "I'm going to count back from 30. That's how long you have to come down and accept Jesus!" The band then musically builds up the suspense - louder and faster during the countdown - like a timebomb about to explode. By the end of it, you've got people up front who don't even know why they're there! Absolute manipulation!

We should not be too hasty in attributing to the Holy Spirit all of our feelings and emotions, particularly the feelings we get from participating in musical worship. We should not confuse the power of music, with the power of God. Just as in a rock concert, music creates a mood and an atmosphere, and sometimes emotional frenzies. There are a lot of psychological dynamics to consider. Music, particularly of a continually repetitious nature, has been known to create in the listener a hypnotic, suggestive, trance-like state. One must also note that Christians put themselves into these states willingly; and that adrenaline and oxygen highs, brought on from heavy singing, may also play a part.

In summary, true repentance is a change of the mind, in response to truth; not to sights and sounds, sad stories, mood music, endless invitations or slick techniques. The Church's job is Attention and Comprehension. God's job is Yielding, Retention and Action. The decision to yield is between the hearer and God, and not the hearer and the preacher.

Thanks to John MacArthur for his teaching, entitled "Altar Calls". To read the complete teaching, click here.