Michigan Camp Meeting 2023: The Boldness of the Cross

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Michigan Conference of Seventh-day Adventists

Prophetic Preaching and Persuasive Appeals for Decision

Daniel Towar

01 Why the Preaching of Appeals is Crucial

You are about to enjoy a presentation recorded at the 2023 Michigan Conference Camp Meeting held at Cedar Lake, Michigan.

We pray that the Lord will bless you as you listen.

Dear Father in heaven, today we've come to find out about prophetic preaching, to find out how we can give persuasive appeals.

We need your Holy Spirit and We pause to ask you sincerely from our heart to be in our class.

To your name's honor and glory, in Jesus' name, amen.

So what do you hope to get from this class?

Just 2 or 3 of you, and then I'm going to go right into the material.

Any questions that you have about what is this prophetic preaching?

Any thoughts, any questions that you may have?

I mean, I can preach the gospel, I can teach them, I know it well, but concluding it, getting somebody to make that decision.

Even many pastors, maybe even many evangelists tend to be weak on getting the decision at the end of the message.

And an appeal is the invitation, it's the closer, it's the call to action, It's what makes everything click.

And you have an opening case, but it closes the case.

It brings you to the climax of that message so it has proven to be effective.

And we've all been at the point, I have been at the point as well, where you get to the end of the message and you make an appeal, particularly if it's for people to come forward, that maybe no 1 comes.

We oftentimes have smaller audiences at our smaller churches, and there's a variety of different appeals.

You don't have to call people forward all the time.

And so we'll deal with a number of different appeals.

Well, Why is the preaching of appeals so crucial?

I want you to take a look at this, because this is 1 of the answers why the preaching of appeals every time you preach is so vitally important.

Okay, Daddy was there in about 3 seconds.

And if you've ever nearly lost a child, it can be a life changer.

In just a few more seconds, that little 1 would have lost his life.

Mommy was in the pool, but she wasn't a very quick swimmer, and she couldn't do a whole lot.

But Dad raced over there, and he made the difference.

When you preach, And some of you are lay preachers on a regular basis.

You're in your church and you're preaching and you're giving appeals for decision, I hope.

Or you want to be more effective in doing that.

And so you want to go all out to save the lost.

Now I want to answer the question that you may have about prophetic preaching.

Prophetic preaching is usually considered to be Daniel 2, Daniel 7, Revelation 13, and that is true.

But prophetic preaching also is a biblical challenge to the culture of the day that speaks against those true, those belief systems rather, that oppose our spiritual advancement.

There's a lot of belief systems out there today that are in opposition to God's belief system.

And we have to be willing to preach to the times and preach prophetically truth to power.

You've probably heard of the expression preaching truth to power.

And we have to be the ones that are willing to preach that truth to people.

Personal and public evangelism are both very, very important.

I found as a pastor, for about 25 years of our ministry, like I said, we had various districts, anywhere from 1 church where I had associates, to 4 churches that we were responsible for.

And I found that when I had a yearly evangelism, it gave a focus to everything else that I did.

And I mentioned in the handout, and you'll notice, if you have a pen, and we have extra pens at the table, there's, in your handout section, there are blanks.

And on the first page, there's a couple blanks there, and I've tried to make this fit with what I'm going to say, but it probably is not always quite right, even as I was going through it last night.

But at any rate, toward the bottom of the page it said, let the beginning bookend of your message set the stage for the closing appeal.

Let the beginning bookend of your message set the stage for the closing appeal.

Sometimes as you preach, you're going to actually announce, at the end of this message, I'm going to ask you to make a decision, or I'm going to invite you to make a decision for Christ.

It's not something you always say toward the beginning, but what you want to do is get their attention right off the bat.

The introduction should grip their attention.

And so I've tried to underline those on the screen, to put it in yellow or in some way so you'll know you can fill that in.

Otherwise, you won't get it unless I give you an answer key.

I hope your attention was gripped by the very first video that you saw.

You don't know today who will be there tomorrow.

Someone maybe will move away, and they will have an opportunity to hear you again.

They'll start looking at their device, their iPad, whatever it may be.

If you're selling a house, or if you ever have, they say 95% of people make up their mind whether to buy your house or not by the time they get to the front door.

Now they may look through the house and they may give you the courtesy of that and you might say well they're really interested, but they know already whether they're interested or not.

They'll make up their mind if they're really serious by the time they get in that front door.

Their first impressions are everything, and the same thing with preaching as well.

When we fail to motivate early, third square or third line, we may fail the rest of the way.

So not only is the appeal very important, but the very beginning of the message is of vital importance as well.

Okay, well we've done the first half of the page and we have a lot of time left, don't we?

Where is the point of the message if there is no appeal?

If we don't offer an invitation, where is the point to the message anyway?

You just lop off the point on that pencil and it wouldn't be a very effective instrument, would it?

And when we preach, if we do not include and appeal a point of decision, then so much is lost.

The culture today aims a lot of the appeals at the body.

Now you're not going to aim an arrow at anybody's body, right?

But as Seventh-day Adventist ministers, a lot of the appeal that we have is aimed at the head, at the mind, and that's good.

I know I brought a water in here, but I guess I forgot it.

Anyway, we aim a lot of our appeals at the mind, and I'm good at doing that, but there's someplace else where we need to aim the appeal, and I believe it is the heart, because people make their decisions based on their emotions.

I don't know if anybody has ever gotten married without making an appeal to the heart.

The emotions have to be in play, and when you're calling someone to make a decision for Jesus, you're appealing to their heart.

02 The Science of Soul Winning Appeals - How to Say It

Our Father in heaven, we pray today that you would pour out your spirit upon our class.

We ask that you would please guide and direct our thoughts.

We pray that this class will be practical and worthwhile for everybody here.

Yesterday afternoon, I really appreciate that someone dropped a question in the question box.

How do you know if the Holy Spirit is working on someone's heart?

And a second question along with it, when someone is under conviction.

So how do we know when someone is under conviction by the Holy Spirit in a series of meetings.

I found this in the Desire of Ages, a quick review of that question, and I think a very good answer actually.

I believe the Holy Spirit is present to convict people whenever we ask Him to come.

When the truth plainly spoken touches some cherished idol, he marked, this is Christ, marked the change of countenance, the cold forbidding look that told that the light was unwelcome.

It doesn't mean the Holy Spirit wasn't working because there became or was a cold forbidding look upon the hearer, it may mean indeed that the Holy Spirit is working, but that's 1 way to tell.

They're responding to what they're hearing.

When he saw men refuse the message of peace, his heart was pierced to the very depths.

There was no lack of Holy Spirit in the preaching of Jesus.

And so he could see people at times that were not responding.

And that is very hard to believe, but it is so true.

Even when Jesus preached, not everybody desired to accept what he said.

Jesus watched with deep earnestness the changing countenances of his hearers.

The faces that expressed interest and pleasure gave him great satisfaction.

When his eye swept over the throng of listeners and he recognized among them the faces he had seen before, his countenance alighted up with joy.

He saw in them hopeful subjects for his kingdom." So how did Jesus perceive that someone was under conviction?

What were those 2 ways that we've just read about?

A cold look, they're unresponsive, And what would the other way be?

And that lit up the countenance of our Savior.

And I'm sure he began praying that they would respond more and more as they learn from him.

I think that that's a good way to understand how people are.

Now, they may not be smiling, but if they're paying attention, if their eyes are open, if they're tracking with you, if they're asking questions, if they're responding to an appeal, that's why appeals are also so important because when you give an invitation or a call at the end of a sermon or a class that you're teaching, some of you here may be teaching this coming fall for Discovering Revelation, and that begins October 2.

It's gonna be conference-wide, and pastors cannot possibly do all that work.

So just keep these things in mind as you go along.

Yesterday it was also asked, well, we do pretty good oftentimes with the bulk of the message, but how do we bring a person to make a decision, to respond to the appeal, to say yes to Jesus, it may be a card call, a hand raising, stand up, coming forward, a prayer at the end, but you can tell after a while, if they're tracking with you, how do we bring them through so much and yet sometimes we struggle with getting that appeal out, how to say it.

Today we're going to deal with that more.

And we're gonna begin here at this point.

Being an effective communicator means being genuine, real, authentic.

The notes follow along pretty much what I'm going to say.

Sometimes I don't follow along with the notes that I've written, but you get the gist of it, you know, I'm a little bit spontaneous.

But being an effective communicator, you wanna be genuine, authentic, real and vulnerable, I added on that first and second line for you.

Genuine people will never hide who they really are.

They're willing to share their vulnerabilities with others.

Now being vulnerable, I think that definition by and large is changing in society.

It used to mean more of you're an open person, you're real, you're concerned about others, you're not afraid to just be real with them, to allow them to know who you are, some of your own personal struggles, and give your own testimony.

But nowadays, when you hear of someone being vulnerable, you're probably thinking more of they're in danger or they're in danger of being abused or something like that.

When we're saying vulnerable here, it means in the context of preaching or teaching the word, we want to be vulnerable in the sense that we're genuine, that we're real with people, that we're not hiding behind a facade.

This world is a rough place, and we all get hurt at some point or another.

They are okay if their imperfections are exposed.

Now, you don't have to say every bad thing that ever happened to you in your life, obviously, but I think you get the idea, I hope.

A psychologist, I'll call her, she's noted among those people who have social work degrees as my oldest daughter does, Brene Brown is her name, and she has a TED Talk, Have you heard of TED Talks on the web?

She has a TED Talk that talks about vulnerability.

And she said in this TED Talk that has over 61 million views, so if you're on the net, and they viewed a particular page of yours over 61 million times, I mean, you've begun to hit the Tucker Carlson benefit of being popular and being followed.

He came back on the web last week with a Twitter feed and it's been watched by a hundred and 15 different people, or at least a hundred and 15000000 times.

You know, we're all sort of following what's going to happen with Tucker next, so I guess he's going to do okay.

It says, vulnerability, this is from Brene Brown, is the birthplace of connection and the path to the feeling of worthiness.

If it doesn't feel vulnerable, the sharing is probably not constructive, she says.

Now, I've heard some things, Gospel presentations, I mean, preaching, where I didn't feel that the speaker maybe was all that vulnerable, but in the light of the Gospel, I want to tell you something.

If I don't get a whole lot out about what's being said, I choose first of all to get the blessing that's in it for me.

You know, there's some sermons I haven't been particularly touched by, and I've given some sermons I'm afraid are in that range perhaps, and maybe I didn't feel real good about, but I choose to get a blessing from what I preach, And I want to listen to receive the blessing from others as well.

When our pills have first touched our hearts, people are touched in turn.

This makes the appeal appealing to the hearer.

So what touches you is going to make a difference with everybody else.

If you like donuts, if you like sweets, it was great stuff.

I happen to be 1 of the people like that.

I could eat a donut a day or more, but I don't.

If I'd eaten all the donuts I wanted to, I'd probably be dead by now.

He went on the web and he became real and genuine.

He said, my dad makes great baked goods, but no one's coming by.

This is the address, and we're having a tough time, and it's great stuff.

And that was followed by thousands and thousands of people and all of a sudden he had interest and it was on the web so it went anywhere.

What made Billy's tweet about his dad's empty donut shop so compelling was its earnestness.

The tweet seemed incredibly honest and genuine, which is why Twitter picked up on it.

And so people pick up on passion, they pick up on things.

03 When to Preach Persuasive Appeals for Decision

Father in heaven, we pray that your blessing would be with us today.

We ask in a very special way that you would help us to understand this material and the urgency of preaching appeals for decision.

We ask for your spirit to guide us in everything that's said and shared.

And to your name's honor and glory, we pray, amen.

It's very important that we give these appeals.

In the Bible we read in 2 Corinthians 6 and verse 2, for he says, and the Lord is quoting from the book of Isaiah chapter 49 verse 8, to begin with, in an acceptable time I have heard you.

And our time is always now, to reach Him.

And when we reach out to God, God immediately hears us.

Wherever we are, no matter the emergency, no matter what has been going on in our life, or what could go on in our life, God is always there.

And in the day of salvation, I have helped you.

If we need salvation, and we all do, I mean, I renew that covenant with God every day, don't you?

And so in that day of salvation, that acceptable time, God has heard us.

And so the Apostle Paul, in his brief commentary on Isaiah chapter 49, he says, behold, now is the accepted time.

We're here by the grace of God day by day.

And we don't know the end from the beginning.

We cannot presume ever that we have beyond today or even beyond the hour.

Moment by moment, we want to be right with God.

So today, we're going to be talking about the importance of that appeal, and how often, and when we should be giving that appeal.

Let's go back to this lead text for today.

I've asked our Ministerial Director of the Michigan Conference, Elder Cody Francis, to give us a sample appeal.

Elder Francis has been a professor at Heartland College prior to coming here and pastoring in this state, and now being the director of our pastoral force here in Michigan, we really appreciate you.

And We appreciate you at camp meeting because you are superintending the audio visual department.

There's a lot going on in our lead pastor's life.

I appreciate the time you're giving our class.

But the time limit is right, and it begins now.

I wish I could be in the class the whole time because this is, you know, giving appeals and calling for decisions is 1 of the key things in giving Bible studies or preaching or anything like that and is being able to lead people to see the importance of making a decision and You said you're going to be talking today about when to make a pose.

I'm sure you'll read some statements, but every time we share something, any time we give a message, there should be some type of appeal.

That appeal is going to be different every time.

And I believe even when we have family worship, we should grab their something from it and say, you know what, we want to follow this.

It's not the same as making an appeal at an evangelistic series or something like that, but saying, what have we learned?

Okay, maybe we've learned we need to be kinder today or something like that.

So it really is going to vary based on what you are, what context you're in.

And We all have different ways of making appeals, of sharing, because God's gifted us all.

For me, my favorite way is painting a biblical picture and asking for a decision based on that biblical picture.

Some people can go with this long story, drawn out stories, and sometimes I try that.

It's not my strength, and so I don't dwell there very often, But if I can paint a store a picture from the Bible and ask people to make a decision based on that Then that's what I'm most comfortable in and there's lots of things that we can paint pictures from the Bible and ask for a decision So there's different stories you can end with.

There's different stories that you can use.

My absolute favorite is the second coming.

So when I'm preaching evangelistic meetings, probably I'm going to have, every week or so, I'm gonna have an appeal of some type based on the second coming.

I'm gonna keep coming back to the second coming.

And it'll be different based on where we are in the series as far as how I would present it or I would start my first week and I would present about the second coming in there as, and we would be laying groundwork for why the, why we believe in a personal, literal, visible second coming and not a disappearing, although 20 years ago that used to be much bigger than it is today.

It seems like we don't need to hit that quite as much as we do today.

But I would begin with, you know, saying imagine what that's gonna be like.

Imagine you're looking up and you see a little cloud coming and it comes closer and closer and as you're looking there you can see and there's a, you begin to see a bright shining light and clouds of angels there, and it comes closer and closer.

And the earth is shaking, there's convulsions in the earth, every mountain and island are being moved out of their places.

Imagine looking up and as you look up, There's Jesus.

Our friend, the 1 that died for us, the 1 that gave everything for us, he's coming back for us.

And imagine the sky being full of the glory of God, 10, 000 times 10, 000 of angels.

But when Jesus comes, there's going to be 2 groups of people.

And the Bible records those 2 groups of people.

Some are going to look up and they're gonna say, this is our God.

We have waited for him and he will save us.

But there's another group that are gonna run.

They're gonna run to the mountains and to the caves of the earth.

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Prophetic Preaching and Persuasive Appeals for Decision

05 The Holy Spirit Makes Appeals Appealing

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