How do I make my friend a Christian?
That’s a provocative question! Someone asking that question probably has the right motive, yet the phrasing implies a misunderstanding of the process of salvation.
My oldest son has just started a band with his friends at school. One of those friends isn’t a Christian, and my son asked me, “Dad, how do I make my friend a Christian?” In this context, I loved hearing this question. We got to talk about the different things he could do to help his friend discover the grace of God. Two key words in that last sentence are ‘help’ and ‘discover’ and I want to talk more about how important they are now.
“Helping our friends discover the grace o God.”
The scriptures are very clear that it is God who saves and not us. That is why we emphasise the idea of helping our friends because we can’t save them on our own. Nobody except God can save. In the same sense, nobody can reveal the truth about Jesus to anybody either. We can talk about Jesus and share experiences of Him, but to truly reveal who He is for others to know in their heart that Jesus is Lord and Saviour is the work of the Spirit.
When it comes to God revealing Himself to people, theologians identify two ways that God does this. The first is General Revelation and the second is Special Revelation. General Revelation describes God’s way of revealing Himself to humanity through creation. Psalm 19:1 says, “The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands”, and Romans 1:20 says, “God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen…so that people are without excuse.” Both scriptures tell us that God has generally revealed Himself to all humanity. This relates to people who believe in a God but don’t really have a genuine faith.
Special Revelation, on the other hand, is God specifically revealing Jesus as Messiah to people. Again, only God can do this. When Jesus asked Peter who he thought He was, Peter replied “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.” Jesus then replied, “this was not revealed to you by flesh and blood, but by my Father in heaven” (Mat. 16:16-18). Peter didn’t have a nominal belief in God, but now had a specific belief in Jesus as the Son of God. It’s not that much of a stretch to generally believe in God. In fact, most of society won’t have a problem with you for that. However, to believe in Jesus as the Son of God is different and draws the line between what society sees as acceptable to what can be considered outrageous. Think about it, is it rational to believe in a person who existed 2000-plus years ago, who lived, died, came back to life, and now communicates to us through an invisible Spirit? Only God can reveal this kind of truth to us in a way that we accept as completely true.
Another scripture worth highlighting is John 6:44, where Jesus says, “No one can come to me [Jesus] unless the Father draws them.” What this tells us is that it is, again, only God, who can take people from general revelation to special revelation. So, it is God who generally makes Himself known to people, God who draws people to Jesus, and God who reveals Jesus. In other words, God is in control of the whole process.
A question begins to emerge, “So what part do we play if God is doing everything?”
“General revelation is a blurry truth about God that only comes into focus through the revelation of Jesus Christ”
The amazing thing is that although we can’t do what only God can do, we are invited into the journey of God drawing somebody to Himself through salvation in Jesus. The Great Commission in Matthew 28
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