For many, the terminology of getting saved and being reborn is familiar and deeply meaningful. For me, it’s not. Growing up, I was raised in a PC(USA) congregation and this language was not used to indoctrinate me. One summer, I attended another church’s Vacation Bible School with one of my friends from school. I know they were some breed of Baptist and that VBS is the the only time I remember interacting with that church. During VBS, the leaders and my friend’s mom discussed with me about when I had been saved. As a child, this confused me. I thought that Jesus had always been in my heart and that I had been saved 2,000 years before on the cross. Since I couldn’t recall a specific time and date in which I was saved, they told me I wasn’t actually a Christian yet because I hadn’t been reborn. I never quite understood this and have struggled with this language ever since. Being saved and reborn is very much a part of the PCEA religious culture. Like many other things that have stood out to me in the PCEA, I think this is a remnant of missionary culture that manifested itself in Kenyan religious practice over a century ago. In order to be considered a person of faith here, one must made a public prayer of repentance and continually profess their faith every time they encounter another Christian. When we do home visits in the districts, the lesson always shifts to an altar call if someone present is not a professing believer. I can always tell the direction the lesson is going before Pastor makes his point. I try not to stare at the person whose about to get a lecture on sin, but I always find myself looking at them to see how they react. They usually look just as uncomfortable as I feel. It seems so invasive to go into someone’s home and preach repentance at them. The way in which this invitation is presented feels more like discipline than freely given love. It’s always cringeworthy. I’m often called upon to pray for people who have just turned down Pastor George’s invitation to repentance. How does one do such a thing? I try not to use the same language if hellfire and repentance. Instead, I pray that the person would come to know Christ and would be open to it when right time comes. But, following the repentance lecture, it still feels so wrong.
After hearing Pastor George preach repentance at more people than I can count, this is the first and only person I’ve seen “get saved” through this approach. The man is pictured praying a prayer of repentance and asking Jesus to come into his heart. It was difficult for me to determine how sincere this prayer actually was. I feel bad questioning it, but the man’s father (who is also a deacon) was standing next to me and the man’s son was behind him (yellow shirt) watching this happen. I struggle to understand if this was a pressured public profession of faith or a transformative moment of rebirth in this man’s life. I believe that God is at work in all circumstances - including this method of evangelism - but I still struggle with it. I’ve prayed similar prayers with children before at conference and during other internships. I see the beauty in it because I was present for those special moments in the lives of the young people I’ve worked with. But, those prayers never came after speeches that threatened Hell. They never came after these folks preached at instead of being preached to. They never came after being cornered about faith in front of several witnesses. The young people that I’ve seen pray that prayer did it after a transformative encounter with the Living God who used a circumstance to “save” a life rather than a lecture. For me, that’s what “getting saved” should really look like. ~ Nell in Nairobi