Walking the Aisle.

     I do agree with this article. I think that altar calls can be good, but they can also be bad.  They can be good because they lead people to Christ, but they are bad because normally when there are altar calls, they are after a very emotional speech about being a follower of Christ and it's almost manipulative(which is not a good way to lead people to Christ). 

     For all my life, I have been around altar calls and thought they have been perfectly fine, but now i don't think that really. Now that I think about it, all the altar calls i've watched where A TON of people came to Christ were at camps and things like the last night. At Falls Creek for example. This was my first year to ever go, and the speaker was Mike Keabone. He is an awesome man, but I'm not sure if his motive for his altar calls were quite right, I don't know for sure what his motives really were, but it seemed as if he was trying to manipulate the non-Christians to believing in Christ.  I mean he got people's attention! He was a VERY charismatic speaker, and I'm sure that he caught the non-Christians attention, and the last night of Falls Creek was the night where the most people went to the altar. It was right after he spent an hour talking about becoming a Christian. And to end the sermon, he said something like, "Now if any of you are thinking about coming to know Christ, come down to the front now, and if your scared to, ask a friend to come with you."  Then after a while he would say, "Now if you still want to accept Christ but are scared to, come down now."

     I think this is almost a bad motive for having an altar call. It seems to me, looking back on it, that he almost maninpulated the people to coming to know the Lord. I'm sure there were some that really did become a Christian, but I bet you most of them that went up to the front went back to living the way they used to when they went back home. I think it would be better if the speakers would just give an example prayer and have the people pray to God and not go to the front, so then they won't feel as pressured. I'm sure at camp setting a lot of the kids that do go down to the altar are pressured to be their peers.