We had a situation last Wednesday night at church. I was home sick w/ the kids, so I missed it. We had a lady come to the church. It was her second time there. She asked prayer for her father who was dying w/ cancer. I think, dh asked her to come up front to stand in for him. Anyway, she ended up at the altar. Of course, dh prayed w/ her. Others came up to pray w/ her as well. At our church, “those that will or feel led to pray” have been allowed to come, pray with, & lay hands on people. It’s usually been the leaders of the church, so there has never been a problem.
Anyway, dh felt led of the Holy Spirit to ask about her personal salvation. Apparently, the others around her started pulling at her in different directions. Her best friend was at her side, trying to pull her to her knees, begging her to repent. The lady on the side of her was trying to talk to her. And or course, our wonderful C.A. was in there w/ his two cents. Dh told everyone to back off & just pray.
On Saturday night, we were at a church family’s home when the situation was mentioned. (This family is a solid Christian, Spirit-filled family, but they have only been attending our church for about 2 months.) Apparently, the C.A. called them & started talking about the issues that he has w/ the church. In particular, he mentioned the incident on Wednesday night. He said that he spoke w/ this woman later, and that she was very uncomfortable w/ what happened on Wednesday. I would be, too. Dh was. Anyway the C.A. said that the pastor went too far & was pressuring her. (All dh did was ask once about her personal salvation.) “She may not come back because of the pastor.” The woman that he had the telephone conversation w/ told him that she thought the pastor was in the right & listening to the Holy Spirit. Ugh, the man drives me absolutely positively crazy
My question for everyone is: Do you have guidelines for your altar workers? Who can come up & pray for people? We’ve thought about coming up w/ some kind of training / policy, etc. As always, I appreciate your input.
Our former church handled this issue wonderfully. When they felt the spirit leading toward an altar time, pastor would ask the altar workers (called "prayer counselors" which are people who have gone thru a few altar worker classes) and they came up first. Then the people were encouraged to come up for prayer. Pastor would mention that the people (counselors) were trained to pray for your needs and I think that helped those who needed prayer. then knew who they were approaching were approved of by pastor so it saves scenarios like that somewhat. But the problem is it is hard sometimes to prevent some of the madness it seems. As far as heading it off. Sometimes I have seen dh or pastor call individuals by name like "sis jackie I need you to come help me pray with this dear lady." But to answer your questions we did have guidelines and a course they had to complete to be considered "altar ministers" Rod Parlsey's church was wonderful at that. I was going thru those classes before we left Bible college there. It is usually an effective means of hand picking your prayer warriors and in a round about way letting others know not to get too involved in it because it is understood about classes are required. Does that make sense. Just like a small group leader. They had to finish a little class thing. And after a few seasons of people hearing announcements about an altar workers class or a small group leaders class they kind of understand they ought to go thru the class if they want to minister in that area and they restrain themselves usually since they know they havent done it yet. But you still ahd individuals who felt led to pray with others one on one and you kind of have to hope they are saying right things by how well you can guage their spirituality. I think there were always those who made pastor nervous. They were just loose cannons! Hard to handle. Was that a long way to say there is no easy answer or what! lol
We do as Cassandra described. Our pastors, board and ministry leaders know as well that they are all to be read as altar workers at any time. This pretty much covers it. When my dh is concerned that the wrong person might get ahold of somebody he does as Cassandra suggests: "Sis Jackie, please come and pray for this lady..." Even if the "wrong" person is standing there with them, he will announce, "Sis. so and so, come and pray for this person" and then the person who already went to them usually steps aside, but if not, one of our ushers would gently direct him/her aside.
The other thing I would add is to make sure you all have each other's backs! At our church (especially with the kids and youth!) we discourage one-on-one "private" prayer - where someone will pull a leader aside for a private conversation or counseling session. If one worker or leader sees that happening, they will go over to the area so there are at least three people there. It's for the protection of everyone involved...
It's sad to even have to bring that up, but in this day and age, it really does need to be addressed! People will use anything - even prayer - to try to bring someone down!!
