Leading Someone in a Prayer to Follow Jesus Online
Have you ever had the opportunity to lead someone to Jesus?
To give you some insight as to what this looks like in an online environment, here are the basic principles that we use when we have the opportunity to introduce an explorer to Jesus.
It’s important to guide the explorers’ step by step, as it’s often really new, and we don’t want to rush or make them feel uncomfortable. Once we have asked them if they would like a relationship with Jesus, we send them one of the video links below which provides some understanding. Our response team take time to consider what video might best suit the explorer.
If they are ready, we help lead them in prayer. These are the steps we would follow:
Ask what questions they have and if they understand what they are doing before you both start.
Let them know you can lead them in talking to God.
If they are OK with this you can say something like “I will type out a prayer for you line by line for you to speak out loud to God”.
Ask if they are ready to pray.
Once they say yes then say something like “OK let’s start…".
Type the prayer out line by line, It doesn't have to be the prayer below. It’s better to type a prayer relating to what they are saying. Here is an example of a possible prayer you might use:
Dear God,
Thanks for creating me. Thank you that you died for me and rose again, defeating sin and death. I would like to follow you. Please forgive me for turning away from you And for all the things that I have done that I know were wrong (spend a little bit of time saying sorry for anything that specifically comes to mind)… ….ok to continue with the rest of the prayer? (wait for a response).
I want to hand my life over to you and follow you. I give you my mind, my will and my emotions. I now receive the offer of a new life that you give me. Please teach me your ways. Amen.
Ask them how they are feeling/doing. Spend time listening to their experience.
Talk to them about what they can do now. Options would be church connections, Alpha courses or helpful blogs that they can continue to grow with. We help them with this rather than just leaving it for themselves to figure out.
All of this starts with a simple invitation, asking explorers if they would like to make a decision to follow Jesus (make Jesus their boss). It’s a two-way conversation and an invitation with no pressure.
