How the Holy Spirit Draws People to Christ

How God Gets Our Attention

We all have different stories about how we came to Christ. When we look closely, those stories reveal something beautiful about how the Holy Spirit draws people to Jesus. For some of us, we can barely remember a time when we weren't faithful followers of Jesus. For others it was only after a long and painful process of God getting our attention.

"God draws each of us to Himself in ways perfectly suited to our hearts, but His call is never without sacrifice; it confronts, transforms, and demands a response."

As Jesus said, “No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him” (John 6:44). What draws people to Jesus? Churches rightly focus on love, but sometimes it is to the exclusion of almost everything else. Certainly, God is love and Jesus does love us, but does the Holy Spirit use different means to bring us to Jesus? Absolutely He does, and some may be quite surprising. While love is central to the Gospel, it is not the only way God awakens a heart.

What is Conversion?

First let's talk about what conversion is not. It is not simply an agreement that God exists, it is not a detailed knowledge of theology, it is not becoming a nice person, and it is not necessarily a deeply emotional moment in time. What conversion is, is a change of heart. It is repentance and faith in Jesus Christ. The Lord looks at the heart because that is where true worship comes from.

Our heart is changed so deeply that it changes our entire life and way of thinking. We become sorrowful over our sin. Not because we know sin produces unpleasant consequences but because sin hurts the heart of God. Sin sent His Son to the cross. We love others because He loved us. We see ourselves growing, perhaps slowly, to become more like Him. Our motivations change. Our desires become His desires.

Because He knows us so well He knows what we will respond to. His Spirit faithfully draws and calls us to Him in all manner of ways, and we are free to respond. Something that might make another person flee from Him will cause another to desire Him. How was your call? That nudging of the Holy Spirit can begin in many ordinary ways.

Perhaps you remembered an old familiar hymn from childhood that suddenly spoke to you like it never had before. Or you looked at a sunset one day and for the first time saw God's hand at work and knew He could work in your heart as well. Maybe you were on the streets, alone, strung out and at the very end of your rope, when a caring person reached out a hand to help and shared God. Each of us makes our way to the Gospel when we accept Jesus, but we don't all arrive at the foot of the cross the same way.

Then Peter said to them, “Repent, and let every one of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins; and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. For the promise is to you and to your children, and to all who are afar off, as many as the Lord our God will call.” Acts 2:38-39

When the Call Is Confrontational

For Paul, his conversion was quite different from the loving, sort of gentle Jesus. This Jesus knocked him to the ground and plainly spoke to him, "Saul, Saul why do you persecute me?" Only after this encounter did Paul realize God's love for him. The Holy Spirit knew the type of call that Paul needed to reach his rebellious heart.

I believe that many people need to hear what I would call the plain truth of the Gospel. A.W. Tozer once wrote, “Christ calls men to carry a cross; we call them to have fun in His name.” In some of our churches today, the call can seem too easy, with little discussion about the change the power of the Holy Spirit should bring to our lives.

The Gospel does not flatter us; it confronts us. It does not merely comfort; it calls us to repentance and surrender. Jesus tells us to "count the cost" when we follow Him because there will be one (Luke 14:28-33). Sometimes God even uses suffering and persecution to change hearts and draw people to Himself.

When Suffering Becomes the Seed

There is an expression you may have heard, "the blood of the martyrs is the seed of the Church." This is a quote from Tertullian in about 197 A.D. What Tertullian was saying is that the death and persecution of Christians led to conversions. The idea comes from John 12:24 where Jesus says,

"Very truly I tell you, unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds".

Because persecution often causes the church to go underground, it spreads and springs up in new places. Also, when people see Christians facing torture and death with peace, rejoicing in their Savior, it drives people to want to know what these Christians have that they do not. Growth in the church almost always follows persecution, from the first century to today. Surprisingly, some people have even experienced hearing the voice of the Lord speaking to them.

A Voice in the Garden

The life of the great St. Augustine is another unusual story of conversion. He was 40 years old and had lived a life of worldly pleasures with women and wine. One day as he sat outside in the garden he noticed a Bible lying next to him. He later said he heard a voice saying, "Take up and read," which he believed was from God. Thus began a transformation that would impact the lives of millions.

Questions That Would Not Go Away

In modern times we read the story of Rosaria Butterfield. To quote her, "As a leftist lesbian professor, I despised Christians. Then I somehow became one." After she published an article attacking the faith, she received a reply from a pastor that wasn't hate mail, nor did it really try to defend the faith. Instead, he asked questions that made her think. She threw the letter away but retrieved it because she couldn't stop thinking about the questions it asked.

Eventually she became friends with the pastor and opened her heart to Jesus. Now she is a wife and mother, having left her lesbian lifestyle behind. She travels the country speaking about this Jesus who transformed her life forever.

Dreams in the Darkest Places

Perhaps some of the most unusual conversion stories occurring worldwide are those of Muslims coming to Christ through dreams. Out of 600 Muslim converts, 25 percent experienced a dream that led to their conversion, according to Mission Frontiers magazine. There are thousands of these stories. Some may question their validity, but in many of these countries Christianity is banned or it is difficult to hear the Gospel.

The Holy Spirit works how He will to bring people to Christ. We know faith comes by hearing the Word (Romans 10:17). These dreams commonly lead people to seek out the Gospel and many experience legitimate conversion by faith and repentance.

I am reminded of Acts 2:17,

"And it shall come to pass in the last days, says God, That I will pour out of My Spirit on all flesh; Your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, Your young men shall see visions, Your old men shall dream dreams."

The Gospels have several examples of God speaking to people in dreams or visions; among them are Mary and Joseph and Pilate's wife in the Gospels, and Cornelius and Stephen in the book of Acts. One modern story is the following.

An Afghan Muslim woman, living in Greece, saw a bright white light in her dream and heard these words,

“My daughter, my daughter, the door is open for you. Come!” She replied, “The door is closed!” Again the voice called to her, “I am the Son of God, Jesus. The door is open for you, my daughter. I am the door!”

After telling the pastor who had urged her to pray for God to speak to her, she realized that Jesus was truly alive. She shared Bibles from the pastor with her friends and insisted they read it. She wanted to share the peace and joy she had found for herself in following Jesus.

How the Holy Spirit Draws People to Christ

Regardless of how the Holy Spirit, moves people to come to Jesus, He certainly knows and uses the most effective tools. Perhaps it was a gentle Sunday School teacher when you were a child, devout parents, or a rousing revival service where you felt His call on your life. Or maybe it was a more unusual way, through dreams, visions, a voice, or seeing persecution. The church should be aware that all of us are not called in the same way.

How did you become a Christian? Do you have a unique story? Our God knew us before we were born and loved us while we were still sinners so much that Christ died for us. When we reflect on our own story, we begin to see how the Holy Spirit draws people to Christ in ways perfectly suited to each heart. Who has a story as incredible and beautiful as that?