You ever hear the phrase... "there's always room for Jello"?
Man... there's always time for teaching.
I think too much is done in the heat of the moment these days. It is almost like... hey lets dunk them before they change their mind. Well if you only have a few minutes window of time before they change their mind then how deep is this conversion?
I don't mean a 3 week bible study before you baptize them. I don't even mean wait until another night. But I think people need (and they even appreciate) someone taking the time to sit down for a few minutes and explain what all this is that is going on here.
We once had an evangelist come in who, when he would go and pray for people, would stop them and ask if they had repented. He explained what repentance was, what it was for, why we needed to do it, and all that... They would then repent (if they hadn't done so before) and he would continue praying for them.
I don't remember any of the numbers from the revival.... sorry.
But these people then actually understood more about what was going on.
Quite often people feel something VERY real but are confused as all get out because they don't know what's going on.
Whew... a few minutes can make a world of difference.
What's the hurry? Fear? Whatever is not of faith is sin.
It is the word that is going to change their lives. It is the spirit that is going to give them the power to accomplish it.
Don't let them walk off into that water... don't let them be put under that water calling on that name... don't let them do this... without first making sure that they, at least in some measure, comprehend the unbelievable, merciful, powerful, life changing thing that is about to happen.
There are several things in life too beautiful to just fly off in a mad rush into... this is certainly one of them.