This was the popular approach in many evangelical churches for decades. A denial of the really important aspects of Biblical salvation (after all, repentance has never been popular!) in a quest for numbers. Preachers attending conferences and boasting of how many decisions and how many baptisms they had in their churches the past week, month, year.
However, those of us who come of late onto the scene find that none of those they got to decide and few of those they baptized are anywhere to be found today. Church rolls full of the names of those who haven't darkened the door of any church for decades. As a Baptist, I am chagrined whenever we receive a request for a "letter of recommendation" from a sister church for someone I don't even know (and I have pastored the same church for over 12 years!). I take these requests to business meeting, and ask if anyone, anyone at all, knows who this person is. I have yet to have anyone come up with something more concrete than a maybe. As a result, I send a letter to the requesting church telling them that we are glad they are ministering to this person now, and that we will be removing them from our roll (if we can find them at all). A Letter of Recommendation? How do you grant a "recommendation" in cases like this?
Reminds me of a certain conversation just before Christmas about a fellow who thinks that decisions build character.