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The
Salvo Way: In Defence of The Salvation Army System
by Major Stephen Court
It’s not trendy.
And for those who grew up with it or are quite familiar
with it, the Army system, with its unique vocabulary and
peculiar traditions, might even been regarded as defunct.
Corps Sergeant-Majors?
Recruiting Sergeants?
Quarter Masters? I
mean, come on!
But our discipleship and
leader training system, from junior soldiers through corps
cadets, into senior soldier training and local officership and
corps council, complete with orders and regulations, followed
by options in candidateship and officer training, works.
Part of the problem is
that we’ve forgotten what we are.
As Major Harold Hill explains, in “Four Anchors From
The Stern” (http://www.armybarmy.com/JAC/article2-64.html):
The Army’s own history, the history and doctrine of the
church, the pattern of sociology, the Word of Scripture, all
testify against any great need to be “a church”. Our own
history provides us with a clear precedent for retaining our
identity without resorting to denominationalism; the history
and doctrine of the church provide an ecclesiological and
theological base, the sociology of religious movements
provides a rationale, and Scripture provides a mandate.
We are not a social agency
only. We are not a
church. We are not
a denomination. We
are an order.
And we have orders and
regulations, not suggestions and recommendations.
‘Obedience to properly
constituted authority is the foundation of all moral
excellence’ (Catherine Booth). That is fine in regard to
ethics. But Florence Booth takes it further when she
testifies:
Looking back over 44 years of officership, it seems to me
impossible to speak too highly of the value and importance of
Salvation Army discipline…
I realised very clearly that if all leaders had a truer
idea, a stricter ideal, of obedience to rules and regulations,
a much greater advance would be made throughout the Army
world. (cited in A Field For Exploits, 2012)
This isn’t popular today.
But the issue is not that obedience to Orders and
Regulations has been tried and found wanting but found
‘irrelevant’ and ‘obsolete’ (and maybe a little too ‘hard’?)
and not tried.
Our desperation for
success has sometimes led us far astray from Salvationism.
You can possibly see for yourself corps in your
division more or less imitating the Baptists, Pentecostals,
and Anglicans and others (including poor substitutions of
‘church’ for ‘corps’, ‘service’ for ‘meeting’, ‘pastor’ for
‘officer’, ‘offering’ for ‘collection’, ‘committee’ for
‘council’, ‘member’ for ‘soldier’, etc.).
The problem is that most of these methods and terms
don’t work very well when clothed in Salvationism.
We are not free to make
things up on the fly.
We’re part of an Army.
We’re actually obligated to apply the Army system.
If you aren’t applying it, you are compromising The
Salvation Army and limiting the pace of advance of the
salvation war.
Applying non-salvo methods
and programmes with non-salvo doctrines and non-salvo theology
in attempts to mimic their success while we play the role
pastor and church is doomed to failure.
Strategically, it is
mistaken. The
significant majority of Canadians have voted with their feet
that ‘church’ is irrelevant.
Why would we pretend to be a church?
Biblically, it is
near-sighted.
There are all kinds of biblical metaphors for the people of
God – body, temple, vineyard, building, flock, etc.
But the Army of God is not a metaphor – it is not
compared to something it is not.
We are engaged in actual spiritual warfare.
Biblically we are on solid ground.
So, to present as a
‘church’ is neither accurate nor effective.
What goes for church goes
for its leaders.
In NIV 'pastor' turns up once - Ephesians 4:11, though the
Greek word 'poimen' appears 18 times in the New Testament, 17
times being translated 'shepherd'.
'Pastor' is a biblically rare synonym for the much more
popular 'shepherd', which it makes much more strategic and
biblical sense to use instead of the term ‘pastor’, packed as
it is with negative connotative accretions today.
…Oh wait, except that
shepherd relates to flock – a metaphor, in contrast with Army,
in a very real spiritual war against the forces of evil.
So, let's agree that
'pastor', being unbiblical and unpopular, is another term we
should avoid.
Let’s stop pretending.
Let’s embrace The Salvation Army.
Let’s embrace Salvationism, its leadership system and
structure (for more detail on this, see
http://www.armybarmy.com/JAC/article11-75.html).
We’re not embracing these
things out of tradition or loyalty or some desperate insane
stubbornness (or stubborn insanity).
It’s just that our crucified and resurrected Lord and
Savior, Jesus Christ,
has lavished His love on
us, transforming us from dreary, hopeless ne’er-do-wells
slouching to heaven into mighty warriors who live to fight and
fight with love, and has commissioned us to
this wonder-working, world-winning mission through this divine
marvel called, "The Salvation Army… the extremity of an
extraordinary imagination made history. The wildest dream of
the wildest dreamer materialized" (Evangeline Booth, The
World's Greatest Romance).
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Twitter.com/StephenCourt
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