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The Salvation War of 2020
by Captain Thom Moffitt

 

Soldier –– I write to you today from a sort of exile; a place of watching and waiting. For many of us previously on the front lines, these past 10 years we have seen a season of subverting retreat, but I write to you in hope and expectation of revival and much grace; that the Lord’s Kingdom will come – His will be done in this new year.

 

As I look in retrospect to the Salvation War of 2020, we took casualties, probably more than at any time in our history. And while these weaknesses became more evident in 2020 due to heightened circumstance of that year, I fear we were moving in that direction for almost a decade before. Now, a decade later, with 2020 vision, we realize the toll it has taken – or at least some of us do.

 

One could argue the economic and cultural circumstance gave permission to leaders who further separated the preaching of the gospel from meeting human need. Reconnecting the two may prove the most difficult task ahead.

 

There was special attention given to any one of us who spoke out against the false teachings of economic salvation and the impulse to balance power, yet I maintain whereas equality of opportunity is Biblical, equality of outcome is a false god.

 

Many in our ranks looked to the world’s ideas and ideologies as a new standard instead of Christ, bending to the world’s judgement in hopes of being accepted. We were taught by example to stop exposing flaws in other worldviews – some were shamed into recording taped confessions to that end. We abandoned objective truth for poetic truth, and before long it destroyed morale.

 

We got into the habit of reacting with an overtly legal social desirability bias; responding to culture with consideration of how our position would be interpreted rather than replying truthfully.  General Booth’s “subjugation of the world to the sway of the Lord” was all but abandoned; replaced by the idea that Christians need to borrow from secular ideologies to be better Christians. This became the new normal.

 

I trust you know this… that your conviction is true. If 2030 will see revival, we must get back to the “covenant” concept as the key to understanding the Bible and history and the basis of Christian living. We must rediscover the purpose of our movement and revive one of our most distinctive features; the spirit of attack – desperate unflinching assault on the strongholds of evil.[1] We must restore the word “aggressive” to our vocabulary, and be willing to stand alone, grasping the standard even in death.[2]

 

Whatever treaties may have been signed, I urge you dear friend, keep advancing.[3] There’s still plenty of fighting to be done. Go! Win the world for Jesus!

 

Undaunted,

Major Moffitt

 



[1] The thought, borrowed from Catherine Bramwell-Booth’s “Trumpets of the Lord” reads in quotation: “Never must we lose sight of the fact that the spirit of attack is one of the distinctive features of The Salvation Army. Was it not, in fact, this that brought the Army into existence? There were already churches and chapels and mission halls. There was probably more religious observance than now, an abundance of preaching, any amount of routine business of what is called Christian service. That which was lacking – that which gave birth to the Army – was desperate unflinching assaults on the strongholds of evil outside.”

[2] Frederick Booth-Tucker’s idea comes from “Life of Catherine Booth, Vol. 2” and reads: “Those who are led in the fight must be prepared to see their comrades fall, and run as well as the enemy, and must be willing to stand alone, if need be, grasping the standard even in death.”

[3] The original quote from George Scott Railton is from “Heathen England”: “Whatever treaties may be signed or broken, we shall keep advancing.”

 

  

 

 

   

 

 

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