In the book 1929 by
General Larsson there is this quote from the Founder to his successor in a
letter presented to Bramwell immediately after being named General (hat tip
CH).
"Persevere on
the lines of aggression. Beware of stagnation. Set a watch against
the natural conservatism of character--you must go forward on the lines of
conquest or you must perish."
There you go.
Are we persevering on
the lines of aggression? Is what you are doing in your daily life
aggressive? Does your schedule resemble perseverance on the lines of
aggression? Is it something that the demon’s wake up to every morning
cringing? Is it something that the victims of oppression wake up to every
morning with hope?
Are you wary about
sliding into stagnation? It is easy to get into a routine that quickly
solidifies into a rut. If you are stagnating, challenge yourself.
Throw some curves into your schedule. Maybe add a midnight war room
shift. Maybe add another weekly evangelistic foray. Maybe aim to
evangelise all of your friends/workmates/classmates by the end of September.
Maybe determine to read the New Testament twice this month. Maybe read
your soldiers covenant daily in September.
Let’s advance on the
lines of conquest. First, conquer your own life. Get sanctified.
Determine your life according to God’s revelation and teaching. Live
intentionally. Fight zealously.
Then you can help
sort out others. People in your DisCo (discipleship covenant group) will
benefit from your success. Your disciples will. Your comrades as
the corps will. Your family and friends will. Those you are
evangelizing will. And so on.
----
The kingdom of God is
at hand.
----
Now, we recognize
that the Founder was writing to the second general regarding the salvation war
of The Salvation Army. So, some broad comments are pertinent, here.
Beware of stagnation.
Wow. In some
places we’ve fallen into it. We punch the clock, fill in the order of
meeting, sleepwalk through it and the rest of the week without expecting God to
show up in any way that will inconvenience us, let alone turn our world upside
down. In some places we major on the trivial. We have policies
about how long we can talk on the phone long distance and how many courses you
have to take before we can leave you with another ‘qualified’ adult in a car to
drive home some kids from Sunday School and how many days we can take off.
Our priorities, as
measured by the pages of our magazines, foci of our websites, appointments on
our calendars, goals of our strategies – in some places – shout ‘stagnation’.
We’re satisfied with the status quo. Our mercy seats are clean and dry.
We excel at fellowships and ‘club’ activities, we focus on enriching ourselves,
we pretend that our music if for others and the Lord, and we convince ourselves
that people were ‘blessed’ (so we can sleep at night).
Beware of stagnation.
----
Holy. now.
----
‘Watch against the
natural conservatism of character’.
The Salvation Army
enjoys an excellent reputation. We have great credibility. Praise
God for those who boldly and faithfully fought over the last 147 years or so to
establish this profile.
With some exceptions,
though, we don’t leverage our considerable reputation and credibility to ‘persevere
on the lines of aggression’. Instead of exploiting it, we protect it.
We treasure the favour we enjoy. We avoid strategies that would threaten
the status quo in society. We make rationalizations that we are working
behind the scenes to accomplish the same ends. We fail to watch against
the natural conservatism of character.
Wake up!
We’re not aiming to
please society but our Saviour. We’re not looking to win kudos but to win
converts. We’re not shooting for a slot on another top ten list (of
enduring institutions, top charities, best organizations) but a spot in the
hall of faith.
So, what to do?
Well, after we take
care of conquering ourselves, let’s leverage. Let’s fight against evil.
Let’s risk everything for the Gospel. Let’s pour our resources – people,
reputation, networks, infrastructure, cash, properties, etc. – into the
salvation war NOW, instead of building up a nest egg that will ultimately rot
away.
One way to fight the
natural conservatism of character is to aim to invest everything we have into
the salvation war now – aiming to win while we live in this town, have this
appointment, while we are in this decade. If the decade is out and we
haven’t poured everything we have into the war, have we any reason to be
surprised or disappointed that the war hasn’t been won?
Stephen
Court
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