We Need Officers ATTRITION SERIES XXII

Part Two

What then is a vision? 

Vision is perceiving God’s will in the ongoing life of His Church.  It is the act of seeking to translate God’s will in the progressive life of His body.  Vision occurs as we earnestly focus on God’s ‘alternative’ to our status quo.  And the vision must never be confined to present circumstances or the ‘vision’ will forever be small.  Elton Trueblood stated, when speaking of the Church in a 1983 interview:  ‘Christ did not seek to build a little thing.  The chief way you and I are disloyal to Him is when we make small what He intended to make large.’

God, the Holy Spirit sees us as we are, assesses our needs and then supplies all we need.  Our stewardship lies in the acceptance of who we are, perceiving what we have been given by God, and with His leading, utilizing and making it ‘large’ for His glory.  God has already supplied the Army with  all the evangelistic tools needed to fulfill that part of His great commission assigned to us.  There is, however, , one thing lacking and that is an abundance of time.  And here I don’t want to imply Christ’s imminent return – I have no such insight.  I mean only that we ought to have about us both a sense of urgency and a sense of  indignation.

Stott says:  ‘Every Christian ought to weep at the very sound of the word Hell!’  Am I sufficiently mindful that friends and neighbours are bound for Hell?  Am I indignant enough about the troop losses, and about the state of my Corps and our involvement in rescuing the perishing?  Are we moving quickly enough from organization to involvement?

Divine indignation coupled with divine compassion are emotions clearly seen in the life and ministry of Jesus.  He perceived the conditions in which people lived, physically and spiritually, as unacceptable to His Father.  In Him was found a powerful seeking for an alternative.  It was this same twofold combination which served to move William and Catherine Booth into visionary action 125 years ago.  And it is the same divine combination that can serve to fuel and ignite dormant  salvific hope and ambition in today’s Christian soldier.

Booth wrote:  ‘The supreme purpose of Christ’s life was, and still is, to save the world.  Is this what you are living for?  Will you leave the masses where you found them?  Heaven forbid.  Go and be compassionate with them.  Go and represent Jesus Christ to them.  Go, and a great Army shall stand up to live and fight and die for the Living God.  What is the Army’s future?’  asked Booth.  He answers his own question this way:  ‘That depends on the Army.  If she is energetic and faithful and steadfast, she will go branching this and that way, going from great to greater things.  If she is slothful and slackens her zeal, she will perish.’

Like Booth, we too must seek to understand and translate God’s vision; to seek our own way into divine indignation with the status quo.  We must ask God, the Holy Spirit to reveal His dissatisfaction.  And we must pray that He will inspire our indignation sufficiently that we will go out and be compassionate.

Can the tide be turned?  Booth has answered for us all.  Let’s remain faithful and steadfast, never slackening the zeal.  And what does faithfulness entail?  It requires that we soldiers of Jesus Christ walk daily with God in good times and bad, offering our hands in Christ-fired compassion, being certain our hearts are tuned to God’s directives, and keeping our ears constantly and compassionately alert, listening to the needs of those around us.

Sven Ljungholm
Birkenhead Corps UKIT