some thoughts from Commissioner Robert Street

The following are all quotations from Commissioner Robert Street's holiness lecture last week in Finland:

I think theologians have made the doctrine of holiness more complicated than it should be

What is the point of magnificent theories if we know they do not work out day by day in the world in which we live?

Let us begin by quoting the Salvation Army’s 10th doctrine:
‘We believe that it is the privilege of all believers to be wholly sanctified, and that their whole spirit and soul and body may be preserved blameless till the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ’ (1 Thessalonians 5:23). The doctrine is a direct quote from Scripture.

In the late 1990s General Paul Rader set up the International Spiritual Life Commission. The Commission was made up of officers of all ranks, as well as some soldiers. Ages ranged from those in their 20s to those about to retire. Including corresponding members, about 22 people were involved. It held its meetings – over a period of 18 months - with the instruction to seek God’s mind on what should be at the heart of the Army’s spiritual life.

It will come as no surprise that ‘holiness of life’ was highlighted as being essential to the life of the Movement. It was among the ‘distinctives’ that were affirmed from all parts of the globe. It was not seen as an ‘optional extra’ for Christians – like a kind of luxury car wash instead of just the straightforward basic clean. Holiness of life was identified as being integral to ongoing Christian experience.
When the commission published its findings it made 12 specific calls to the Army throughout the world. The eleventh call urged Salvationists worldwide to ‘restate and live out the doctrine of holiness in all its dimensions – personal, relational, social and political – in the context of our cultures and in the idioms of our day while allowing for, and indeed prizing, such diversity of experience and expression as is in accordance with the Scriptures’. Holiness was seen as touching all areas of life. It is not ‘just a nice feeling’ or ‘experience’ that some Christians enjoy Holy living is something that permeates the whole of life.

The Salvation Army was born out of Wesleyan tradition, with its strong emphasis on the doctrine of holiness.

within two years of the Movement being named, William Booth called holiness a ‘fundamental truth’ of The Salvation Army. ‘It stands in the front rank of our doctrines,’ he said. ‘We inscribe it on our banners. Any officer who did not hold and proclaim the ability of Jesus Christ to save his people to the uttermost from sin and sinning, I should consider out of place among us’ (1880).
An American officer, Commissioner Samuel Logan Brengle, became a prolific writer and preacher on holiness. In The Holiness Standard of The Salvation Army, he wrote: ‘It is this holiness – the doctrines, the experience, the action – that we Salvationists must maintain, else we shall betray our trust; we shall lose our birthright; we shall cease to be a spiritual power in the earth.’ He saw the dangers and he gave his warning.
Brengle also emphasised the need for doctrine and experience to go hand in hand: ‘Without the doctrine, the standard, the teaching, we shall never find the experience, or having found it, we shall be likely to lose it. Without the experience we shall neglect the teaching, we shall doubt or despise the doctrine, we shall lower the standard.’ We need both and we need to emphasise both.
What is ‘the standard’? The recently-published Salvation Story begins its holiness chapter with this:
‘God’s purpose in saving us is to create in us the likeness of his Son, Jesus Christ, who is the true image of God. It is to impart the holiness of Jesus so that we may ‘participate in the divine nature’ (2 Peter 1:4). It is to make it possible for us to glorify God as Christ’s true disciples. It is to make us holy.’
This is the very heart of how The Salvation Army understands and portrays the life of holiness.

Salvation Story also makes further points:
‘Our salvation is assured as long as we continue to exercise faith in Jesus Christ. Such faith is expressed in obedience to his leadings, will and command. Obedience as a free-will choice is a consequence of faith, and without it, faith dies.
‘Our conversion inaugurates a journey during which we are being transformed into Christ’s likeness. Thus salvation is neither a state to be preserved nor an insurance policy which requires no further investment. It is the beginning of a pilgrimage with Christ. The pilgrimage requires from us the obedience of separation from sin and consecration to the purposes of God. This is why “obedient faith” is crucial: it makes pilgrimage possible.’

When someone comes into relationship with Jesus Christ, and is born of the Spirit (John 3:3-8), that person’s life is changed. That person is indwelt by God himself. The relationship is established. God has been invited to live his life within and through the life of the believer. The Apostle Paul describes it this way: ‘I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me’ (Colossians 2:20).
Salvation Story picks up this theme well: ‘The cross is at the heart of the holiness experience. It points the way to a radical new life. Scripture describes in dramatic terms our decisive dying to the old self and to sin, as we identify with Christ in his death for us, and recognise that in a profound sense we died in him.’
The experience of holiness cannot be realised without the willingness to die to self and be raised to new life by God’s Spirit. There is a tendency to avoid teaching this requirement, but without it holiness teaching and experience will have no real power or effectiveness. No death to self, no resurrection to new life.

Through the years we have sometimes failed to see that promotion of holy living – by our lives and by our teaching – gives the Army its spiritual energy.

we ask the question: how meaningful, purposeful and possible is holiness of life to us? How alive is it to us today within the Movement?

The Salvation Army, in recent years, declined to publish much of its own teaching material, music and songs. It had been thought prudent to use some of the other excellent material available. In some respects, that makes sense. In other respects, it has meant that gradually we ceased to emphasise the distinctives for which the Army was brought into being – holiness being one of them.

The songs we borrow from elsewhere have their own emphasis and they can be used to support our own, but as ‘our own’ are increasingly not being used, we are increasingly not singing about conquering the world for Jesus (having a wider vision than our own community church) and dedicating ourselves in specific sacrificial ways.
Holiness gives us a wider vision. When John Wesley said that there is no holiness without social holiness, he was reminding everyone that we cannot be holy in isolation. Our holiness must have a positive effect on other people. It prompts us regarding our obligations. It involves ethics, relationships, social responsibilities and caring interaction with the rest of the world. Living out our holiness involves contact with others.
We cannot be holy alone. We are called to be saints, and that means as a body of Christ’s people. The New Testament makes it clear that Christians were to be a holy people – not just isolated individuals trying to live holy lives.

for God to do his work of grace in us, we need to have a meeting with him, bring ourselves to him, talk with him, interact with him, listen to him.

Commissioner Phil Needham, quoted in Called to be God’s People, says: ‘A true holiness meeting is grounded in who God the Holy One is, and invites his people to respond to him by becoming like him, and living as his holy people in the world’. He continues: ‘In the presence of God we see ourselves for who we really are and the values by which we live, for what they really are. There is no room for deception, no allowance for escapism. The holiness of God invites us to look honestly at our lives, to see where transformation is needed, and by his sanctifying grace actually to make those changes.’

perhaps there is a tough question which must now be faced. Has the Army lost its first love, its deep devotion to loving and serving the Lord Jesus - whatever the cost?

Perhaps we hide from holiness for fear of what the Lord will say. Perhaps Brengle’s warning of losing our birthright and lowering the standard is all too evident.

Catherine Booth said of the gift of holiness: ‘God never gave this gift to any human soul who had not come to the point that he would sell all he had to get it.’

General Albert Orsborn, writer of many holiness songs, once went on record as saying: ‘When an army settles down to an acceptance of a code, and is content to stitch its trophies on its banners and to admire its own history, that army is lost.’ He concluded: ‘We who are the trustees of a great deposit of victorious faith can keep it alive only by using it.’ Today I feel more like a trustee that ever – a trustee of a sacred God-given teaching for the Army.

Any organisation that has an ‘open door’ policy will attract people who don’t live up to its ideals. That will always be the case with the Army – and we must live with it. But there are some poor practices that creep in among those who should know better. Sometimes even our leaders disappoint us. We should not be surprised, but neither should we take our standards from other people.

the ideal of people free from self-interest, offering their lives to Christ in love, and sharing his love willingly and sacrificially, challenges anyone who remembers their own first, glad, wholehearted, unadulterated response to Jesus. Sacrificial holy living most definitely made the Army the Army.
Dedicated holy lives will always be the driving force of the Army. Without them the Army will die.
For the future, for God’s Army, for us to fulfil our birthright, let us:
· Promote holiness
· Preach holiness
· Live holiness
· Enjoy holiness
· From this foundation: Save souls, Grow saints, Serve suffering humanity

Robert Street. 2008