The Holy Spirit and The Salvation Army

  What, if anything, do Salvationists think or feel about God the Holy Spirit?

Let’s consider the historical roots of Salvationists’ theological grasping after the Holy Spirit. The Salvation Army has always believed in and preached on a personal relationship with Father, Son and Holy Spirit (p 40, the old Handbook of Doctrine). But we have no specific doctrine addressing the person of the Holy Spirit.

The Salvo doctrines touching on the Holy Spirit, as with all Salvo doctrines, are highly evident as being theologically sound and hailing, via Wesleyan and Arminian lineage back to orthodox Christianity’s origins. 

There is the third doctrine: ‘We believe that there are three persons in the Godhead - the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost, undivided in essence and co-equal in power and glory.’ 

The seventh doctrine: ‘We believe that repentance towards God, faith in our Lord Jesus Christ and renewal by the Holy Spirit, are necessary to salvation.’ 

The eighth doctrine: ‘That we are justified by grace through faith in our Lord Jesus Christ and that he that believes has the witness in himself.’ 

The Spirit has particularly been sought through prayer; we plead with the Spirit to ‘indwell’ Salvationists both in their platform/pulpit ministry and in their daily lives.  

William Booth, no scholar but a great ‘practitioner’ who knew how to work a room, sought to establish a vital and compelling ministry that would work on people’s hearts and minds and compel them to make peace with God (General Booth by Railton: pp 40-43).  

He would consequently act like a spiritual berserker at times (ibid: p 42), his outlandishly demonstrative preaching style breaking through people’s formal and respectable ‘defences’.  

Booth believed he was empowered by the Spirit and acted with the strength of that belief. A committed belief in the indwelling of the Spirit, Booth taught his officers, would mean ‘you are full of faith, and of the Holy Ghost, you will have a full measure of salvation’ (Seven Spirits, p 88). That would affect the outcome of public and personal ministry. 

Booth taught his officers that they themselves were responsible for the outcomes under God’s steam, as ‘all this is in harmony with the law laid down by Jesus Christ when he said, “According to your faith be it unto you”‘ (ibid). 
 

Consider Commissioner Brengle’s classic if daggily-titled Love Slaves (for example, pp 70, 71). Brengle was of course one of the Army’s most prominent damage control experts (a ‘putter outer’ of internal arguments and ‘friendly fires’) and perhaps our most respected holiness teachers . To a certain extent we enjoy a legacy of ’seeking after’ holiness - we persist in this organisational quest and conversation - because of Brengle and his peers. We should all doff our caps at the Army’s remaining/surviving (?) spiritual retreats known as ‘Brengle fellowships’. 

Brengle emphasised the need for personal purity (Love Slaves, p 72) and also wrote against the dangers people in ministry encounter from wrongful expressions of their sexuality (pp 61-67, particularly the prophetic example given of the silver-haired American evangelist, p 62). 

Salvationists have traditionally been more comfortable pursuing the fruits of the Spirit rather than the Spirit’s gifts. But there have been experiences of signs and wonders that defy rational thought or conjecture. In particular the supernatural power of the Spirit has been attested to by Bramwell Booth, the Founder’s oldest son and the second international leader of the Army (see Echoes and Memories, p 50). 

I want to put the possibility of levity at ‘witnessing levitation’ aside (one of the high points of Bramwell’s memoirs), and add this disclaimer: I don’t want to sound disrespectful of the guy and his grasp on reality (not intended). But we should be aware that, as well as the reality of political payback on the part of his relative/s and his leadership peers, the second General’s mental and physical health was one of the reasons the High Council got rid of him some few months before he was ‘promoted to glory’  

Salvationists have occasionally issued criticism of other churches for lack of an authentic conversion experience of their congregations. This has been, it has been suggested, due to a lack of pursuing, wrestling and submitting to God the Holy Spirit (see These Fifty Years, pp 64,65). 

But no less an authority than the Founder himself attested to the fact that the gifts of the Spirit, including physical healing, had been enjoyed intermittently ‘in the Army throughout its history’ (Larsson, The Man Perfectly Filled With The Spirit, p 70). 

Obeying the Holy Spirit’s prompting was part of the way Salvationists were taught they would prevail in prayer. Catherine Booth urged her comrades to live in union with Jesus, obey the teaching of the word and the urging of the Spirit, and rely utterly on God (Practical Religion, p 211). 

Perhaps sailing a little close to the notion of a ‘magical formula’ for answered prayer, the historical record of the Army reveals that Salvationists did catch the wind of the Spirit in their sails. 

Evaluating the growth and sustaining work the Spirit undertook in the life of the Army, these words of Catherine Booth ring true for the Army of her day and challenge Salvationists in this era: 

‘God must be true; and if your experience contradicts the sure word of promise, you may be certain that it is your experience [read personal experience here] which is at fault. Examine yourself. Repent, and do your first works. He is faithful and just to forgive the sins of His people, and to cleanse them from all unrighteousness. 

‘And then bring all the tithes of a whole-hearted, loving, and believing service into His store-house, and prove him therewith, and see if He will not open you the windows of heaven, and pour you out such a blessing that there shall not be room enough to receive it.’ 

Do we put up our hand and accept culpability for a perceived lack of spiritual success?  

Are our expectations of God too small?  

Or do we fail to back them up with genuine faith and works? 

 

Writer: Barry Gittins is a Melbourne-based writer, lifelong Salvationist, husband (to Trudy) and father(to Emily and Benjamin) who seeks God in everyday encounters. A frustrated poet and playwright, he has worked for the Salvos’ Australia Southern Territory in various roles since 1991: as a journalist (for Warcry, The Young Soldier/Kidzone, The Musician),technical writer and CD-ROM author in corps program (mission development), senior review editor (Warcry) and editor (On Fire). He currently works as a social program and policy consultant (writer/researcher) for the social program department.

1 Comment to The Holy Spirit and The Salvation Army

1. Barry–I thank you for this comment you wrote. I for one believe that today’s Salvation Army (at least in the Western World) tries to avoid remembering our history as an organization which relied heavily on Holy Spirit in its outreach. The London Holiness Meetings in London where there was levitation, slaying in the Spirt et al as well as the evangelisitic activities of many of the early officers mark as unique in the Holiness Tradition as what I would call a Charismatic Holiness Church.

   While in Training College(75-77) in Toronto we had to do a 2nd year 5000 word paper on a topic of our choice. Mine was done around the idea of The Army being one of the original charismatic/pentecostal denominations including sectiosn relating to Gift use within the Army. It turned into a 180 plus page document.

   I truly believe we need to rediscover the Spirit that inhabited the Army in those days.

   As an Officer (even if only for a short period) I conducted healing services ( and continued to do so in the denomination we moved to before coming back to the Army).

   May God infuse the psyche of the present day leaders of our organization to rediscover its roots.

   John Stephenson
John Stephenson on August 24th, 2010

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