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“Alexa - Find Rubicon”
by Lieutenant Scott
Swires
Like Julius Caesar, The Salvation Army
has come to a Rubicon. I believe that the Lord has, in His
wisdom and kindness, brought us to a place where we need to
make the decision to run where we have a habit of holding
back. The Army has increasingly given up ground as leaders of
innovation. We still rave about how Booth bought one of the
earliest cars in England, they were less than a decade old,
and held his famous motorcade in 1904. Booth was an early
adopter, willing to make mistakes. Though I believe that there
are many habits we need to develop, I will highlight three
with this story.
First, Booth adapted to modern
technology and methods that worked. Barna noticed a drop in
church tech growth after 2005. Our YouTube channels show how
ineffective we have become in using social media. YouTube is
the second largest search engine online and Americans older
than 75 go on it at least once a month. Studies show that most
millennials believe they can learn anything on YouTube. This
is not a fad or age specific trend. This is a large community
asking questions about the One we love. Who is there to answer
them? Online is just one method I’m highlighting. When the
Booths saw the effectiveness of Charles Finney’s methods they
made his writings mandatory reading for officers while other
Christian leaders scoffed. What is the language of leadership
around revival culture in your area? Fruit-bearing ministries
need prayerfully examined, not scoffed at.
Second, Booth was willing to make
mistakes. To create a creative culture it is imperative to
cultivate one where people know they will not be executed for
making mistakes. Mistakes are necessary for progress. An
officer once joked that in the Army we tend to shoot our
wounded. It is interesting that out of the three people that
received talents to invest it was the one that didn’t try that
was punished. Fear of punishment is directly related to not
understanding God’s love and counter to His mandate to create
(1 John 4:18, Hebrew 11).
Finally, we need to restore our
redeemed imagination. My mentor, Bob Jones, taught the
redeemed imagination is the language of heaven. Holy Spirit
has messages and assignments that are for the Army today, but
we’re still stuck on what He said 100 years ago. We can’t live
on yesterday’s bread anymore. It’s possible the Brengle of
Today cannot be heard over the Brengle of Yesterday.
I get how scary this sounds. But I also
get how many know it’s time to cross the river. It is more
important than ever to look to Him, because we have never
passed this way before. Let’s go get what the Army was
promised. So get online, make mistakes, and be like those who
dreamed.
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