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The Opportunity
by General Bramwell Booth

What of the opportunity of declaring the Message? How do we stand in that respect? Bear with me if I travel over ground more or less familiar to many of you, that I may show some of the wide doors of opportunity that are before us. Be patient with me also if I add details which may seem insignificant, for these may have a useful bearing on your understanding of what The Army is capable of doing and the opportunity that is ours.

As Training Officers, I hope you will often mentally review The Army. Consider for yourselves what it is, what it is doing, what it may yet do. I want you to take a frequent survey of the whole Field with the thought in mind that it is a vast opportunity for the people we are training to declare their message. In the early days of Christianity, and in those dark periods which we speak of as the Middle Ages, the opportunity for ordinary people to deliver a message was very restricted. Even to-day many devoted people, nearly as enthusiastic as we are, have given their lives to work for God in existing societies and churches, only to find before them what may almost be likened to a stone wall. There is no doubt that much that is done by many societies to train workers is lost because directly those workers go out into the world they find themselves restricted to a very limited sphere and in many important respects sadly lacking in opportunity for practical work.

The Pioneers
Now, beyond all question, The Salvation Army has made for its own messengers an unparalleled opportunity. Many things have contributed to that. First and foremost, the life, example, and testimony of our Founders. They went on ahead! They forced the door! I do not think anyone will ever be able fully to comprehend what it meant to my dear mother to take the stand she did in regard to Women's Ministry. It was in very truth a forcing of the door in the face of obloquy, bitter misrepresentation, and accusations even of immodesty and loose living. She faced all that; she determined that a platform should be found, and a door opened for woman, and she really did open the way for women to come to the front for Christ.

Aspects of the Army
Then think of the opportunity arising from what The Salvation Army already is. There are about 14 000 Corps and Societies, besides other Agencies operating among the people. Each is a centre of specific organised effort. Each has certain recognised opportunities, Senior and Junior. Some are small centres, helping comparatively few people, others are large and powerful, influencing multitudes. All of them, especially the smaller, offer a valuable opportunity for these young messengers to exercise their powers. About 150 000 separate indoor Meetings are held each week. Some millions of souls are reached weekly in the streets and open spaces with a message, and, with comparatively little extra effort, many more could be reached. Occasional efforts through the Press and in special campaigns probably influence millions more.

Think also of the opportunity already existing in the Social Work. The Social Work is a distinct undertaking, and part of the opportunity of which I am speaking lies in this work, with its boundless openings for development through upwards of 1500 centres of one kind and another, influencing and re-making men and women throughout the world.

Another branch of the existing opportunity lies in our papers and books. We need writers and translators. Books have not yet gone as far with us as they will go. Our people are becoming more inclined to read than formerly, and we are in a better position now with regard to translating and to publishing translated works. Leaving the books aside, our periodical publications, now numbering over one hundred in the different languages, present a wonderful opportunity. They enlarge the change which presents itself to those who want to find their life's work in The Army.

Again, I do not think many of us realise that – though we have never deliberately planned to do that work – The Army is conducting about a thousand schools, mostly day schools, attended by approximately 50 000 children. Many of these children, probably half of them, come from the homes of the heathen. There are other opportunities to which I need hardly refer. This is our existing platform, or part of it. It is like an area of ground, taken from the wilderness and cultivated, to show to all who care to look what can be done with the barren wastes around.
Supposing, which God forbid, by some strange aberration we were to stop where we were and add nothing more to our fighting front, would not the provision of agents to carry on merely the existing work be in itself a stupendous undertaking? Suppose there could be no more Corps or Posts established, either in the Field or Social Work, yet even then the provision of more effective men and women, more really adequate Officers, would tremendously increase and strengthen the existing Corps and Posts. If, now, any 1000 Corps may represent 50 000 Soldiers, there is no doubt that with more effective Officers that same 1000 Corps could be made to represent five times as many Soldiers. If, therefore, our limits of expansion were already prescribed, and we had only to devote ourselves to holding fast what we have, the task of raising up agents equal to the opportunity would still be tremendous.

Again, it would be worth our while to spend ourselves, our time, and all that we have in making our agents effective, if only because of the increased work which could be done on the ground already occupied. We all know that men and women of high capacity, devotion, and ability attract and influence the people, and that even in areas where we are most known and best understood there remains still an enormous opportunity for zeal, adventure, training, and talent.

Army Needs
Then think of our needs everywhere. The provision of better buildings, for instance. Look at the stables – I was going to say the pigsties – in which the work of The Army is carried on in some places in the Old Country, yes, and in some other countries also. I shall never forget the effect produced on me when visiting a certain town over here. Our hall there was built on the top of a stable. It held four or five hundred people and was always crowded on Sundays. There was a canal at the back, the stable underneath, and at the side a rubbish shoot. The Officer, a young man, said that in twenty-five years or so this Corps had sent a very large sum of money – some thousands of pounds – to the Self-Denial Fund, and he murmured and said, 'Look at this place, General! Smell it!' But an old Local said, 'Captain, don't talk like that. We wouldn't have back on sovereign, General. We have sent that money to bless and help the people in the dark lands.' What a chance there is to improve our present position and opportunity in such a place as that!

Think of India. I could spend £100 000 in India in a fortnight. At any rate, it would not take me anything like that time to allot the sum. Many of our Halls there are made of leaves. Some are like caves made of hay and chaff, rolled up together with a little treacly mud. When there comes a real downpour of rain they are gone! Yet £50 would put up a Hall that would stand the weather.
Think of the opportunity to enlarge the present congregations and increase the soldiery. Officers of a certain type never fail to get hold of new people, alike in the open-air and in other gatherings. One of the problems before us, especially in the European countries, is how to make Open-airs more effective, how to increase the 'punch', so that every Meeting will wound the conscience of some who hear the message. The work in Germany during the last two years is a fine example of what can be done. Open-air work in Germany is, in some important features, in advance of any throughout The Army world. It is enthralling! We capture the crowds. We have a Penitent-form in the middle of the ring, and there have been multitudes crying for mercy. We ought to do still better there, and indeed far better everywhere. We want a constant supply from all the Training Garrisons of competent, effective, and devoted Officers to meet that opportunity alone.

Unoccupied Ground
But there is also the other aspect of our opportunity – namely, the open door to unoccupied ground. We in this room well know that if we had sufficient capable agents it would be possible in a very few years to double, treble, even quadruple the number of Corps, Social Institutions, newspapers, and so forth. It is chiefly a question of men, not of money, for if we had the men they would raise the money. Our desperate need is for better trained, more capable, more daring, more adequate Officers. In Great Britain alone there are probably between two and three thousand districts in which we could raise effective Societies at once. Yet we have scarcely sufficient Officers to maintain our existing Posts as they should be maintained.

In the United States there are thousands of areas, especially west of the Mississippi, in which we could easily find an entrance for our message. In many of these areas there is not church or chapel. Communities there, without anything in the way of religious influence, are waiting for us. We have a wonderful opportunity in the United States, where we are extraordinarily appreciated by the people, especially since the War. Nowhere in the world are we received with more widely opened arms.

Or think of the continent of Europe, of the opportunity of the Salvation Army in Austria, Hungary, Bulgaria, Italy, Poland, to say nothing of the other countries. There are thousands of towns in Europe in which we could raise up groups of witnesses for Christ had we the available Officers.

Africa
Look at Africa, South, East, West, and Central, offering us widely open doors. South of the Zambesi nine or ten millions of natives are accessible to us. They are of various nations or tribes, each speaking its own language, which makes it difficult to organise work among them; but it is all a question of men. What a chance we have there!

East Africa is open to us with its fifteen million natives, many barbarous, savage, heathen, without any idea of true religion, and with little notion of truth or right, or of self-control, but all ready to listen and to learn.

West Africa, with Nigeria, the Gold Coast, and the French Congo, lies open before us. In these lands with their twenty or thirty million souls, we have probably our most wonderful opportunity on this side of the continent, because the natives are of a superior type, capable of very much more than the natives on the eastern side, and wonderfully responsive to us. One of the difficulties there arises from polygamy, but it applies to other parts of the world as well. Colonel Souter tells me of a Holiness Meeting in which the first to come to the Penitent-form was the chief who had given land for a hall. All his wives – there were sixteen of them – came to the Mercy-seat. The chief was greatly blessed, and he said to the Colonel, 'I will now give land for a school, and if you will educate my children I will give you money to build a school.'

The Light of Asia
Asia presents tremendous problems. There is India, with its small groups of towns and its 600 000 villages. We are working only in 5000 of those villages. I said just now that a building could be put up in India for £50, a small sum, but think of what a problem it is when it comes to five thousand of them! In Africa they have no particular religion, but in India it is different. India has a marvellous civilisation and literature, dating back for thousands of years, and certain teachings entrenched deeply in the hearts of the people have to be dealt with before the seed of the Kingdom can spring up. But there are hundreds of thousands of places in India where we might raise happy communities of saved people. Again it is a question of men. Japan also offers a marvellous opportunity. Man for man, the Japanese are worthy to take their place with any nation in the world. I consider that we have raised leaders at a greater rate and of higher ability in Japan than in any of the Eastern countries in which The Army is at work. Consider the opportunity! There is opportunity also to extend our work in the Dutch Indies, where there are thousands of perishing lepers and thousands of thousands of people who know little or nothing of God.

China
I cannot tell you what I feel about China. Things which Commissioner Pearce has been telling me have filled my heart and mind. Even in the midst of revolutionary and anti-foreign rage and fury, our work in China is not affected. The accommodation in the Training Garrison in Peking is for thirty Cadets, and thirty Cadets are in Training now as if nothing were happening, though the streets resound with the shouts of 'Down with the foreigners!' The ringleaders in the recent disturbances – the students – met and decided that no newspapers except their own should be published. But a man stood up and said, 'Wait a minute! What about "The War Cry," the "Save the World Army's" paper?' And a shout went up, 'Let that continue!' So the only newspapers published for a time were the revolutionary paper and 'The War Cry.'

Commissioner Pearce also told me of the wonderful qualities of the Chinese Officer. We have now Chinese Field Officers, men and women in about equal proportions, representing nearly every type of worker in China. We have raised a Chinese editor, Chinese printers, Chinese teachers. Some time ago we bought about 130 girl children, at an average of twenty shillings each, to save them from ruination. They are all doing well, and half of them seem likely to make Officers. Three years ago two of these girls went into Training, the next year four, and this year six. The Training Garrison Officers say that they are amongst the keenest and best of the Chinese Salvationists. If only we had the Officers and the money, we could bring in thousands of uncared-for children – for it is amazing how little regard many Chinese parents have for their children – and train them in the love and service of Christ.

Come Over and Help Us
The opportunities before us press heavily upon me, and make me realise, with the most vivid intensity, how vital is your work of Training. It is given to you, and to you alone, to train men and women to meet these urgent demands. I want you to realise how great is that opportunity.

New vistas are opening all around. I may mention one or two recent invitations. A most pressing appeal has reached me from Bulgaria. There a Society, modelled on The Salvation Army, has been formed by some Christian enthusiasts and their converts. So anxious are they for The Army to be established in Bulgaria that they are ready to send some of their Converts as Cadets to London and to pay for their Training.

I also have an invitation from Greece. A woman went form Greece to Sweden to visit her daughter, and while there attended Meetings in Stockholm and was saved. She now writes from Greece, 'We could have The Salvation Army in Greece if you would only send us Officers.'

Then there is Spain – Roman Catholic to the backbone. We have had one or two tries there, and we ought to make another. But again it is a question of men. In the Malay States a great opportunity lies before us. We have been invited to open up work in Annam. We have been entreated to send Officers to Singapore, in the Straits Settlements. Buildings have been offered to us there.
In Egypt we have been offered a property. It is a wonderful opening. The people there are Mohammedan, some of them of a low type, but many full of promise. Many of you have been to Port Said, and know something of these people. God knows they want our help. I should like to do something to make our Saviour known in Egypt before I die.

In West Africa there are many possible openings; for instance, in Sierra Leone and in Calabar. We might do a great deal more in South America; a pressing call has reached us from Guiana. Many other countries are ceaselessly calling.

The Young People
In addition to these opportunities, which I have very roughly classified on a geographical basis, there is our marvellous opportunity all over the world for special work. The young people of the world are slipping away from religion, and not from religion only, but from restraint and discipline. There is a general slackening and even a snapping of those bonds which are supposed to assist in the training of character during youth. The Roman Catholics are complaining of it, so are the Church of England and the Noncomformist Churches, so is the Greek Church. I was talking to one of the priests of the Greek church who was speaking specially of Russia, which was a stronghold of the Greek Church before the Revolution, and he said, 'The young people of our nation have gone from the Church.'

But the great thing about The Army is that it attracts the young people. Wherever we have laid ourselves out definitely to win and help the children and the young people, we have had wonderful proofs of what can be done with both. If only we had sufficient well-trained and well-equipped men and women, we might everywhere do a mighty work among the young.

The Criminals
What of the world-wide opportunity among the criminals? The modern more intelligent way of dealing with criminals has created a great opportunity for us in Western countries, in the British Dominions, and in the United States. In the United States and Canada our work for criminals leads the way at present, but everywhere the prisons are opening to us. The prisons of China are open to us, and we are desperately needed there, because the Chinese prison system is very cruel. Imprisonment for life often involves the cutting out of the tongue, and the condemnation of the prisoner to lifelong silence and solitude.

There are always something like ten million people in the gaols of the world, and there are always far more, of course, than ten million criminals. What an opportunity for The Army and its message of life and hope! Again it is a question of men.

I recently spoke to four hundred men in a prison here; among them some Jews and Roman Catholics who, until that day, had never chosen to go inside the chapel, although they had been in that gaol for some years. But The Salvation Army attracted them. Many great fellows who had been there for years broke down before their comrades as I spoke of the love and power of Jesus Christ. I felt then over-poweringly what a tremendous opportunity the gaols offer us all over the world, what a chance to bring hope to the despairing and life to the dead!
Other Opportunities

Music! Our Founders claimed music for God, and all over the world, wherever there is our Flag there is at least an attempt at music. In some places our music may be more musical than in others! Here and there the quantity may be in advance of the quality! But what an opportunity The Army affords for musicians, for composers, for instructors of others. Here indeed is ready to hand the machinery for the most effective broadcasting. The human heart everywhere is susceptible to music. Everywhere it brings hope and uplift.

The printed page! Again what an opportunity the printing press offers for circulating and emphasising our message! What might we not do with periodicals and books had we but the men and women to work this great arm of service!

Look at your Cadet and then look beyond him to the vast sweep of lands somewhere in which it may be God's plan to place him as a light in the darkness. I have put before you in broad outline the possibilities before us. Remember that every Cadet represents the fulfilment of some of those possibilities.

I am convinced that we are only at the beginning of our service for God and man. The Army is increasingly becoming a world movement because it is following a world Saviour. There was nothing little, petty, or narrow in His conception of His work. When He hung on the cross, He knew that He was dying for the whole world. Make every Cadet aware beyond all doubt that in the name of Christ an open door to all the world is before him. 'Go ye therefore, and teach all nations.'


 

 

 

 

   

 

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