Salvation Army

A Post-Reformation Model of Worship: Salvation Army Worship

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The earliest record of a Salvation Army worship service is found in the publications of William and Catherine Booth’s London East End ministry that began in the late 1860s.

Introduction

The organization that would become The Salvation Army in 1878 commenced its ministry in July 1865 in a series of tent meetings in the East London district of Whitechapel (Robert Sandall, The History of the Salvation Army, Vol. 1: 1865–1878 [London: Thomas Nelson, 1947], 37).

William Booth. This is a likeness of the portrait presented in 1856 to Booth by his friends in Sheffield in appreciation of his labors there and in other parts of the country.

The format of these early day services was modeled on the “free and easy” nineteenth century Methodist song service. These unstructured services included a combination of extemporaneous prayer, hymns, numerous personal testimonies, and often a concluding sermon.

Text: The first recorded example that provides the details of these services are found in The East London Evangelist, the monthly periodical that William Booth first published October 1868 as a record of the “Christian Work Among the People” of his East London Christian Mission. The March 1869 issue includes a reprint of a report from The Revival, another religious periodical of the 1860s:

On the afternoon of Sunday, January 31, I was able to see some of the results of William Booth’s work in the East of London by attending his experience meeting, held in the New East London Theatre. Probably about 500 were present, though many came late. The meeting commenced at three, and lasted one hour and a half. During this period forty-three persons gave their experience, parts of eight hymns were sung, and prayer was offered by four persons. After singing Philip Phillips’ beautiful hymn, “I Will Sing for Jesus,” prayer by Mr. Booth and two others, a young man rose, and told of his conversion a year ago last Tuesday, thanking God that he had been kept through the year.

A negro of the name of Burton interested the meeting much by telling of his first open-air service, which he had held during the past week in Ratcliff Highway, one of the worst places in London. He said, when the people saw him kneel in the gutter, engaged in prayer for them, they thought he was mad.

Hymn, “Christ, He Sits on Zion’s Hill.”

A young man under the right-hand gallery having briefly spoken, one of Mr. Booth’s helpers, a genuine Yorkshire man, named Dimaline, with a strong voice and a hearty manner, told of the open-air meetings, the opposition they encountered, and his determination to go on, in spite of all opposition from men and devils.

A middle-aged man on the right, a sailor, told how he was brought to Christ during his passage home from Columbo. One of the Dublin tracts, entitled “Johns Difficulty,” was the means of his conversion.

A young man to the right having told how, as a backslider, he had recently been restored, a cabman said he had a deal to talk about. The Lord had pardoned his sins. He used to be in the public-houses constantly, but he thanked God he ever heard William Booth, for it led to his conversion.

Three young men on the right then spoke. The first, who comes five miles to these meeting, told how he was lost through the drink, and restored by the gospel; the second said he was unspeakably happy; and the third said he would go to the stake for Christ.

A middle-aged man in the centre spoke of his many trials. His sight was failing him, that of one eye having gone entirely, but the light of Christ shone brilliantly in his soul.

Hymn, “Let us walk in the light,” etc.

Two sailors followed each other. The first spoke of his conversion through reading a tract while on his way to the Indies four months ago. The other said he was going to sea next week, and was going to take some Bibles, hymns, and tracts with him to see what could be done for Christ on board. He thought the conversion of sailors was fulfilling the passage, “The abundance of the sea shall be converted unto Thee.”

Hymn, “I believe I shall be there, And walk with Him in White.”

A young man of the name of John, sometimes called, “Young Hallelujah,” told of his trials while selling fish in the streets, but he comforted himself by saying, “Tis better on before.” He had been drawn out in prayer at midnight on the previous night, and had dreamed all night that he was in a prayer meeting. He was followed by another, a converted thief, who told how he was “picked up,” as he termed his conversion, and of his persecutions daily while working in a shop with twenty unconverted men.

A man in the centre, who had been a great drunkard, said, “What a miserable wretch I was till the Lord met with me. I used to think I could not do without my pint a day, but the Lord pulled me right back out of a public-house into a place of worship.” (Gawin Kirkham, “An Afternoon with William Booth,” The East London Evangelist [March 1, 1869], 89–90).

The report continues in a similar vein for several more pages (the portion reproduced here is only one-third of the whole account), and concludes:

Mr. Booth offered a few concluding observations, and prayed. The meeting closed by singing: I will not be discouraged, for Jesus is my Friend.

The Salvation Army Worship in the Post-Reformation Period

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The Salvation Army, founded in London in 1865 by William and Catherine Booth, is an international, evangelical part of the universal Christian church. Its mission is to preach the gospel of Jesus Christ and meet human needs in his name without discrimination. Salvation Army officers (ordained leaders) and soldiers (lay members) operate corps community centers, schools, hospitals, shelters, feeding sites, and other programs in ninety-six countries around the world.

From its beginning, The Salvation Army has been thoroughly evangelical. The founder, William Booth, served as an evangelistic revivalist preacher from 1849 to 1861 with both the Wesleyans and New Connexion Methodism, and from 1861 to 1865 in independent ministry. As an evangelist, Booth preached convincingly on the themes of personal conversion and sanctification. Using almost any means available—open-air preaching, tambourines, brass instruments—to attract attention to his gospel message, Booth soon had a following of loyal supporters.

From the early open-air meetings, Salvation Army worship moved inside to disused pubs, dance halls, theaters, even a tent on a Quaker burial ground. The meetings were lively. Army musicians took secular tunes from pubs and dance halls and gave them unmistakably evangelistic words. (For instance, “Here’s to good old whiskey, drink it down” became “Storm the forts of darkness, bring them down.”) Converts testified enthusiastically to the change wrought in their lives by salvation. Preaching, by men and women Salvationists alike, was fiery and always aimed at the individual’s need for salvation in Christ.

In an 1889 article, “Salvation for Both Worlds,” Booth expanded his message to include the social dimensions of salvation. Redemption meant not only individual, personal, and spiritual salvation, but corporate, social, and physical salvation, as well. Booth and his followers believed that preaching had to be complemented by caring for the physical needs of the poor to whom they preached. Booth’s book, In Darkest England and the Way Out (1890), became the textbook for an all-out, aggressive two-front war for the souls of people and for a rightly ordered society.

Today, Salvationists are still fighting “The Great Salvation War” on those two fronts. Salvation Army worship emphasizes spontaneity, personal experience, and congregational participation in worship. A typical worship service might include congregational singing with brass band accompaniment, spontaneous testimonies from members of the congregation, and an invitation for individuals to publicly respond to the biblical call to holy living.

In theology, The Salvation Army is Wesleyan. In philosophy, it is practical. An Army slogan, “Heart to God, Hand to Man,” explains the commitment of salvation soldiers around the world to preach, teach, counsel, shelter, feed, clothe, and befriend their brothers and sisters of all races, colors, creeds, and ages.

“We are a salvation people,” William Booth wrote in 1879. “This is our specialty, getting saved, and then getting somebody else saved, and then getting saved ourselves more and more, until full salvation on earth makes the heaven within, which is finally perfected by the full salvation on the other side of the river.” More than one hundred years later, the heart of all Salvation Army worship and work is still preaching and personal experience of salvation for all people and sanctification from all sin.

Worship and Sacred Actions Throughout the Year in the Salvation Army

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Worship in the Salvation Army does not include sacraments or observance of the traditional church year. Salvationists regard these practices as unnecessary to the life of consecration to God, experienced through the inward power of the Holy Spirit. They do, however, believe in the importance of ceremonies such as child dedication, enrollment of soldiers (members), and commissioning of officers (clergy), events that recognize and celebrate decisive moments in an individual’s spiritual life.

The Salvation Army is nonsacramental, practicing neither water baptism nor the rite of Communion in its corporate worship. Like the Quakers, Salvationists believe that sacraments and ordinances are symbols of spiritual truths and seek to experience the realities these symbols represent.

A Spiritual Approach

General Frederick Coutts explains The Salvation Army’s position on sacraments in his book In Good Company: “Our witness is simply that the presence of Christ may be realized, and His grace freely received, without the aid of any material elements. Our testimony is not against the sacraments—and never has been—but to the truth that the unsearchable riches of grace can be communicated by the Holy Spirit and received directly by the believer who comes to the throne of grace in faith.” (Allan Satterlee, Notable Quotables: A Compendium of Gems from Salvation Army Literature [Atlanta: The Salvation Army, 1985], 177).

For Salvation Army founder William Booth, the one true sign of the church and of conversion was participating in the work of redemption. (Roger Green, War on Two Fronts: The Redemptive Theology of William Booth [Atlanta: The Salvation Army, 1989], 56). In an 1889 address, he declared, “Neither water, sacraments, church services not Salvation Army methods will save you without a living, inward change of heart and a living active faith and communion with God … and an active, positive, personal consecration of yourself and all you have got to help Him who hung upon the cross to fill the world with salvation and bring lost sinners to His feet.” Periodic observances of the sacraments were not to be criticized but simply deemed unnecessary for experiencing and demonstrating holiness of heart. For Booth, as for Salvationist today, the scriptural essentials were baptism by the Holy Spirit and constant communion with God.

General Albert Orsborn portrays the Army’s spiritual approach to the sacraments in his song, “My Life Must Be Christ’s Broken Bread”:

My life must be Christ’s broken bread,
My love his outpoured wine,
A cup o’erfilled, a table spread
Beneath his name and sign,
That other souls refreshed and red,
May share his life through mine.

Sacramental Ceremonies

The Salvation Army’s spiritual approach does not exclude all ceremonies, however. Salvationists recognize that ceremonies help individuals and congregations mark spiritual milestones. For that reason, the Army practices the dedication of children, the enrollment of soldiers, and the commissioning of officers (clergy) and local officers (lay leaders).

With the flag of the Salvation Army as a backdrop, each of these ceremonies marks a solemn covenant and a joyous celebration. In the dedication ceremony, parents affirm their desire for the child to live entirely for God and serve wherever God leads. They promise that they will not keep their child from “hardship, suffering, poverty or sacrifice in the service of Jesus Christ and the Salvation Army” and that they will be to the child true examples of salvationism. The congregation is asked to participate by declaring their intention to pray for parents and children and to help them carry out the promises made in the dedication ceremony.

The enrollment of soldiers (members) begins with the signing of “The Articles of War” (a soldier’s covenant), which affirms agreement with Salvation Army doctrine and principles. Soldiers (members) promise, among other things, to abstain from alcohol and tobacco and to pursue a life of holiness.

Officers (clergy) are ordained and commissioned after signing a covenant promising to love and serve God, to make soul-winning the first purpose of their life, and to uphold the doctrines and principles of the Salvation Army. Local officers (lay leaders) are commissioned by their corps officer for specific tasks at the local corps (church) level.

While they are not intended as replacements or substitutes for traditional sacraments, each of these Salvation Army ceremonies is, in some measure, sacramental because they are external symbols of inexpressible inward works of grace.

The Arts in the Salvation Army

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The Salvation Army, whose long-time commitment to music is particularly well-known given the visibility of its performers, is not restricting itself to its traditional musical repertoire. Rather, for the past ten years, it has been introducing new music in its services and its public appearances, including nearly every style of contemporary music.

The Salvation Army has a rich and unique heritage of instrumental and vocal music that reaches back to its earliest days in Victorian England. The Army is currently experiencing a dramatic renewal of its music. This is due both to a systematic emphasis on music education and to a re-emphasis on the functional philosophy of music that guided both the initial, rapid development of our music programs and publications during the 1880s and also the growth of Army music in subsequent decades. This philosophy of Salvation Army music was articulated by General Albert Orsborn years later:

We have no wish to be outcasts of the musical world but our music is and must continue to be functional as distinct from the merely artistic, aesthetic, or impressionistic. Our message, our praise, our mission, and our worship all embody our function. (Ronald W. Holz, “A Brief Review of the Function and Administration of Salvation Army Music,” in A History of the Hymn Tune Meditation and Related Forms in Salvation Army Music in Great Britain and North America, 1880–1980 [Storrs, Conn.: Unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, University of Connecticut, 1981], 6).

In the preface to Salvation Music, Vol. 2, published in London in 1883 for congregational use, the founder of the Salvation Army, William Booth, wrote:

The music of the Army is not, as a rule, original. We seize upon the strains that have already caught the ear of the masses, we load them with our one great theme—salvation, and so we make the very enemy help us fill the air with our Savior’s fame.

This radical approach to nineteenth-century church music was reflected in the borrowing of popular ballads, drinking songs, patriotic anthems, and folk songs. American gospel songs and spirituals were also included in this early-day songbook.

The popular music of late nineteenth-century England was found at park bandstands and in the music halls. William Manchester in his bibliography of Winston Churchill, The Last Lion, documents the principal venues for popular music during Churchill’s youth:

Not counting The Salvation Army and the military, there were over five thousand bands in the country, and on holidays Londoners crowded around the bandstands in their parks. This was the golden age of the music halls. Between 1850 and 1880 about five hundred new ones were built with the city’s fifty theaters, meaning that 350,000 Londoners were entertained every night. (William Manchester, The Last Lion: Winston Spencer Churchill; Vision of Glory: 1874–1932 [Boston: Little, Brown, 1983], 68).

William Booth echoed Martin Luther’s question from the sixteenth century: “Why should the devil have all the best tunes?” Booth’s forces conducted many of their early-day meetings in rented music halls, wisely borrowing the tunes of music hall songs and added religious words. The most popular music hall song of the 1880s, “Champagne Charlie Is Me Name,” became “Bless His Name, He Sets Me Free” (The Song Book of the Salvation Army, American ed. [Verona, N.J.: The Salvation Army, 1987], 149).

The British “working class” of this period found that the brass band provided a comparatively easy way of participating in a music group. One hundred years ago the Army attracted the poor and underprivileged of the “working class,” and new Salvationists were encouraged to bring their instruments to the meetings. This included not only brass instruments, but also banjos, concertinas, and accordions. Within just a few years there were hundreds of Salvation Army brass bands in Great Britain. As the Salvation Army rapidly spread from London to many parts of the world, the British brass band remained a distinctive feature of the Salvation Army whether on the streets of New York or in the parks of Sydney and Adelaide. (Eric Ball, “Salvation Army Bands and Their Music,” in Brass Bands in the 20th Century, Violet and Geoffrey Brand, eds. [Baldock, Herts., UK: Egon Publishers, 1979], 184-186.)

The renewal of Salvation Army worship during the past ten years has been strongly influenced by changes in our music publications and music programs. For over 100 years the Salvation Army has published its own band and vocal music as well as its own congregational songbooks. By regulation, Army bands and songster brigades (choirs) are limited to performances of only music published by the Salvation Army. This was somewhat relaxed in 1991 when at the same time all Salvation Army music was first marketed to other denominations and schools.

The current generation of Salvation Army composers and arrangers has updated the Army tradition of presenting the gospel message through popular music, and Army music publications now regularly include the full gamut of contemporary music styles. It is no longer unusual for a Salvation Army band to perform jazz-influenced arrangements during a worship service. Collections of contemporary songs written and arranged by Salvationists have been published for the rapidly growing number of contemporary Christian music ensembles. (Stephen Bulla, ed., The Contemporary Songbook, vols. 1 and 2 [Atlanta: The Salvation Army, 1987, 1992].)

In 1987 the Salvation Army published the first revision of The Salvation Army Song Book since 1953 (The Song Book of the Salvation Army, American ed., [Verona, N.J.: The Salvation Army, 1987]). This was followed in 1988 by the total revision of the Youth Songbook of the Salvation Army (Verona, N.J.: The Salvation Army, 1988). For the first time, many Salvation Army worship services included the hymns of Brian Wren, the songs of Bill and Gloria Gaither, Kurt Kaiser, and Ralph Carmichael as well as contemporary hymns and songs by the new generation of Salvationist songwriters.

These changes in music publications have been accompanied by significant growth among Salvation Army music groups. The major factor in this growth during the 1980s has been the employment of full-time music directors at the state level. These professional music educators supervise the developing programs at the local level, provide intensive music instruction at summer music camps and regional music schools, and train local volunteer music leaders. In 1992, there were approximately forty-five full-time music directors working on behalf of Salvation Army music within the United States. Within the Salvation Army in the United States, there are 841 local corps (church) brass bands (adult and youth) with a combined membership of 7,778, and 1,418 local corps choirs (adult and youth) with a combined membership of 19,162. (Data from The Salvation Army National Composite Statistics for the year ending December 1990.)

Salvation Army, The

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The Salvation Army began in 1865 as an evangelizing agency to reach those who lived in the dreadful British city slums, which at that time had no churches. William and Catherine Booth, a Methodist couple, started an independent ministry in the heart of London. They pitched their gospel tent in the slums and won over many despite the taunts of most of the locals. In 1878 William introduced military features into his organization, which was already growing beyond England. As general of the Salvation Army, he continued to direct its policies with autocratic power, establishing posts in various cities of England, North America, the European Continent, and Asia. With unique methods, including band music, people were drawn to open-air meetings on street corners and in halls and were told to give up their sinful lives. Again and again, men and women were rescued from the depths of despair and were transformed by the power of Christ’s love. The Army later broadened its work to include social services because of the great needs of the people among whom it ministered. After 1889 the Army established rescue homes, farm colonies, and labor bureaus. Booth obtained money for his enterprises from the sale of his best-selling book, In Darkest England and the Way Out, and from wealthy friends of the movement.

Impact: Catherine died of cancer but not before she had worked tirelessly to secure the passage of laws that improved the lives of women and children. William lived another two decades and saw his organization spread to 55 countries. During his lifetime he traveled over five million miles and preached about 60,000 sermons. The Salvation Army continues to thrive and provide help for those in need, in Christ’s name, throughout the world.