By Love Serve - The Mission of the Army

‘Mission’ is one of those terms that can end up being reduced to something trotted out to justify a new activity or project, or used to either raise or reduce the perceived value of a church depending on whether it is being ‘missional’ or not.

When we talk about mission we should be talking about the way that individual disciples and the Church as a whole, through prayer and discernment, seek to align and participate in God’s mission of redemption and transformation in the world.

What we normally end up talking about when we talk about mission is ‘doing stuff’ which may or may not involve talking to people about Jesus.

Understanding God’s mission doesn’t have to be complicated. We start by saying that who God is and what God does is the same. In other words, God always acts according to God’s nature. God cannot do something that is against who God is. The Bible is clear that God is by nature love. We also know that God is complete in God’s self – which means that God doesn’t need anything because God doesn’t lack anything.

So God’s desires are not based on God’s needs but purely for the good of that which is not God. We put those things together, and we understand that God always expresses God’s self as love given for the good of that which is not God. This is the foundation for salvation and redemption. Salvation is a gift that is given because we need it. It is not grudging, and it is not to make God feel better.

What Is Our Mission?

Our mission needs to be shaped by the simple principle of love being given to that which is different to us. The mission of the church is love the rest of the world. What that looks like needs to be worked out in context, but the reality of mission at its most basic is really very simple. Being missional, or doing mission, simply means being loving.

The missional question for every disciple, every corps, every department, the Army as a whole, is: “How are we meant to be loving today?”

Where do we need to start with that question? We start with the great commandment to love our neighbour as ourselves. The young man tried to get out of the question by asking who his neighbour was. He wanted to avoid having to actually follow the commandment and instead just love the people he liked. Instead, Jesus tells the story of the Good Samaritan where he says that the person who shows mercy is the person who is a neighbour. To love our neighbour means to become a neighbour. It means entering into a relationship of attention and care. Loving our neighbour means caring for the person in need of mercy. So our neighbour is defined purely by who needs mercy, which means knowing who is the person in need. Our neighbour is not necessarily the person who looks like us, or who lives near us, or who is closest to us. Our neighbour is the person in need.

Which means the missional question then becomes not only “how are we meant to be loving today” but also “Who do we need to love today and how are we to love them?”

The Mission To Love!

To find who we need to love today we need to open ourselves to the reality of the world. It means seeing the people around us with the eyes of Christ rather than our own inner gaze. It means being more attuned to suffering in the world, having more exposed nerves not less, and being open to seeing people through the lens of the cross.

To know what we need to do to love our neighbour we can turn once again to scripture. Jesus tells us that to love God, we need to love our neighbour by feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, visiting the prisoner, caring for the sick, and loving those who are unloved. In fact, Jesus says that the very reason why he came was to preach good news to the poor. Paul also tells what loving people looks like – being patient and kind and forgiving and slow to anger and not holding onto grudges. Loving our neighbour is more than this kind of practical support. Loving our neighbour also means introducing them to Jesus. If we take seriously the belief that Christ is the ultimate source of joy and life and that it is Christ alone who can heal and transform us and the world, then we must also take seriously the need to help others come to know Jesus.

As a disciple, my calling to join in the mission of Christ means acting with love to the people around me and discerning who needs me to be merciful to them and then taking personal responsibility to love them both practically and with the message of Jesus. In reality, we need to see these things as two aspects of one Gospel. Telling people about Jesus and showing them practical love are both equal in the Gospel, because when we love our neighbour we are loving God. We are called to take personal responsibility to love our neighbour.

That last part is key. Personal responsibility.

Personal Responsibility

We are all responsible for the wellbeing of people in need. We cannot give up our responsibility for our neighbour to another person. There may be times when there is someone better suited to us, or when there is someone with more knowledge and skills than us, but we cannot give up our responsibility to love our neighbour. This is a basic calling for every Christian and is not an optional extra. Loving the neighbour is a divine command, an imperative which we must obey.

But what does it mean for the Army as a whole? How can a church have a neighbour? What does it mean for an organisation with thousands of employees, many of whom are not Christian, to be obedient to Christ’s command?

The starting point for the Army is the same as for the individual. We need to be able to discern who is need of mercy at a greater degree of scale. Who in our society are most in need of mercy? The reality is that not everyone is our neighbour. The person who is oppressed is our neighbour, not the oppressor. The abused is our neighbour, not the abuser. The hungry and poor are our neighbours, not the rich and full. The Army needs to know who it is meant to serve, and then go and do so. The neighbour of the Army are the groups and people society who are most at need of mercy, who are most at risk, who are most likely to suffer.

Then the Army needs to love those people. This can look like housing the homeless, feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, advocating on behalf of the marginalised, helping people find employment, providing education and language classes, offering health care, visiting the lonely, supporting people to maintain their dignity, and loving the unloved. The very same call to individuals is to the Church as a whole, just done on a larger scale. The Army can act at a larger scale than the individual, but it needs to recognise that in doing so it is seeking to act in love. Whether we are operating a hostel, supporting people into employment, or selling the War Cry, we are loving our neighbour. When the Army wants to make a decision, whether at the national or the local level, the first questions it should be asking are: who do we need to love, and how can we best love them.

Mobilised For Total Mission

Obedience to the mission of God is for everyone in the entire Army. Everything the Army does is done to fulfil that mission. Every part of the Army’s work, whether administration, social care, or evangelism, is part of its mission. Everyone who works for the Army, is a member of the Army, or who goes to the Army, is part of its mission to love God and to love our neighbour. We need to grow and develop a culture where every employee, officer, envoy, soldier, and member, asks themself who are they meant to be loving and how can they do it best. Imagine what our church would look like if in our budget meetings, in our corps council, at mission strategy boards, we are asking who we need to love and how can we love them?

On the grounds of William Booth College there is a plaque which perfectly summarises what the mission of the Army is. It simply says, “By love, Serve.” This is everything for the Army.

We are called to serve our neighbour by loving them. We are called to serve each other through love. Jesus tells us that the sign of someone following Jesus is the way they love each other. In the first letter of John we are told that we can only love God when we love other people. Love is everything for the Christian, and for the Army, because love is who God is. Every time we need to make a decision, every time we need to work out what the best thing to do is, we need to ask ourselves, how can I be of loving service, and then go and do it. This is true for us as individuals, and for the Army as an organisation.

The mission of God and the mission of the Army and the mission of us as disciples are all the same. Love people in need. People in need of practical support. People in need of Jesus. Feed them, and tell them about Jesus. Clothe them, and show them Jesus. House them, and introduce them to Jesus. The American philosopher Cornell West said that love in private looks like tenderness, but love in public looks like justice. But it is always Justice and Jesus. The two go together. Mission means taking practical responsibility for a person in need as well as helping them come to know Christ.

We must make “by love, serve” the heart of who we are. As individuals, and as an Army. It is only by doing this that we can fulfil our mission. It is only by doing this that we can love Christ.