Monday, August 20, 2007

The Holination Meeting

a Jesus thought...
No one can do these signs that You do unless God is with him. (John 3:2)

a Godly thought...
If the church is simply a community of like-minded people, inviting other like-minded people to join them, then it will always be severlt impeded in its attempt to win the world for Christ. (p46 Frost & Hirsch)

a leading thought...
Often the crowd does not recognise a leader until they are gone, then they build a monument for them with the stones they threw at them in life. (p248 Blackaby)

a Dave thought...
Yesterday I attended our three weekly services at Box Hill 9.30, 11.00 and 6.00. Over the years I have been involved in decisions that have made these services quite distinct in their various styles to appeal to different sub-cultures or age groups of our community. In Australian society most of the 7% that regularly attend church will only attend once so we attempt to do a lot of things in one service.
Over the last 30 years we have shifted a long way from our traditional morning Holiness meeting and our evening Salvation meeting. Most soldiers of corps across the world used to attend both of these meetings and we were taught the doctrine of Holiness in the morning and at night there was a service which gave a people an opportunity to get saved. Today as we make our Sundays more culturally acceptable by just attending one service we attempt Holiness and Salvation together and lose the focus of our meetings. So is the Holination meeting the answer or is it just convenient for what has become an apathetic Army in the 21st century?

Just a thought.

3 comments:

james said...

its not good. it doesnt work. it is a product of an apathetic generation/s who care more about themselves than getting people saved. the holination meeting is a compromise in an effort to get people in the doors.

if we kept the holiness meetings as holiness meetings and people received the blessing of holiness then people would naturally want to get people saved and the salvation meeting would naturally become a need.

thought id let u know dave, we're starting up a salvation youth meeting and soul saving crusade next term at plenty valley... i'll call u about it

Anonymous said...

I agree with you and James! In my experience of Salvo meetings they are worship services, that is they are designed to give the people in the corps their weekly dose of a sermon and songs. The Army was formed to get people saved & use the converts to save others. Therefore I think it would be better if Salvation Army meetings aimed at either Holiness, Salvation or training people in evangelism.

Anonymous said...

I agree with the other comments. Holiness Meetings are almost a thing of the past and so are Salvation meetings. However the present approach is not really achieving a great deal. Our Corps run some Friday night Holiness Meetings (but not regularly enough) in an effort to try and help the situation but even that is not enough to fill the gap. People are crying out for a full measure of both and I believe that we need it to help those who are seeking after Holiness and to bring people to a commitment to Christ in the first instance.