Church, that was General Booth's great offence all through life. To
think of having uneducated and formerly godless people "bawling" the
"mysteries of the faith" through the streets of "Christian" cities,
where it had hitherto been thought inconsistent with Christian humility
for any one to dare to say they really knew Him "whom to know is life
eternal"! Oh, that was the root objection to all The General's preaching
and action.

And it was one of the most valuable features of his whole career that
wherever he or his messengers went there came that same certainty which
from the days of Bethlehem onwards Jesus Christ came to bring to every
man.

"By faith we know!" If every outward manifestation of The General's
successes could be swept off the world to-morrow, this positive faith in
the one Saviour would be capable of reproducing all its blessed results
over again, wherever it was preserved, or renewed. Any so-called faith
which gives no certainty must needs be hustled out of the way of an
investigating, hurrying, wealth-seeking age. Only those who are certain
that they have found the Lord can be capable of inducing others to seek
and find Him.




Chapter III

Lay Ministry