Caring for Sinners

There is a human tendency to care more for the prosperous and to give the best presents to the wealthiest. But some people have broken this trend and committed themselves to serve the deprived and downtrodden social classes.

One of these was William Booth (1829–1912), the founder and first general of the Salvation Army. William Booth was born on April 10, 1829, in Nottingham, United Kingdom. In 1844, he had a conversion experience, and two years later, he became a lay revivalist preacher. In 1865, Booth and his wife, Catherine, founded the Christian Revival Society —which later became the Salvation Army— to reach the poorest and neediest, including alcoholics, criminals, and prostitutes. During its early years, the Salvation Army faced much opposition from the alcohol industry, which did not want the poorer classes to stop buying its product. His wife reported that Booth would “stumble home night after night haggard with fatigue, often his clothes were torn, and bloody bandages swathed his head where a stone had struck.” But Booth would not give up! In his last public address in the Royal Albert Hall, London, on May 19, 1912 (three months before his death), Booth declared, “While women weep, as they do now, I’ll fight; while little children go hungry, as they do now, I’ll fight; while men go to prison, in and out, in and out, as they do now, I’ll fight; while there is a drunkard left, while there is a poor lost girl upon the streets, while there remains one dark soul without the light of God, I’ll fight —I’ll fight to the very end!”15 Booth is also often credited for the quote, “The chief danger that confronts the coming century will be religion without the Holy Ghost, Christianity without Christ, forgiveness without repentance, salvation without regeneration, politics without God, heaven without hell.”16 Appreciating the work of the Salvation Army, Ellen White also emphasized that God raised the Seventh-day Adventist Church to restore the biblical truth in an end-time setting. This means that its solemn mission cannot be replaced by any merely social gospel.

While caring for people’s physical and social needs, we must also lead them “into all truth” (John 16:13; see also Matthew 4:24; 28:20).