Tales from the Riverbank 2024: Speaking truth to power

 

I have recently returned from a fantastic weekend at the riverbank, a conference for women within The Salvation Army and I had such a brilliant time. The fellowship was sweet, the worship was spirit-filled and the teaching challenging, and I am only beginning to unpack all that God did over our time together. Today I am thinking about the keynote speaker Dr Helen Paynter who powerfully brought us the story of Esther - a woman in the bible who discovered she can!

Dr Helen Paynter presented the account of Esther in a fresh light showing the tyranny of the powers of the day and how her story was truly one of resilience and pain. She talked about the call on her life to make a stand for God and how in spite of the barriers, she gave her risky yes. 

While talking about the call on Esther’s life, Helen used a phrase that has been bouncing about in my mind for a little while, and one that I felt God had been challenging me with. This is the command of “Speaking Truth to power.” Esther was called to go into a situation where everyone was against her, where even her speaking any word could cause great consequence and to speak the uncomfortable truth to someone who is likely to disagree. 

As many of you know, for the past year I have been undergoing training at The Salvation Army’s William Booth Training College as a distance learning territorial envoy. Each cohort of session in Salvation Army training colleges worldwide are given a name and next month I am going to be commissioned and ordained as an officer  as part of the session called ‘The Defenders of Justice’ As part of the commissioning services the session will sing a song especially written for them and our song is written by the Beautiful Major Kerry Coke and her husband Nick. Those of you at Riverbank will know Kerry and will know that she is gorgeous inside and out and not only has great dancing skills and an eye for a bargain but also, and more importantly has a powerful and prophetic gift. There is a line in this song that floors me every time I sing it (and as we are rehearsing for commissioning, it is all the time!) which says:

“Courage rising in us, speaking truth to power, God we follow you!”

When Doctor Helen Paynter began to speak about this concept of speaking truth to power I felt goosebumps all over, as I knew that is something that God is calling me and is calling us as The Salvation Army to do. You see we live in a world where truth is so rare it is like gold dust (or a sunny day in June 2024!) where we are told everyone has their own truth, and that what the bible says is true really isn't true in this day and age. We are in a season where we are being asked to vote for truth when there doesn’t seem to be the truth anywhere and we live in a world where the truth of the gospel is labelled a lie…..a world that sounds very similar to the tyranny in Esther’s age. 

However, Dr Helen Paynter explained that speaking truth to power is the role of the prophet and the church is called to be a prophet and expose tyranny. God is calling his church and I, as a part of his church, know I am called too, to speak truth to the powers in front of me. 

The yes to this call is a risky one, it doesn’t always end happily and it often comes with kick back and persecution and that isn’t easy. However we are called to be holy, we are called to  stand against tyranny, we are called to be defenders of justice, speakers of truth to power…

One powerless and seemingly insignificant woman, with the power of God, and the support of the community of God’s people, by speaking truth to power changed the trajectory of a whole race of people. Imagine what we could do if the women of The Salvation Army, the daughters of the true king,  gave our risky yes and spoke truth to the powers of our day?