Over the last few days I have been representing our territory, along with 12 others, at the Tri-Territorial Theological Forum's annual conference "Thought Matters".
This conference has been constituted by the territorial leaders of The Salvation Army in Australia and New Zealand to consider theologically the issues that are presented to the group. The purpose is to provide sound theological/ biblical underpinnings to our practice and policy.
This year the leaders of our territories asked the group to consider a theology of social justice. And so, the 80 delegates from around Australia and New Zealand met in Wellington to do so.
The papers presented contained an ecclesiological perspective entitled "Un-Binding Salvation", and Old Testament paper about what it means to walk with God, a New Testament consideration of the church enacting social justice, a church history paper that looked to justice as understood by the church fathers and a missiological paper about how we construct our mission - rather than waiting to join God's mission.
The plenaries were varied and helpful as well. They covered everything from the 'so what' questions through to worship times that centered around the social justice theme.
The reports from the conference will ultimately be published, probably early next year. The group will meet again next year in Sydney to consider next year's topic: Reviewing Booth's Vision 100 years on... A Vision for the Lost, or a Lost Vision? (Next year is the centenary of the death of William Booth).
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