"Going to the Army!" - Marc Harry's Podcast

Episode 108: Going to the Army - Easter Reflection 2025

Had things gone to plan: then today – Tuesday 15th April 2025 I would have been preparing myself for one of my favourite events of the year.   Each Holy Week for quite some years now the Band and Songster Brigade from Lincoln Salvation Army here in the UK have presented an evening of reflective music for Easter.  The music chosen has usually been interspersed with bible readings and poetry written for and about the events of Holy Week leading up to, and including Good Friday.  Some years we have had a featured soloist as well to add to the evening. Over the past few weeks, however, my health has not been too good.  The stresses of life, despite my general happiness in life, have exacerbated some health conditions that changed my life a great deal some 20 years ago – conditions that, as these recent days have proven, are still capable of coming back and haunting me from time to time.    So, despite the preparations that we had made and the posters and leaflets produced to invite people to the event it has not been possible to go ahead THIS YEAR – let’s hope things can return to normal in plenty of time for 2026.   In the meantime, however, I thought - why not use the music chosen for this year, some used in previous years and some other items  from our wonderful Salvation Army heritage to produce a Holy Week programme of reflective music that can be enjoyed by many, many more listeners than our SA hall could hold – and, what’s more enjoyed and blessed by time and time again!

Episode 107: "Going to the Army!" - Marc Harry's Podcast - The History of Salvation Army Music P1 (1865-1905)

To mark the TENTH anniversary of the very first GttA podcast in July 2013 this is the first of a very special 4-part series of podcasts featuring music from each decade of the Army's existence right up to the present day. The Salvation Army began - as The Christian MIssion - in 1865 when William Booth preached outside The Blind Beggar pub in Whitechapel, East London.  Spreading throughout the whole of England, Wales and Scotland in its first decade it became The Salvation Army in 1878, Booth taking on the mantle of the General of his army. Within 25 years, as we hear in this episode, 60,000 Salvationists could gather together at the Crystal Palace for a Silver Jubilee and today, 158 years after those humble beginnings the Army is at work in over 130 countries, right round the world. This episode uses music with its origins in the earliest 40 years of the movement's history 1865-1905, a surprising amount of which is still known and occasionally used in the present day.  We hear music from writers such as Richard Slater, George Scott Railton, Kate and Herbert Booth (two of the Founder's children) and William Pearson as well as, of course, popular tunes of the day 'adopted and adapted' for the Army's mission a-plenty. Some of the music has been adapted by well-known composers like Ray Steadman-Allen, Norman Bearcroft and Leslie Condon and sections featured include the ISB and ISS, Hendon, Portsmouth, Stockholm and Boscombe Bands, songster brigades from Birmingham and Moonee Ponds, Sydney Australia and a stellar collection of soloists including Susan Turner, Fred Crowhurst, Kaytie Harding and Ian Johnston - not to mention Commissioner John Lawley himself! Enjoy this opportunity to transport yourself back in time to hear music and words with a relevance to the present age. God bless you all. Marc

Episode 106: 'The Salvation Meeting (66) - Queen Elizabeth II Vigil - 18/09/2022

'The Salvation Meeting' makes its return this Sunday after my summer break. It returns with something, by necessity, a little different from a 'normal' meeting.The 90 minute 'special' has been specially written and recorded to be broadcast the evening before the funeral of our late Queen Elizabeth II and takes the form of a 'Heavenward-looking Vigil' Specially selected Salvation Army music and songs are interspersed with thoughts reflecting Her Majesty's life and service, particularly her strong and vibrant Christian faith - and many of her own quotes have been recorded by Jeannine Ridha for the broadcast. The meeting will be broadcast, as usual, on Fortress Radio at 6pm on Sunday 18th September and then available on the "Going to the Army!" site as well as the Fortress Radio Podcast service. Please join me for this special meeting.Marc

Episode 105: Salvation Meeting (65) - Jesus - the Way, Truth and Life (What is a Salvation Meeting?)

For the last meeting prepared before I take my summer break (I'll be back in September!) I found my inspiration after seeing a question asked in a Salvation Army forum online:  What is a Salvation Meeting? In these days when most corps only have one service on a Sunday it seems strange to some to imagine we once had at least 3 indoor meetings, Sunday Schools, Open-Air meetings and more EVERY Sunday! Each meeting had its own focus - Praise, personal Holiness - and Salvation - the meeting to which we were encouraged to bring friends, neighbours etc. in the hope and belief that they would find salvation for themselves. So...I try to answer the question - and make an impassioned plea for a response in this meeting. As always there is some wonderful music - Dean Goffin's timeless classic 'The Light of the World', Ivor Bosanko's beautiful setting of Herbert Booth's 'I Bring them to Jesus' - some great songs and choruses and a singing company item with a guest General participating for good measure! Join me for an hour's worship and challenge - and God bless you all. Marc

Episode 104: Salvation Meeting (64) - PENTECOST (Sunday 5th June, 2022)

"Send the Fire!" What must it have been like to have been in that room...that day...on that occasion when the sound of a mighty wind brought tongues of flame to settle on each person's head? And then to have gone out into the streets with the followers of Jesus as each man heard the message in his own language - as the sheer POWER of the Holy Spirit on that first Day of Pentecost saw many thousands of people saved! Well...all the best times have NOT already happened!  Did YOU know that you can have a similar effect on the people around you?  Do you even WANT that to happen? Join me to explore what God wants and expects from us, His followers today, in taking Christ to a world in such desperate need! "All around us seemingly, darkness holds its sway."  What could the FIRE of the Holy Spirit do to alleviate that darkness? So why don't we? Great songs, wonderful band, songster and singing company music and a plea from us all:  "Holy Spirit - Promised Presence - FALL ON ME."