From his first days as a Christian in the Salvation Army, Harry Ironside had a deep passion for winning lost souls for the Lord. By the time he was nineteen, he was already preaching well over four hundred sermons a year in addition to dealing with countless individuals and directing the work of his company.
The ceaseless activity of his life left him little time to evaluate his relationship with the Lord. While his associates taught the necessity of holy living to maintain salvation, Ironside rarely took the time to think about it in his own life–he was happy in his sea of busyness, willing to make any sacrifice for the cause of Christ. In fact, he was satisfied that his life was righteous enough, both Godward and manward, to qualify as “perfect love” which he believed made his salvation secure.
During his third year as an officer, doubts started tapping at Ironside’s heart. What if he wasn’t reaching the high standard of Christian living that he preached? As he looked into his heart, Harry knew that his old nature was far from dead. His struggle for victory over a particular personal sin left him almost hopeless. Every time he thought he had at last made full surrender and was experiencing the blessing he so craved, he would suddenly catch a glimpse of himself–a sinful creature in which no good thing dwelt.
Not daring to talk freely with any of the Christians who were of lower rank in the Salvation Army, for fear he would distress them and lose his influence as a leader, Ironside struggled silently for months.
His confusion was heightened when a dear friend–one of the loveliest Christians he knew–confessed that she, too, battled with doubts because she didn’t meet the standard of holiness that she believed was required to be assured of eternal security. Ironside stood helplessly by, while she crumbled under the strain and fell into a maze of spiritism and became shipwrecked in her faith. Miserable, he at last concluded that this teaching of perfection was leaving an enormous train of spiritual derelicts. He recalled scores of dear saints who had given up hope and renounced their faith because “they had failed” as a Christian.
Harry Ironside was convinced there was something dreadfully wrong. Second Timothy 1:7 makes it clear that “God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind.” So why were people driven to insanity? It wasn’t the study of the Bible, he was sure, but a lack of knowledge that explained their wretched condition.
Distraught and not knowing where to turn, after many weeks of prayer, Ironside made the very difficult decision to resign from the Salvation Army. His superior officer tried to convince him to stay for at least six months. They even offered him a position with special missions where he wouldn’t have to come in contact with the holiness doctrine. But even as the two men spoke, Harry was plagued with doubts and fears as to his spiritual state.
Utterly despondent, Harry Ironside knew that he could go on no longer and asked to be sent to the Army’s Rest Home near Oakland, CA. It disturbed him that his own standards had dropped so and that he believed he had become an outright hypocrite.
In Beulah Rest Home, Ironside welcomed the thought of rest for the first time in his life. In such a sacred atmosphere, surely he would be able to seize the secret of “perfect sanctification.” Fifteen other officers were in the Home in the same condition as Ironside. He watched them all to see which one gave the clearest evidence of “complete holiness.” As he observed, he concluded that while there were godly Christians, none could be termed “sinlessly perfect.” Many of those who claimed to have been sanctified acted jealous and quarreled loudly. They seldom read their Bibles, he noted, and avoided conversations about the Word and the Person of Christ. It seemed to Ironside that the ones who spoke loudest about holiness in the meetings were the least spiritual in their lives.
By the end of the first month, Harry had almost become an agnostic. He argued that he had done his part in believing God, but God had failed to uphold His half of the deal–he was still carnal to the core. Finally he refused to think on the matter any more. He sought solace in his old secular books that he had given up years before when he first got saved.
One day, Lt. Alma Jungbeck arrived at the Home, dying from tuberculosis. She was a lovely character and spent much time with Ironside. He watched her intently and at last was convinced that if anyone was truly and fully sanctified, it was Lt. Jungbeck. It completely startled him when she arrived at his room with another friend and announced, “Captain, I know that you are always occupied with the things of the Lord and I need your help.”
Painfully aware of his own heart, Ironside impulsively shoved his secular book under the pillow and grabbed a tract that his mother had given him years before which he had never yet read. It wasn’t printed by the Salvation Army and he apologized that it might not be 100% sound.
He read aloud page after page, desperately hoping that something would speak to the heart of the dying woman. The tract presented the salvation story and claimed something rather absurd: that one could have eternal security. They sat in long silence until at last Lt. Jungbeck blurted out, “Captain, do you think that could possibly be true? If I could only believe that, I could die in peace.”
When Harry recovered from his shock to hear such uncertainty out of the lips of this godly woman, they launched into a discussion of their spiritual fears, doubts and utter failings that carried them well into the night. Hearts aflame, the two ladies went to bed, and Harry was more stirred than ever to know the truth.
Setting everything else aside, Ironside and Jungbeck began to search the Scriptures with vigor and almost ceaseless prayer. Little by little the truth opened up to them that they had been looking to the wrong person and wrong place for holiness–they had looked within instead of to Christ. They began to apprehend that the same grace that saved them was alone the grace that could keep them.
The new light brought with it plenty of confusion. It seemed to Harry that what he now believed contradicted everything he had been taught and so it must be contrary to God’s Word. He was confused, yet his feet were resting on solid ground as he began to understand that holiness, sanctification, perfect love or whatever term you use–belongs to the Christian from the moment he believes, and by God’s grace it is his forever.
Alma Jungbeck saw the truth first and then, about four days later, the light burst on Harry Ironside. The more he searched the Scriptures and studied the doctrine of sanctification, the more he realized that nothing is of self, except sin. All is in Christ.
When the blazing light of the truth pierced his soul, all doubts and fears were swept away. Liberty and joy reigned in his heart as he had never known them. He was free! He found what he had been searching for: Christ was his all in all!
Information gathered from Ordained of the Lord by E. Schuyler English