HomeARC ML 0673
"7 SUPPORTERS!"--By Father David. February, 1978 MO--DFO NO.673
--For Brave Pioneers!--Or YOU!
Copyright © by The Family of Love, March 1978, CP 748, 00100 Roma, Italia.
1. DID YOU KNOW THAT OUR FAMILY SURVIVED FOR FIVE YEARS BEFORE WE EVER EVEN HEARD OF LITNESSING? Now most of our kids have never heard of anything else!
2. NO WONDER YOU'RE STRUGGLING, no wonder you're having such a hard time! No wonder those slave drivers had to keep driving you!
3. YOU'RE NEVER GOING TO SUPPORT THIS WHOLE THING AS FAR AS GOD WANTS TO GO WITH NOTHING BUT LITNESSING! You've got to start provisioning, winning disciples with forsake-alls, writing appeal letters, FFing, music and jobs!--The seven major sources which God could use!--And has used!
4. IN SOME COUNTRIES, ESPECIALLY ARAB COUNTRIES, SOME OF OUR TEAMS HAVE FOUND IT NECESSARY TO EVEN TAKE JOBS in order to get the necessary permits to remain in the country and be a witness there.
5. OFTEN THESE JOBS, PARTICULARLY WITHIN THE MUSICAL OR MEDIA FIELDS, have proven to be not only good covers, but also excellent avenues to get the message out in newspapers, TV and radio broadcasts, and also a very beneficial source of supply so they could afford to raise their living standards and reach the rich!
6. YOU'VE GOTTEN SO BUSY HAVING TO GET OUT AND BEAT THE PAVEMENTS AND JUST LITNESS, LITNESS, LITNESS, you forgot what you joined the army for! So you're dissatisfied, unhappy, discontented, uninspired, discouraged and pitiful! But you're neglecting the six other ways of God supplying our needs!
7. THE FAMILY EXISTED FIVE YEARS BEFORE WE EVER SOLD A LETTER!--We gave away millions of free little Warning Tracts, that's all!
8. WHO HATH BEWITCHED YOU? Who hath deceived you? What went wrong? How were you led astray? I don't think you can find it in the Letters!
9. I DON'T THINK I WAS THE ONE WHO LED YOU ASTRAY. I emphasised litnessing for awhile to get you started, but then you went overboard with it! You stopped everything else completely!
10. OUR FIRST FORM OF SUPPORT WAS THE MAIL MINISTRY.--Next came forsake-alls, through winning souls!
11. THE DISCIPLES WE HAD GAVE EVERYTHING THEY HAD! We were winning souls right and left and all their money was coming in with them!
12. YOU STOPPED GETTING FORSAKE-ALLS BECAUSE YOU STOPPED WINNING SOULS! You stopped getting support through the mails because you stopped writing appeal letters.
13. WHERE ARE YOUR MONTHLY PRAYER LETTERS showing what a good work you're doing, showing how you're helping people, to encourage your friends and family and people back home and past friends and contacts to keep on supporting your work?
14. YOU CAN'T GO TO THE EXTREME ON ANYTHING. We used everything!:--We won souls, got forsake-alls, learned about provisioning, wrote prayer letters--and now we litness, FF, play music and get jobs!
15. PROVISIONING IS REALLY IMPORTANT TO ENCOURAGE AT THE SERVICE CENTERS. It's important to Pioneers, Homes, Sprint Shops, Schools, everybody! If the Servant himself is not a good provisioner, he ought to get someone on his staff who can!
16. THE 7 SUPPORTERS!: MAIL MINISTRY, FORSAKE-ALLS, PROVISIONING, LITNESSING, MUSIC, FFing & JOBS!
17. IT'S IMPORTANT TO GET OUT THE WORD but when you're doing it just because you need the money, you've got the wrong motive!
18. I'D RATHER YOU'D GET OUT THERE AND GIVE THEM AWAY WITH THE RIGHT MOTIVE, then I know God would supply your needs! That's the way we used to do, we used to give away millions of copies of the little Warning Tract and God supplied all our needs! But now God wants us to use a balance of all these means of support.
19. WHERE'S YOUR FAITH! YOU'VE LOST YOUR FAITH IN GOD! You lost your faith in His ability to supply, because you're not obeying. If you're not obeying the Letters, you can't have faith because you're not obeying the Word!
20. WITHOUT OBEDIENCE IT'S IMPOSSIBLE TO HAVE FAITH, impossible to believe God, and it's certainly impossible to please God, He says so!: "Without faith it is impossible to please God!" (Heb.11:6.)
21. IF YOU HAVEN'T GOT THE FAITH FOR GOD TO SUPPLY YOUR NEEDS, YOU'RE DISPLEASING HIM.--And the reason you haven't got the faith is you're not obeying.
22. ON PIONEER CHECKS: You should go over their reports and see what they're accomplishing.
23. AFRICA HAS PRETTY MUCH HAD IT! Frankly, I just don't see all that much future in Africa. I think we ought to do all we can, but most Arab-Muslim countries are closed doors.
24. YOU CANNOT OPENLY WITNESS OR LITNESS and so what little you can do in some Arab countries is pretty negligible.
25. JUDGE EACH CASE ON ITS OWN MERITS: Think who the people are, what are they accomplishing, and what future is in that country.
26. WHO'S DONE A GOOD JOB AND WHO'S ACCOMPLISHING SOMETHING? Should they be able to support themselves by this time, or is it still impossible?
27. IN CASES WHERE YOU KNOW IT'S IMPOSSIBLE FOR THEM TO SUPPORT THEMSELVES, if they're accomplishing enough and worthy enough, I'd say let's keep supporting them. But if you're pouring money down a rathole, we're going to have to cut'm off!
28. I'VE DONE A LOT OF PIONEERING IN MY DAY AND I KNOW WHAT IT'S LIKE. What some need first of all is a lump sum to get started, but I've started out with nearly nothing and still made it by God's help!
29. WHEN YOU NEED HELP THE MOST IS WHEN YOU'RE ACTUALLY RENTING A PLACE AND PUTTING DOWN DEPOSITS for utilities etc. Then you can hit the streets and start litnessing, provisioning, FFing, soul-winning, playing music, working and writing appeal letters.
30. THE INITIAL SUPPORT SHOULD BE CONSIDERED AS A PIONEER LOAN. Eventually, as soon as they are able, they should start repayment.
31. SOME OF THE PLACES THEY'VE BEEN PIONEERING MUST HAVE GOTTEN ON THEIR OWN FEET BY THIS TIME. So besides giving their 10% tithe they ought to start paying back.
32. UNTIL THE TIME THAT THEY CAN REPAY THE FUNDS WE'VE INVESTED, THEY'RE NOT REALLY OPERATING ON A PAY-AS-YOU-GO BASIS. So it's time for some of them to start paying back some of those funds so we'll have them available for other children who need help.
33. I SUGGEST THAT EVERYBODY INVEST AN EXTRA 10% IN PIONEERING if you have more than your needs. If you have more than your needs you should send in an extra 10% for Pioneering funds.
34. THE RICHER HOMES SHOULD GIVE THIS ABOVE THE WS 10% as a gift. If you've got more than you need, then you ought to be sending extra to the KQS Pioneer Fund.--Amen?
35. THE VS'S SHOULD BE READING THE HOME FINANCIAL REPORTS. There is a place on the new Home Servant report for the general finances, their income, costs, expenses etc.
36. SUGGEST TO SOME OF THE HOMES THAT THEY SHOULD MAKE EXTRA DONATIONS TO PIONEERING works if they're clearing far and above their expenses. They can donate to the World Service Pioneer Fund or their own KQS Pioneer Fund.
37. EACH HOME SHOULD HAVE A COUNCIL MEETING TO DECIDE THEIR GIFT TO PIONEER MISSIONS abroad: How much they think they can afford to give, then they could even decide on a regular percentage of their monthly income--above their monthly costs.
38. I DON'T WANT THEM TO TAKE IT OUT OF THEIR LIVING EXPENSES. Just say, "Now, here's what our living costs are and here is how much surplus we're getting above our living costs. How much do you people want to give of this increase to missions?"
39. I WOULD SAY IT OUGHT TO BE LIKE IT WAS IN THE BIBLE, 10% of the increase. 10% of whatever income they have above their total Home costs, their 10% tithe and their lit costs.
40. TOTAL UP ALL THE EXPENSES INCLUDING THE REGULAR TITHE and then figure out how much the remaining income was for the month. I believe it would be fair that at least 10% of that should go to Pioneer Missions abroad.
41. A SET PERCENTAGE IS ALWAYS THE FAIREST. That's the way God did it. No matter what their income was, He asked them to tithe just 10%, plus extra gifts.
42. YOU OUGHT TO GIVE AT LEAST 10% of whatever you made above your costs to Foreign Missions. Then you'll have plenty left to donate to local missions. Call it your Foreign Missions donation.
43. THE IDEAL PIONEER FINANCING IS FROM LOCAL HOMES that have extra funds. They can send out the pioneers to nearby fields where they can keep an eye on them and see how they spend the money and if they accomplish anything.
44. IF THEY CAN'T MAKE IT BY THE TIME THAT RUNS OUT, I'M NOT SO SURE GOD WANTS THEM WHERE THEY WENT. Maybe they're out of God's will or in some unfruitful field. I'll tell you, that's a lot better than what I started out with when I went out pioneering!
45. I STARTED OUT WITH $30 from Los Angeles, California, USA, preached and witnessed all the way and landed in Miami, Florida, 3,000 miles and 3 months later with $300! God never fails a true Pioneer!
46. HOW ARE THEY GOING TO LEARN FAITH if they don't learn to trust God instead of us? We'll help them to get started and that's all!
47. THAT'S THE WAY THE NEW TESTAMENT CHURCH DID IT: Paul kept coming back to Antioch, his base. He went out one loop, then came back to Antioch. Then he went on further next time and came back again to Antioch.
48. PAUL KEPT GOING OUT PIONEERING AND THEN ALWAYS BACK TO BASE. They knew what he was doing and I'm sure they were checking up on him to make sure they were getting their money's worth.
49. HE WAS EXPECTED TO RAISE HIS MONEY AS HE WENT, to trust God to support him, and He did. I'm sure they sent him off with what they could, and as he went along establishing new churches, they helped him get to the next place where he could establish another one, and so on.
50. I THINK LOCAL PIONEERING IS THE BEST WAY, just like the Early Church. The Mother Church sprouted a bunch of little chicks. They went out from the central Mother Church into the surrounding areas.
51. THE CHURCHES THAT HAD MONEY HELPED THEM ON THEIR WAY, helped them to pioneer. They were pioneering locally where the Mother Church could keep an eye on them and make sure they did it right and behaved themselves and used it right and actually did pioneer. They kept in touch, in communication with each other. And I think that's the best form of pioneering.
52. BUT, OF COURSE, IF YOU RUN OFF TO SOME OTHER COUNTRY half way around the world, and you're a total pioneer in a brand new country and there are no local churches, then somebody's going to have to help you somehow.
53. THE VERY FIRST THING TO DO BEFORE YOU LEAVE IS FIND AS MANY FRIENDS AS YOU CAN and start advertising what you're planning to do to other local Homes, Family, relatives, contacts and friends. If they like the idea and they have confidence in you and know that you've done a good job at home, they'll want to help you.
54. LET THEM KNOW THAT YOU'RE GOING TO A CERTAIN FIELD TO PIONEER, "There's nobody else there to help me, it's a closed field and I can't litness there. Will you help us go?"
55. DON'T BE AFRAID TO ASK. Ask your local Homes, your friends, your family, your folks, your relatives, contacts. If you have been in this work any time at all you ought to be keeping an address book loaded with contacts, your provisioning contacts, businessmen, FF contacts, etc.
56. MY ADDRESS BOOK IN MY PIONEER DAYS WAS MY BREAD AND BUTTER! The most valuable thing we had was an address book full of friends! And while in the field I never failed to write them a letter every month!
57. WE SUPPORTED OURSELVES ON THE EVANGELISTIC, PIONEERING AND WITNESSING FIELD, for years mostly just by mail!--Just by getting out a little prayer letter every month.
58. THE FIRST ONES I WROTE BY HAND. Finally, we got a little Speed-O-Print mimeograph and I cranked them out by hand about 100 every month. Finally by the time we had our little missionary school our mailing list was up to 2,000 and that's where most of our support came from!
59. IF YOU'RE NOT WELL SUPPORTED, I CAN'T HELP BUT THINK IT'S YOUR OWN FAULT. You're not really using every possible avenue of support. Encourage your pioneers to raise their own support, even the churches do this.
60. BEFORE THE CHURCHES WOULD EVER LET A MISSIONARY GO TO THE FIELD, they travelled around visiting churches, friends, family, contacts, making friends and influencing people and gathering pledges for their support--promises for people to give so much monthly.
61. THEY HAD LITTLE SLIPS PRINTED UP, little pledge books like check books, and they would pass the slips out to people while they spoke about the field they were going to. And on there it said, "I promise, God helping me, to send you $___________ a month," with a blank to insert whatever they wanted to give.
62. WHEN THE MISSIONARIES HAD RAISED THEIR OWN SUPPORT, their fare, sufficient clothing and whatever equipment they needed to take to the field, and had raised pledges sufficient to support them in that field, they were allowed to go.
63. PIONEERING SHOULD BE INDIGENOUS: It should be self-supporting, as well as more or less independently self-governing and certainly self-propagating.
64. SO ENCOURAGE YOUR PIONEERS TO USE EVERY POSSIBLE MEANS OF RAISING THEIR OWN SUPPORT, and not just expect you to give them some kind of constant perpetual budget to live on forever!
65. TRY TO KEEP YOUR PIONEERING SUPPORTED ON THE LOCAL LEVEL and let them prove themselves by pioneering locally at first. Try to keep your pioneers supporting themselves. If they're going to go to some field they ought to try to raise their support in advance, raise their fare in advance and try to get people, friends, other Homes and Families to promise to help, to pledge regular monthly donations toward their field support.
66. THOSE WHO CAN'T MAKE IT AT HOME WILL NEVER MAKE IT ON THE MISSION FIELD! Those who don't make missionaries at home, won't make missionaries on the field! Before we give anyone a penny for pioneering, they have got to prove themselves in local fields first!
67. HOW GOOD HAVE THEY BEEN AT PIONEERING AT HOME?--Wherever home is! If they have not provisioned by mail already, provisioned in person, FFed, litnessed, won disciples who had forsake-alls here at home and proven themselves successful self-supporting pioneers right here at home, they'll never be successful on the field either! So I don't believe in pouring money down ratholes!
68. I WANT TO ENCOURAGE THE NEW PIONEERS TO GET OUT JUST LIKE WE DID IN THE EARLY DAYS when we sent people on the road purely by faith. We couldn't give them anything because we didn't have anything to give them!
69. IF WE MANAGED TO RAKE UP THEIR FARE THEY WERE THANKFUL! They would arrive sometimes flat broke and had to go right away and provision their meals or their housing or whatever, because we'd never heard of litnessing!
70. SOMETIMES I THINK THEY WANT TO GO TO FAR FLUNG FIELDS JUST FOR A CHANGE of scenery or because they have a yen to travel! That's fine if they get the job done when they're there. But if they never proved to be good soul-winners, witnesses, litnessers, FFers, provisioners and pioneers at home, they'll certainly never make it on the field!
71. SO I WANT YOU TO MAKE IT A LITTLE DIFFICULT TO GET PIONEER LOANS because the real pioneers are going to make it with or without our help! They're going to get there and they're going to make it.
72. I LIKE TO HELP THOSE WHO REALLY NEED AND DESERVE IT. They say God helps those who help themselves--well, I believe He's more inclined to help those who can't help themselves!
73. THE ONES THAT CAN HELP THEMSELVES DON'T NEED OUR HELP and they should help themselves. We only ought to help the people who can't help themselves, like on closed fields where you can't litness etc.
74. BUT I DON'T SEE HOW ANYBODY COULD GO TO ANY FIELD WHERE THEY CAN'T ESTABLISH SOME MEANS OF SUPPORT. I don't think there's a field in the world where they can't do some kind of provisioning, FFing or writing for support from home etc. We need to cut down on this drain from the top because we're going to need that money to help people who really need it!
75. THEN WHEN THEY GET THERE THEY HAD BETTER KEEP IN CONTACT and report to their supporters how they're doing, what they're doing and show they're doing something so that their supporters will know they're getting something for their money!
76. THEY BETTER KEEP LETTING THEIR SUPPORTERS KNOW, EVEN IF THEY WRITE BY HAND or crank it out on a little mimeograph like I used to! My Lord, you can at least write them a postcard to let them know that you're still alive! Communicate! Keep in touch! Don't neglect your lifeline!--Your supporters at home that keep you in the field!
77. USE YOUR KQS AS YOUR PERMANENT ADDRESS, as field addresses often change and mail is uncertain. Have your supporters mail their gifts designated for you to your KQS, and then he can forward them to you in some safe and fast form monthly--and make up whatever is lacking if folks forget!
78. (QUESTION: WHAT'S YOUR FEELING ABOUT PEOPLE WHO GET JOBS TO KEEP THE HOME GOING?) I think I've already expressed that in the Letters haven't I?--In "Drop In". Where it's impossible any other way, of course!
79. PAUL DID IT, HE MADE TENTS part time. He took all kinds of different jobs part time in order to support his missionary work.
80. SOME PEOPLE GO TO THE EXTREME ON DROP OUT, FORSAKE ALL. There are some exceptions to every rule, and there are some cases in which they cannot drop out and they have nothing to forsake. They have to hold a job to do the job, the work of missions.
81. THERE ARE PLENTY OF EXAMPLES OF THAT IN THE BIBLE and there's nothing unscriptural about it. So if they have to take a job in order to help support the work, that's better than failing. That's better than folding because they don't know how to support it.
82. I STILL BELIEVE THAT YOU CAN SUPPORT IT BY ALL OTHER SIX MEANS, at least some of them, and still devote your full time to the work. But I would say that you could add that as a 7th means.
83. IF ALL ELSE FAILS AND THERE'S NO OTHER WAY, GET A JOB. The only trouble is, in most countries, if you're a foreign tourist they don't allow you to get a job. So that may prove more difficult than the other means.
84. I'D SAY IT'S CERTAINLY PERMISSIBLE IF NECESSARY. Especially if you've got some local contacts or some local drop-in fish who still have their good jobs and want to be live-in and join you and live with you like part of the Family, but work out.
85. THIS IS WHAT'S HAPPENING IN TENERIFE right now. We've got one man who runs a restaurant, one man who runs an audio business, and another man runs a hotel. They're all holding down their old jobs but living with the Family.
86. THEY'RE JUST NOT QUITE READY TO DROP OUT YET, and if they did the Family would be pretty hard up because it's got its problems. So don't knock it, use it! PTL?
87. MANY A FAMOUS MISSIONARY OF THE PAST, in some of the classical stories of pioneering, had to go to work and earn their way because people failed to support them.
88. PAUL BLAMED IT ON THE CHURCHES AT HOME. He said it was their fault, they should have supported him. But when they failed he didn't quit, he went ahead and supported himself. Surely you should be able to support your work on one of these seven methods--a nice Biblical number! PTL!
Copyright (c) 1998 by The Family
