HomeARC ML 1271
THE 7 CURES FOR FINANCIAL ILLS! 11/7/82 DO 1271
1. WELL, PTL! HALLELUJAH! THIS IS AN EMERGENCY! We're having a business & finance conference regarding general finances & problems arising from WS' increased giving & the Family's decreased giving, to the extent that we have given more this past month than we have received & we have a deficit.
2. THE THING TO DO WHEN YOU FIND YOU CAN'T LIVE WITHIN YOUR INCOME is to either cut your living down to the level of your income, or figure some way to raise the income. If you can't figure any way to increase the income, then you've got to cut down expenses--the living or whatever you're doing or spending--like Pubs!
3. BUT DON'T DO LIKE GOVERNMENTS & A LOT OF BANKS & SOME COMPANIES DO: When the can't live within their expenses & their income, they just borrow!--Until most of the World & most governments & most banks & businesses are living on borrowed money & borrowed time & are now beginning to gradually crumble & fall & go bankrupt, because it's finally beginning to catch up with them!
4. THE GOVERNMENTS CAN JUST PRINT MORE MONEY--COUNTERFEIT MONEY IS WHAT IT IS! When it's not even worth the paper it's printed on, it's counterfeit money. If it's not represented true value in gold, silver, etc., it is counterfeit money. Governments are the biggest counterfeiters in the World! That's why they're so hard on private counterfeiters, because they want the monopoly on the game to make sure that nobody but them is doing it!
5. THEY PRINT WORTHLESS MONEY BUT THEY BACK IT UP WITH GUNS!--And they can take yours away with guns! They don't want anybody else--criminals as they call them--printing the same kind of money or they'll go with guns & take it away from them & put them in jail! They don't want any competition in the counterfeit business!
6. WHAT IS A COUNTERFEIT?--SOMETHING THAT PRETENDS TO BE SOMETHING IT ISN'T, RIGHT? What is paper money? Almost any paper money pretends to have value when it actually doesn't, so virtually all paper money is counterfeit money. It's one of the greatest counterfeits ever cooked up by governments to cover their excessive luxury-living beyond their income.
7. WHEN THEY NEED MORE MONEY THEY JUST PRINT IT & PRETEND TO THE PEOPLE IT'S WORTH SOMETHING, & the people are dumb enough to accept it! In fact, they're required by law to accept it whether they like it or not!--Which to me is robbery at the point of a gun by the government! But the government gets what it deserves in return, of course, because the taxes they receive in return aren't worth anything either! That paper money is not worth anything & eventually it catches up with them.
8. ALREADY SOME OF THE BIGGEST CORPORATIONS & BANKS IN THE WORLD ARE GOING BROKE! Governments are already broke but the can pretend they'd not & cover it up by continuing to squeeze the corporations & the public & rule by the gun. But we can't do that.
9. WE'RE NEITHER COUNTERFEITERS NOR DO WE BELIEVE IN FORCING THE FAMILY TO GIVE at the point of a gun like the governments do! They have to give in love & voluntarily & the best they can. We can't force them to, but we can cut down on what we give them in return; if we can't afford it, we can't give it.
10. AND WE DON'T BELIEVE IN BORROWING MONEY! We believe in the Scripture: "Owe no many anything save to love him!" (Ro.13:8.) And we're trying to love the Family all we can & they're loving us all they can, & I hope they're giving all they can.
11. THE DROP IN THEIR GIVING IS ACCOUNTABLE FOR A NUMBER OF DIFFERENT REASONS, probably mostly because such a tremendous number of them have now moved South. I told you last time about 10% of them moved South last month, & another 10% have moved South since I told you that! There are now only about one-third of us in the North & two-thirds of the Family have moved South! Think of that! They are really obeying & really getting out, TTL! But it costs something!
12. SO WHEN OUR INCOME DOESN'T MEET OUR EXPENSES, WE CUT DOWN ON THE EXPENSES--especially the excessive expenses or the fat & the frills & the little fringe benefits that we don't absolutely have to have. If it gets bad enough, we even cut down on some of the needs to make our income cover our outgo.
13. I BELIEVE IN LIVING WITHIN OUR INCOME & NOT BORROWING! The only thing we borrow from as a Family & as World Service Units are our Reserves. But in a sense, that's not actually borrowing, because they're already ours & are just a little stockpile of emergency funds to use in just such an emergency as this & as we have before. PTL!--Each WS Unit has a little.
14. TRIMMING THE FAT MEANS TRIMMING FAT PERSONNEL & FAT INCOMES & FAT PROJECTS & any kind of fat we don't absolutely have to have & w don't really need. And having trimmed all the fat, then we trim a little bit of everybody's meat as well as fat, even units' needed income if we haven't got it.
15. SO MY SUGGESTION IS, FIRST WE TRIM THE FAT, THEN WE CUT OFF A POUND OF MEAT: 10% of all of their income. Since WS income has fallen off nearly 10%, we will have to cut their income 10%. We cannot give them what we haven't got. We went in the hole this past month & we're going further in the hole this month if we don't out down.
16. THE MAIN THING IS THAT OUR INCOME DROPPED NEARLY 10% BELOW OUR OUTGO. This isn't the first time we've out down, we've gone it several times before when we went in the hole. We just covered the hole! We can't pour money down a hole we haven't got & we can't pour money we haven't got down the hole, so we just get rid of the hole so we don't have to pour money down it! PTL? (Chokes:)
17. PARDON ME, I GOT SOME WATER DOWN THE WRONG HOLE WHERE IT DOESN'T BELONG, & THAT'S WHAT WE HAVE TO DO ABOUT OUR MONEY! If we're pouring any of it down the wrong hole we need to put it where it does some good & not where it does us harm by spending money we haven't got! I'm saying all these things to try & teach you a lesson, & at the same time we're having to go into emergency action with counter-measures to correct the problem.
18. WE HAVE JUST PASSED THROUGH A PERIOD WHEN WS INCOME WAS THE HIGHEST IN OUR HISTORY, so we gave raises to everybody & started giving gifts to missionaries & mission fields that we've never given to before, & we have given more generously than ever in our history. And frankly, I deliberately tried to raise our giving to the level of our income, because except for emergencies, I could see no point in having a balance or a margin left over every month.
19. I DON'T BELIEVE IN GOING IN DEBT OR IN DEFICIT, BUT NEITHER DO I BELIEVE IN WITHHOLDING MORE THAN IS MEET & piling up reserves that we don't need or could use better. I don't want the canker of our gold & our silver to be a witness against us. (Ja.5:3.)
20. SO WHEN PEOPLE WAKE UP TO WHAT'S HAPPENING TO THE MONEY & when the governments can't cover it anymore & the banks can't cover their loans anymore & the corporations can't cover their debts anymore, etc., then they being to crash!
21. AND FINALLY, GOVERNMENTS CAN CRASH TOO, & when they do--as they have in the past many times--their paper money is worth nothing & the only thing worth anything is real estate value & things that people consider valuable, things with intrinsic material value like gold, diamonds & jewelry--even food & clothing!
22. WHEN IT COMES DOWN TO IT, WHEN THINGS REALLY GET HARD UP, THE BIBLE SAYS THEY'LL EVEN CAST THEIR GOLD & THEIR SILVER & THEIR IDOLS they have made to the caves & to the moles & the bats! They'll flee to the caves of the Earth to hide themselves from the fury of the Wrath of the Lord! (Is.2:19,20; Rev.6:15,16.) In other words, even such material intrinsic values will be worth nothing any more.
23. FOOD & WATER WILL BE THE GREATEST IN DEMAND, & in even greater demand than that will be protection from the horrors of the Hell on Earth that man has brought upon himself & which God has allowed in His wrath for man to suffer for his own sins. So the time will come when even those things are not worth anything & self-preservation is worth even more than food & water.
24. YOU SAY, "WELL, YOU'VE GOT TO HAVE FOOD & WATER FOR SELF-PRESERVATION!" Well, you can do without them both for a few days while you hide in a cave or someplace from the storm. The Lord said in Isaiah: "Go within thy chambers & shut thy doors until the storm of His wrath be overpast!" (Is.26:20.)
25. WELL, THAT'S EXACTLY WHAT THEY'RE ADVISING US TO DO NOWADAYS: Build yourself a bunker, a bomb shelter, sand bag your doors & windows, blah, blah! "Go within your chambers & shut your doors until the holocaust is over!"--And unless you've got your food & water stored up you may have to go without it for a few days!
26. BUT THANK GOD, IT NEVER LASTS FOREVER & NEARLY EVERYTHING IS ALWAYS OVER EVENTUALLY. There's an end to everything & nothing is forever except the Lord & us & Eternity, TTL! Everything of man, his ideas & his doings & his creations are finite, temporal, terminal. We're working on what you might call a terminal patient who is destined & doomed to die inevitably, very soon. In a way, you might say we're trying to save the baby, the second generation, while the parents are dying due to their own sins.
27. ANYHOW, BANKS & BUSINESSES & GOVERNMENTS ARE GOING BROKE THROUGH LIVING BEYOND THEIR INCOMES, & the U.S. is now trying to cover up its debts & save itself by robbing the rest of the World, by borrowing money at phenomenal rates of interest, 20% or more, paying that much interest on money they're borrowing to desperately cover their own debts.
28. THE VALUE OF THE DOLLAR HAS GONE UP BECAUSE THEY ONLY ACCEPT THAT MONEY IN DOLLARS, & THE VALUE OF GOLD WENT DOWN. As a result, people were selling their gold & buying dollars so they could put them in American banks & earn that phenomenal 20% interest--which they're thankful is more than the rate of inflation of about 10-12% a year in most of the West. This is to cover their debts & losses due to inflation.
29. A RISE IN PRICES OF NEARLY 12% A YEAR MEANS THE VALUE OF YOUR MONEY IS GOING DOWN 10-12% A YEAR. You can't put your money in banks that only pay two, three, five or six percent interest, because it won't even cover the rate of inflation, the amount you're losing on the money just through the loss in its value. So banks have got to pay more interest than the rate of inflation in order to attract money.
30. EUROPE & THE REST OF THE WORLD ARE SCREAMING THAT THE U.S. BANKS ARE BEING UNFAIR TO PAY THAT MUCH INTEREST. They know they can't pay that much interest because the European banks are smarter & the operate on a more sensible scale. But the American banks are on their last fling, they're desperate! There's no answer, no way out, so they don't care what they do!
31. THEY'LL PAY ANYTHING JUST TO KEEP THEIR HEADS, THEIR NOSE OR EVEN ONE NOSTRIL ABOVE WATER a little bit longer before they all collapse--which is what they're about to do! And of course, when they see there is absolutely no hope & it's ready to collapse, you know what they'll do, don't you?--They'll pull the trigger! When the head of a family can't earn or borrow enough he's tempted to go out & rob somebody & steal it.
32. SO THE GOVERNMENTS PULL OUT THE GUNS & AIM THEN AT SOME OTHER COUNTRY & TRY TO GET IT FROM THEM--THEY START A WAR! They try to grab somebody else's money & their wealth & their land & their industries & their resources & their raw materials. They rob somebody else to try to cover their own foolishness & their own debts. And that's what's going to happen!
33. OF COURSE, IN A SENSE, WHAT YOU MOTIONED WAS TRUE: YOU PUT THE PISTOL TO YOUR HEAD LIKE THIS. Well, they get to the point where it's either that or put the pistol to somebody else's head, & that's what they'll choose to do first. They'll put the pistol to Russia's head or the financial World's head or whoever. They're even willing to put the pistol to Europe's head & they're doing it right now!
34. EVERY ONE OF THOSE MISSILES IS A PISTOL TO EUROPE'S HEAD! They want Russia so busy shooting at Europe & all those missile sites in Europe that she won't have enough missiles left to shoot down the U.S.A.! That's why they don't want to move their missiles out of Europe--to save the U.S.!
35. THEY AREN'T A DAMNED BIT CONCERNED ABOUT PROTECTING EUROPE, THAT'S A BIG BUNCH OF LIES! Ever missile there, every single damned one of them, every soldier, every gun, ever tank, every bullet that the U.S.A. has in Europe is not for the protection of Europe at all!--It's for the protection of the U.S.A. & it's going to destroy Europe!
36. WELL, WE DON'T INTEND TO LIVE THAT WAY: THAT'S THE WHOLE MORAL OF THAT LITTLE STORY! We are not going to live beyond our income to where we're tempted to borrow or go out & rob & steal from somebody else in order to get enough money to pay our bills. If the Lord doesn't see to it that the Family sends it in, then we must not need it or we must need to cut down somewhere. Maybe we're being extravagant or wasteful or in some way enjoying some luxuries that we don't have to have.
37. OR MAYBE THE FAMILY IS NOT PRAYING HARD ENOUGH OR GIVING ENOUGH & GOD IS GOING TO TEACH THEM A LESSON! "Can a man rob God?" the Bible says. "Yes," the Lord said. "Ye rob me in tithes & offerings!" (Mal.3:8.) "You weren't satisfied with your 90%, you had to take My 10% too!" The Lord said this to Israel in her last days before He shut up & stopped talking to them for 300 years! The Lord & the Prophets left because it didn't do any good, they wouldn't listen, so He just shut up & let them go to their doom & suffer their fate--which they did.
38. AND THEN IN HIS MERCY, GOD SENT ALONG ONE LAST PROPHET TO WARN THEM WHAT WAS GOING TO HAPPEN before He threw them out entirely & scattered them all over the World, & that was Jesus!--But they crucified Him, so a lot of good it did! It didn't do them any good, but it did us a lot of good, TTL! As a result He turned to the Gentiles & you have gotten saved, whoever is Gentile among us! There aren't too many Gentiles, it seems we're nearly all saved Jews! PTL!
39. SO GOD'S BUSINESS IS NOT GOING TO LIVE LIKE THAT & IS NOT GOING TO BE WASTEFUL! In the first, place, we're going to trim the fat, anything we don't absolutely have to have, any people we don't have to have, any units we don't have to have, any projects we don't absolutely have to have, even if it's only temporary! We'll trim'm this month & we'll just tell them we can't afford them, sorry! We'll also tell those who we need to keep on in hopes that things will get better: "Well, that's what your Reserves are for! Live on your Reserves!"
40. THERE ARE ABOUT FIVE COUNTERMEASURES THAT I'VE LINED UP TO MEET THE EMERGENCY, & of course, the first one is to tell them to do something that they're probably already doing anyhow since they haven't gotten their checks yet, & that is to: live on their Reserves this month. And unless things get better, we're going to give everybody a 10% cut in the next check, & if we find out the income has fallen off any more, it will be more that that!
41. TRIM OFF THE FAT FIRST! Cut everybody 10% to make up for the deficit, & on top of it tell everybody to live on their Reserves until we recover. This is something which we worked out once before in Portugal while with our finance man, & we had it all nicely figured out according to the income then.
42. WE FIGURED OUT HOW EACH AREA OF THE WORLD WAS GOING TO SUPPORT ITSELF ON ITS OWN INCOME: The Western Hemisphere was to live within its income & the Eastern Hemisphere was to live within its income, & if one or the other of them were to have any balance or surplus & the other would have a deficit or a lack or a need, then the balance of the one would cover the deficit of the other.
43. AND THAT'S THE NEXT THING I PROPOSE RIGHT AWAY IS TO (3) SHARE, BECAUSE THE EAST HAS GONE IN THE HOLE, WHEREAS THE WEST HAS THE SURPLUS! Well, the whole World, as far as World Services is concerned, has gone in the hole a little, but not too much, TTL! 10% isn't too bad, but it's a 10% drop in needed income & we're going to have to do something to make up for it. (Dad checks the recorder.) Olympus needs to iron out the wrinkles. They're a futuristic machine having an auditory warning system, which is better than only a visual one.
44. DID YOU KNOW YOUR EARS ARE YOUR BEST WATCHMEN?--THEY NEVER SLEEP! They even listen & watch over you while you're asleep, & if they hear any unusual noise they wake you up. So your auditory watchmen are the most important. That's why the Lord said: "Their prophets are dumb dogs who cannot even bark & warn the people!" (Is.56:10.)
45. MY GRANDFATHER SAID THAT'S WHAT THE "DD" OF "DOCTORS OF DIVINITY" STANDS FOR: Dumb dogs who cannot even bark & warn the people! They just honey them up & love them up deceitfully & dissuade their fears with false prophecies. False peace prophets!
46. SO AN AUDITORY SIGNAL IS THE BEST! God created dogs to bark & bells to ring & watchmen to yell & prophets to warn & preachers to preach & not just flash lights, like some tape recorders!--Because you may or may not see the light! The only way you can see the light is if you've got your eyes open, & many people are blind & have their eyes shut! There are none so blind as those that will not see!
47. BUT IF YOU'RE SCREAMING IN THEIR EAR THEY'LL DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT!--Either they'll obey & heed it & do something about it, or they'll shut your mouth & get rid of you--which they usually did to all of their Prophets. Jesus asked them, "Which of your Prophets have you not slain?" (Mt.23:31; Acts 7:52.)
48. THEY KILL ALL THEIR PROPHETS--EXCEPT FOR ONE OR TWO THAT THE LORD PROTECTED LIKE JEREMIAH! That was very unusual, but He needed to have Jeremiah around to pick up the pieces of what was left over. And besides, he went through his hell beforehand so he got his Heaven afterward! PTL!
49. SO ALL THAT TO SAY THIS: THAT IS ANOTHER CONFIRMATION THAT WE'VE GOT TO WARN THE PEOPLE! We've got to warn the Units that they're going to have to live on their Reserves this month & get a cut in their next check if the income doesn't go up--a cut equivalent to whatever the drop in World Services' income is.
50. CAN YOU RECITE BACK TO ME NOW WHAT COUNTERMEASURES YOU CAN USE WHEN YOU FIND OUT YOU'RE NOT LIVING WITHIN YOUR INCOME? Number 1? (Peter: Trim the fat!) Trim the fat: Personnel, projects, size of budgets & all kinds of different ways you can do that. Number 2? (Peter: Give a percentage cut or cut in the budget.) No, {\ul \i number 2} is probably what they're already doing, living on their Reserves. That means no checks this month except in emergency cases where they don't have sufficient Reserves.
51. IN OTHER WORDS, IF WE HAVEN'T GOT IT, WE JUST DON'T SPEND IT! If we haven't got it, but they've got it in their Reserves, then they spend it, not us. So Number 2 is live on what you've already got; that's what it's for. Everybody is supposed to have at least one or two month's reserves on hand in order to survive such emergencies.
52. NUMBER 3 IS THEN WHAT YOU SAID: A 10% CUT IN ALL OF OUR GIFTS & BUDGETS & OUTGO ACROSS THE BOARD!--Everybody & everything, missionaries & all! I don't think you're going to drive the point home & get the point across unless you touch their most sensitive nerve, their pocketbook nerve, & they realise & wake up to the fact that they haven't got as much money this month or next month because they didn't pray hard enough that the Family would have enough income that they could give enough to us so we'd have enough to give them enough!
53. AFTER THE RNR WE CUT 25% BECAUSE WE HAD A 25% DROP IN INCOME! Of course, that was when our income was only about an eighth of what it is now, & our expenses were about that small too. But our expenses are about eight times as much now, so God gives us about eight times as much income--or has been until right now, when we got this little drop.
54. 10% IS NOT ANYTHING CATASTROPHIC, BUT I THINK IT'S A LITTLE WARNING FROM THE LORD THAT WE NEED TO BE A LITTLE MORE CAREFUL & not be quite so extravagant in our expenditures & our giving & our budgets & our projects & our personnel & some of the things that I have questioned before. I have questioned them before but I let them ride because of some of your appeals.
55. BUT WHEN IT COMES TO SURVIVAL I'M GOING TO LOWER THE BOOM & CRACK THE ROD & we are going to cut down, like it or not! We may get a few howls & a few yells, but it's the hit dogs that howl & some of them need to be hit to behave themselves & not spend so much money!--Including us, including you, including me! PTL?
56. I'M GLAD I GOT THIS NICE LITTLE TAPE RECORDER I'M RECORDING THIS ON BEFORE THE ECONOMY DRIVE!--Ha! I got mine is just under the line! TTL! God bless you dear typists, you're enjoying the benefits of this nice recorder sitting beside me now that I didn't have before, when all I came through the fire with from the last trip was my little micro. But the family here was nice enough to give me this nice birthday present for Maria's birthday! She's sharing it right now with me. See, she isn't having to do the recording, I'm doing it for her! PTL!
57. OK! NUMBER 1 WAS TRIM THE FAT! Number 2: Live on your Reserves, what you've got. Number 3? (Peter: 10% cut across the board.)--Equivalent to our loss in income. We just cut our expenditures to trim down to live within our income. Number 4? (Peter: Warn the people.)
58. WARN THE PEOPLE, THAT'S A VERY IMPORTANT POINT, because that's probably why God is allowing it--to warn them that they can't get away with robbing God & not giving Him His share. I presume there are lots of people who figured they couldn't afford to pay their full tithe this last month or so because they had to spend it for their fares to go South, & God bless them, they've gone South & obeyed in one way.
59. BUT AS THE LORD SAYS, "THIS YE OUGHT TO HAVE DONE & NOT TO HAVE LEFT THE OTHER UNDONE!" (Mt.23:23.) They should have gone South, but they should have paid their tithe too! And if they keep the 90% & borrow His 10% too, they're going to find out they may lose everything! Even if they did evil to do good--they robbed God in order to buy their ticket South--it's not going to pay & they may find themselves worse off than they were before! "The last state of the man was worse than it was before!" (Mt.12:45.)
60. IF THEY THINK THAT BECAUSE THEY'RE OBEYING IN GOING SOUTH THEY CAN BORROW GOD'S TITHE TO DO IT ON, THEY'RE GOING TO FIND OUT THEY'RE MISTAKEN! I thank God they have obeyed & gone South! And of course the income in those poor countries of the South is going to be less & we were expecting it. I was surprised, as you know, that it took so long to catch up with them! It seemed like the Lord was really blessing us for obeying, & I believe He was!--For them going South & for us pouring it out! And we've been pouring it on!
61. (MARIA: ANOTHER POINT IS THAT IN THE FIRST TEN YEARS OF THE FAMILY every one would give all kinds of gifts, inheritances, insurance rebates & everything over to the Family en toto, but now they give very little besides their tithe.) Yes, the early policy of the Family was of course 100%: "Give it all! Move in & live with us & serve God 100%, fulltime, & He'll give you 100%, He'll take care of you!"
62. NOW WE'VE LET SOME PEOPLE OFF THE STICK A LITTLE BIT BY ENCOURAGING THEM TO AT LEAST TITHE: If they didn't feel they had the faith or couldn't work full-time for the Lord, well, at least they could work part-time for the Lord & part-time otherwise &give 10% of what they earn. So a lot of people who have received bequests and inheritances or property sales or whatever instead of giving it all as they used to do, they probably just give 10% now.
63. WELL, WHEN WE ENCOURAGED THE TITHING IT DIDN'T MEAN TO CANCEL THE 100% GIFTS! And as Peter told Ananias & Sapphira, they didn't have to give it all. He said, "It was yours to do with it as you wished." But what the Lord didn't like is they were pretending to give everything & they held back part of it. (Acts 5:1-11.) Don't try to kid us that you're giving everything when you're only giving 10%! Don't try to kid us you're giving 10% when you're not.
64. NOW ACCORDING TO THE FINANCE REPORT, THE TOTAL FAMILY INCOME HAS FALLEN OFF CONSIDERABLY, but not as much proportionately as has your giving to World Services. The drop in your giving to us is larger than the drop in your own income, which shows you must be using it for your own purposes. I don't doubt probably a lot of it you are using it for moving South or whatever else you felt you needed it for, or maybe are even living on it on the mission field because of your low income there.
65. WELL, WE KNEW THAT WHEN WE MOVED TO THESE SOUTHERN FIELDS THE TOTAL FAMILY INCOME WAS PROBABLY GOING TO TAKE A DROP & be lower because they're poor fields & your income was going to be lower, but one reason for it is probably because you were too slow, too late & too little in raising home support & pledges & keeping up a faithful mail ministry! Maybe you thought you'd just start it when you got to the field, but that's pretty hard to do.
66. IT'S FAR BETTER TO WIN PEOPLE'S CONFIDENCE & FRIENDSHIP & SUPPORT BEFORE YOU GO THAN TO WAIT TILL YOU GET THERE. But of course a lot of people get in a hurry & say, "Oh, I'll do it later!" Procrastination is the Devil's own tool to get people to put things off until later: "Mañana, mañana!" Tomorrow, tomorrow!
67. SO PROBABLY A LOT OF YOU DIDN'T REALLY WORK ON YOUR INCOME LIKE YOU SHOULD HAVE before you left the rich countries that you came from, or there wouldn't have been any need for any drop in your income, because your income shouldn't be coming from the field anyhow!
68. MOST OF YOUR INCOME OUGHT TO BE COMING FROM HOME, FROM THE RICH COUNTRIES that have nothing better to do with their money & couldn't possibly spend it for any better purpose; your relatives & friends at home who have nothing else to do but earn money & make money, lots of money to give to the Lord!
69. SO THERE IS NOT ANY EXCUSE FOR A DROP IN INCOME! I've told you that before, right? You should have raised it before you left! You should have gotten more Home Support & pledges & kept up a better mail ministry before you left. Amen?
70. SO IF YOU'VE HAD A DROP IN INCOME BECAUSE OF MOVING SOUTH, THAT IS NOT JUSTIFIABLE! It's understandable & it's reasonable, in a way, but it is not excusable, because you could have earned it & raised it before you left so that you wouldn't have a loss of income when you moved out. If anything, you should have a better income now than when you were in a home field, because don't people give to foreign missionaries much better than to home missionaries? Well, I'll tell you, they do!
71. I WAS IN THE BUSINESS FOR MANY YEARS OF BEING A HOME MISSIONARY & givers didn't feel that the home missionaries needed it nearly as much as the foreign missionaries. We nearly starved to death sometimes because they didn't give that much to little home missionaries running around on the home field.
72. BUT THEY GAVE IT BY THE MILLIONS TO THE FOREIGN MISSIONARIES because they knew they were out there where they really needed it & were really preaching the Gospel to the heathen & into all the World to every creature! So it was never too difficult for real go-getter missionary societies to raise money for foreign missions, it was raising money for home missions that was really difficult.
73. OF COURSE, THEY NEVER REALLY HAD TOO MUCH TROUBLE RAISING MONEY FOR THEIR OWN BENEFIT to build church buildings & run church buildings & pay preachers' fat salaries & buy them fine homes & cars & take good care of themselves first. That's the motto of the American church today & the Christian church in general: "Me first! Peter first! If we have anything left over we'll pay Paul to be a missionary!"
74. DO YOU KNOW WHAT THE AVERAGE MISSIONARY GIVING IS OF THE METHODISTS, THE WORLD'S LARGEST PROTESTANT DENOMINATION? I don't know about the Catholics, but out of every dollar of church income received in offerings & collections, the Methodist church spends only 5% out of every dollar on missions! Five cents on the dollar!
75. --AND THEY SPEND THE OTHER 95% ON NUMBER 1: CHURCH BUILDINGS & church debts & church payments. Number 2: Salaries of church officials, preachers & denominational headquarters administration. Number 3: Running expenses like utilities & all the rest that go into running those huge big denominations & churches! And whatever equipment they need--new organ, new pews, air conditioning & all the rest.
76. WELL, I'LL TELL YOU, THEY MAY NEED AIR CONDITIONING IN SOME OF THESE TROPICAL COUNTRIES, but the countries that can afford the air conditioning & have it are the ones that don't need it!--Ha!--In the North! There're only maybe a few days out of the whole year that it's actually hot enough to turn it on!
77. SO THE CHURCHES SPEND 95% ON THE FAT, THE STUFF THAT GOD DIDN'T TELL THEM TO DO & THE DON'T NEED: Huge church buildings & fat preachers to tickle their ears!--Including huge educational institutions that do nothing but give fat educations to their fat kids to go out & earn more fat for themselves & to give their little crumb of 5 cents out of every dollar to the poor missionaries to do the main job that God told them to do, to get out & preach the Gospel in all the World to every creature!
78. WHAT DO YOU THINK GOD IS GOING TO DO TO THE CHURCHES FOR THAT WHEN HE SEES THEM ONE OF THESE DAYS?--In fact, He's already doing it! He's going to destroy it all. They put their money in a bag, not just with holes in it, they put it into sacks of air, because it's all going to be wiped out! (Hag.1:6.)
79. ALL THOSE BUILDINGS & COLLEGES &--I STARTED TO CALL THEM CREATURES INSTEAD OF PREACHERS--ARE ALL GOING TO BE WIPED OUT! The only eternal investments that the have made is the 5% they put into missions, & a lot of that is wasted too, believe it or not. Some of the big denominational missionaries live in luxury on the field like kings in mansions with servants, & preach little or no Gospel at all!
80. THEY HAVEN'T BECOME MISSIONARIES, THEY'VE JUST BECOME EXPATRIATES! They've just moved to another country, that's all! They don't really preach the Gospel, they don't really get out & witness, they don't pass tracts, they don't litness, they don't do anything like that! They're just sitting out there on the mission field writing prayer letters & getting out their mail ministry.
81. MANY OF THEM ARE JUST RAISING MONEY: "Send me money because I'm a missionary out here on the field!"--But are doing little or nothing to prove it! They get little or no results in converts & do little or no witnessing! I know, because I was in a missionary outfit for years & we heard too many stories of missionaries who spent most of their time just in their mail ministry & writing prayer letters & plugging & promoting & raising money from home by writing letters from the field, but were not actually accomplishing very much.
82. AND WHAT LITTLE THEY DID THEY REALLY TOOTED THEIR OWN HORN & REALLY PRAISED THEMSELVES FOR: "We did this & we did that" & they put in pictures & did all kinds of things trying to show what they were accomplishing when it wasn't very much. So watch out you don't do that!
83. MOST OF THE BIG DENOMINATIONAL MISSIONARIES WERE SCHOOL TEACHERS, DOCTORS & NURSES, ETC., IN HOSPITALS & SCHOOLS, some of them doing more damage than good! Most Communist leaders in these Third World countries were raised & educated in mission schools of the big Christian denominations! That's where they got their education & their smartness & their cleverness & learned how to outsmart the white man & how to lick him at his own game!
84. MAYBE THE HOSPITALS DO THEM SOME GOOD, but if they'd teach them how to live & give them more information about how to eat & how to be clean & live a good life for the Lord, then they wouldn't have to patch up their sicknesses & their diseases & their wounds so much!--If they'd build the fence at the top of the cliff instead of a hospital at the bottom!
85. SO HOW ARE WE GOING TO LIVE WITHIN OUR INCOME SO WE WON'T BE LIKE THE OTHERS? Thank God we are "not as other men"!--Ha! (Lk.18:11.) Well, that's one thing I'm glad we are more righteous in than them. In this case, we are the publicans & the sinners & we are more righteous than the Scribes & the Pharisees, that's for sure! Jesus said so! Because we're crying for the Lord's mercy right now & asking Him to help us, forgive us, bless us & give us the money we need to do the job!
86. SO ONCE AGAIN, NUMBER 1: TRIM THE FAT! Number 2? How about you, Honey? Why don't you answer some of these? She's sitting there thinking about how or who she is going to be able to cut, poor little girl! (Maria: Live on your Reserves.) Right, live on your Reserves, on what you've already got. Number 3? (Maria: 10% cut.) 10% cut in budgets & expenditures across the board.
87. NUMBER 4: WARN THE PEOPLE, & THAT'S WHAT I'M DOING RIGHT NOW! I'm warning you & we're going to warn our finance man & we're going to warn our Units & we're going to warn the whole Family! We're going to warn the Units that they're going to have less to live on & less to spend, so they'd better hang on to what they've got & live more economically, because the Family is not giving it.
88. AND WE'RE GOING TO WARN THE FAMILY THAT THEY'RE NOT GIVING ENOUGH TO PAY FOR WHAT THEY'VE BEEN GETTING & they're going to have to either resume better giving & tithing or we're going to have cut down on production. That's a part of trimming the fat. We may have to trim a little meat too, even some needs if they don't give it out. So, that's my recommendation.
89. AND NUMBER 5: HOW CAN WE COMPENSATE FOR SOME PEOPLE'S LACK & OTHER PEOPLE'S SURPLUS?--SHARE! How are we going to compensate for some fields who don't have enough, like the Eastern field, & some fields that have more than they need like the Western Hemisphere? We're going to take from the rich & give to the poor!--Share! We're also going to have to try to make each area independent & indigenous, self-supporting.
90. WHAT ARE THE THREE POINTS OF INDIGENUITY? (No.315C.) {\ul \i Number one}: Self-propagating! That means they do the job themselves. They get out the message & do their own printing, production & all of that. They do the job: Witnessing, litnessing & everything. Self-propagating. Perpetuates the work.
91. NUMBER TWO: THEY'VE GOT TO BE NOT ONLY SELF-PROPAGATING, BUT THEY'VE GOT TO BE SELF-SUPPORTING! That's what we're talking about right now, right? And {\ul \i number three}: self-governing. I'm trying to get that point across to the Western World in particular because they've been the ones who have been babied the most & we took the best care of.
92. THE EASTERN HEMISPHERE LONG AGO LEARNED TO BE SELF-PROPAGATING, real missionaries in mission fields virtually self-supported, because we didn't back them & couldn't back them, really. They had to be self-supporting for years.
93. AND THEY'VE BEEN VIRTUALLY SELF-GOVERNING because they've been almost totally neglected as far as administration is concerned. We've just left it up to Keda, Ho & all the rest of them just to kind of take care of themselves because we didn't have time, we were too busy with the West & the rest of the World!
94. WE JUST PRETTY MUCH LEFT THEM TO THEMSELVES, & AS A RESULT THEY'VE BECOME MUCH MORE INDIGENOUS! They know how to take care of themselves & their fields & the finances & their organisation & government & all the rest! They're in a better position to meet emergencies now than the West is because the West has been babied too long.
95. SO THE WEST HAS GOT TO LEARN A LITTLE MORE INDIGENUITY, INDEPENDENCE, HOW TO MAKE MORE DECISIONS & be more self-supporting & self-governing. They are pretty well self-supporting but they need to learn how to manage those finances better to where they don't have to ask us about every financial situation & every little move & every little thing! They need to learn how to take care of those things themselves.
96. IT'S NICE OF THE LEADERS THERE TO WANT TO GET OUR OKAY & OUR APPROVAL, & IN SOME CASES THEY SHOULD. If they have a question in their mind about whether they should get an OK on it, they probably should phone, but it should be only in the most major serious matters.
97. I USED TO SET A LIMIT ON MATTERS OF HOW MUCH OUR FINANCE OFFICE OR ANYBODY COULD SPEND IN ANY SINGLE EXPENDITURE. Once upon a time in London after they bought that IBM Composer for $900 secondhand, I said, "From now on, any money you spend more than so much, you'd better ask me for my permission!" I think it was anything over a couple hundred dollars.
98. SO MAYBE THAT WOULD HELP THEM MAKE DECISIONS IF WE SET A CEILING ON THE FINANCIAL OUTLAYS THEY MAKE. Then they don't have to ask us about them as long as they have either the income or the Reserves or whatever it may be. Some of those have been pretty stupid long-distance calls! They have got to learn to be a little more independent & make their own decisions!
99. I TOLD DEAR JETHRO THE SAME THING ONE TIME when he was calling me from halfway around the World wanting to know what to do about some stupid little decision that I knew nothing about & had nothing to do with & he should have been able to settle himself! I was standing in a hotel lobby with about 20 people listening to the conversation & screaming at the top of my voice so he could hear me:
100. "FOR GOD'S SAKE, JETHRO, FOLLOW GOD! LEARN TO FOLLOW GOD! You don't have to call us with every little decision that you have to make! You know more about the situation than I do! You know more about the finances! You operate according to your faith, not mine! I'm way over here. I'm doing my job, I'm the Prophet of God, I'm getting the Message from the Lord, but I'm not the one who is supposed to be tending tables! I shouldn't have to make such decisions & you shouldn't have to be asking me what to do in these cases!"
101. IF THEY'RE STUPID ENOUGH TO PHONE YOU ABOUT IT, YOU OUGHT TO HAVE ENOUGH SENSE TO TELL THEM WHAT TO DO! Why the Hell should I have to make a decision? My God, you've got the money, spend it! Do it! You don't have to ask us about things like that!
102. THEY NEED TO HAVE ENOUGH SENSE & WISDOM & PRAYER LIFE TO ASK GOD WHAT IS THE BEST THING TO DO & GET THEIR ORDERS FROM THE LORD! When we're on the other side of the Earth & very busy trying to help the mission field way over here & involved with a lot of new projects & missionaries & mission fields & new ideas & PDQs & reorganising the whole World, for God's sake, why can't they make a tiny little decision about whether this guy should eat or not, or if a guy should move or not! Huh? They've got the money!--Let them decide!
103. NOW IF THEY WERE HAVING TO ASK US FOR THE MONEY, THAT'S A DIFFERENT MATTER. Well, you say, it is our money & they are asking us for it. But they've got it there & they've got Reserves. They want to know if they should live off their Reserves now since they are out of money.--That's a stupid question, that's what the Reserves are for! Why do they ask that?
104. NOW IF YOU ARE AFRAID THEY'RE GOING TO SPEND TOO MUCH MONEY OR MAKE SOME RASH DECISION & waste money or something, then just put a ceiling on how much they can spend on any one major expenditure of any kind. That's not counting their regular expenses & their regular budget & their regular needs, etc., but for unusual expenses. Anything out of the ordinary & above the usual I suggest you set a ceiling on it. If there is some emergency need, some unusual amount that they suddenly need, they could certainly spend up to that much without asking us. That's not going to break us up in business, nor them either. Is that fair enough? OK!
105. SO WOULD YOU PLEASE TELL THEM NOT TO MAKE ANY $30 PHONE CALLS, or maybe $300 over a period of a month, asking questions they don't need to ask! They're supposed to be smart enough business managers & they've done a very good job at it & I trust their judgement & I trust them, & I trust God that He'll give them the wisdom not to spend any more money than they should, & of course, to spend it on things that are needed!
106. THEY CAN INFORM US LATER & LET US KNOW WHAT THEY DID, but in the meantime they should certainly be able to spend up to that amount of money for any emergency needs without phoning us or anybody else. (Maria: Well, I'll just say on their side that the point was not the money, the point in both of the cases was moving those two operations.) I don't even think it should be up to us to decide that!
107. THAT MAN IS THERE, HE'S ON THE SCENE, ON THE SPOT, IN THE COUNTRY! He knows the area & the present situation better than we do! It's his faith that has to do it! He chose Peru in the first place, & we agreed with him, but when something unusual came up like the War & things got hot there & hard & it didn't turn out to be as much of a bed of roses as he thought it was going to be & things weren't as good as he thought, well, then of course it's time to move! He shouldn't even have to ask us that!
108. HE SHOULD JUST TELL US: "I'M SORRY, BUT I CAN'T WORK HERE ANY MORE! It's too difficult & I can't get what I need I'm going to have to go look someplace else." So he does! Now it's up to him to go reconnoiter & do reconnaissance & scout around & find it! I haven't got time to do it! I don't know where he should go! God hasn't told me & I don't think He intends to tell me unless it's something very unusual & unreasonable & contrary to everything you could possibly imagine!
109. GOD EXPECTS YOU TO GO ACCORDING TO YOUR COMMON SENSE & YOUR GOD-GIVEN WISDOM, TO GO WHERE YOU'VE GOT THE FAITH FOR BECAUSE GOD GIVES THE FAITH! Now let him scout it out & find the place if he doesn't like where he is! If he's going flipping around from country-to-country & still can't find things to suit himself, there must be some reason for it, maybe God doesn't want him there. Maybe God wants him to go to the East & research those countries & help really pioneer the World of tomorrow! Forget the past! The Lord called all those countries the countries of the past. This is the future!--The East!
110. TELL HIM TO GO EAST & RESEARCH THE PRINTERS & THE POSTAGE & EVERYTHING ELSE in all these prospective locations that we have proposed. He's never really going to find out unless he tries. Maybe he ought to go out there & plant one bunch of seeds in one lot, then go on to the next one & plant a bunch over there, & the next one, & then try them all & see what happens!
111. YOU DON'T EVER REALLY KNOW IF IT'S GOING TO WORK UNTIL YOU TRY IT! Well, it worked a couple of times in Peru, we got two Books out of it, but then things got rougher & rougher until he didn't like it & the War situation looked pretty bad.
112. ALL RIGHT, IS THAT SETTLED ON THIS MATTER OF PHONING HALFWAY AROUND THE WORLD using long distance calls to make little decisions that they're well able & trustworthy to handle? I know they certainly wouldn't do anything knowingly wrong or unwise. I'm sure they'd pray about it & even pray together about it; they'd ask the Lord about it & do what they think is best. And I'm sure that in that case they'd know better & more about it than we do!
113. WE'RE CLEAR AROUND HERE ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE WORLD BUSY WITH SOMETHING ELSE! Our minds, our time & our hands are already full with our own problems, our own decision, & World problems & World decisions! By the wisdom of God I have laid down the general plan of God's directions for us & I give that to the people, but it's their business to carry it out & tend the tables & do it!
114. I TOLD YOU WE NEEDED TO DIVIDE THE WORLD BETWEEN EASTERN & WESTERN HEMISPHERES. They need to become more self-supporting, self-governing & self-propagating. They need to do their own managing & make their own decisions--unless it's some earthshaking, World-shaking thing that is going to have repercussions clear over on the other side of the World or bankrupt us or whatever! Well, in that case they'd better ask us about it! PTL? All right!
115. SO ANOTHER PART OF THE SOLUTION TO THE PROBLEM IS FOR THE HAVES TO SHARE WITH THE HAVE-NOTS! The rich West have a balance & surplus above their income, whereas the East with all our increased giving to missions & missionaries & all kinds of new Units & new Music Units & Reception Centers & new Lit-Pic gifts & new radio programmes & all is running low financially,
116. WE'RE JUST REALLY PUSHING THE EAST WHICH IS A REAL MISSION FIELD! Which reminds me that that's the next move the Family needs to make! They have moved well from the North to the South--only about a third of the Family is left in the North & two-thirds are in the South--but they still haven't moved well enough from West to East. According to our latest stats, we're doing pretty good, but 53% of the Family are still in the West & only 47% in the East. Well, that's close to 50/50 but that's too many in the West & not enough in the East.
117. AS I HAVE ALREADY SAID, ONLY ABOUT HALF-A-BILLION OF THE WORLD'S POPULATION LIVE IN THE WESTERN HEMISPHERE & THE OTHER 3 BILLION LIVE IN THE EAST! So what the Hell are most of us doing in the Western Hemisphere which has already been saturated with the Gospel & saturated with the Family & saturated with our Message, saturated with our lit? Now that you've moved out of the North in a hurry, too many of you have gone to the West & stayed there.
118. EVEN FROM EUROPE THEY WENT TO SOUTH AMERICA INSTEAD OF TO THE EAST WHERE THEY NEEDED TO GO! Well, there were some who needed to go from Europe to the same language area in South America, which was all right; they already spoke the language & knew the people & all that. But now it's time for some of those other Westerners to move East where English is widely spoken.
119. WE ARE PUTTING THE EMPHASIS NOW ON THE REALLY NEEDY MISSION FIELD OF THE EAST! We've got one Family member to every 100,000 South Americans, & only one to about 7 million Indians alone--Not to count the 800 million or billion Chinese & a billion others or so!
120. WHEN I SAY WEST, I AM NOT INCLUDING EUROPE. The general public & the general Capitalist World calls Europe & North & South America all West, but we don't! Europe is in the Eastern Hemisphere & it is needed to help support the Eastern work. We have divided the World into East & West & we have told the West not to "get lost" but to get saved & save themselves!--And that we're out here in the East not to get lost but still trying to save them! Is that clear?
121. AND SINCE THEY'VE GOT EVEN MORE INCOME IF THEY ARE IN THE WEST, WHY THE HELL CAN'T THEY MANAGE IT & manage to make their now decisions & pay their own bills, govern themselves & do their own job & be self-propagating! They're doing a good job of that, thank the Lord, & they're also supporting themselves, they've got the money, but they still seem to need to learn how to be self-governing, to make their own decisions & take care of themselves.
122. THEY NEED TO LEARN NOW & TO GET EXPERIENCE AT IT NOW SO THEY WON'T HAVE TO LEARN IT AT THE LAST MINUTE WHEN EAST & WEST ARE CUT OFF FROM EACH OTHER, which they will be someday!--Most certainly during the War & maybe after that, who knows? So they have got to learn to take care of themselves!
123. THEY HAVE HAD YEARS OF EXPERIENCE & TRAINING & THEY'VE GOT PLENTY OF MONEY & OODLES OF TALENT, SO THERE IS NO EXCUSE for them not taking care of themselves & not being indigenous, independent, self-governing, self-supporting & self-propagating! They are doing the job, God bless them, & they are self-supporting, really--they may not know it, but they are--but they've got to learn how to be self-governing, how to take care of it themselves & not have to ask us.
124. THE NEED TO GET TOGETHER & GET DOWN ON THEIR PRAYER BONES & ASK GOD WHAT TO DO, & confer with each other & make the decisions together! When Jesus' disciples & Apostles at Antioch were told by the Holy Ghost to get out & evangelise the World & take a missionary trip, they didn't send a man down to Jerusalem to find out if it was OK & if it was OK to spend their money & send out Paul & Silas.
125. THEY DIDN'T SAY, "IS IT ALL RIGHT TO DO WHAT THE LORD ALREADY TOLD US TO DO?--And what in fact Jesus Himself told us, to go into all the World & preach the Gospel! He told us a long time ago & we haven't done it yet!" Did they send down to the church in Jerusalem & ask James to tell them if it was OK to do what Jesus told them to do many years ago?--No!
126. THEY WERE THE MISSION FIELD!--ANTIOCH WAS THE MISSIONARY HEADQUARTERS of Paul, Silas, Barnabus & the rest of them. They didn't ask Jerusalem what to do, they asked God what to do! They sent out their own missionaries & they didn't ask headquarters! They did the job themselves!
127. THANK GOD THEY DIDN'T ASK JAMES OR JERUSALEM WHAT TO DO! Jerusalem was in such a rut & such an Old Church situation & so disobedient to God they almost got slaughtered because they didn't get out of Jerusalem & they didn't go out into all the World like they should have! They stuck around there almost till the last & several of them got beheaded!
127. AND PAUL OBVIOUSLY DISOBEYED THE CHECKS OF THE LORD! God tried to stop him from going to Jerusalem. He even got to one place where a Prophet took his belt & tied his hands together & said: "If you go to Jerusalem, this is what's going to happen to you!" (Acts 21:10,11.) God was warning him not to go, & though he doesn't exactly admit it, he went anyway.
129. AND WHEN THAT MISSIONARY WENT BACK TO THE HOME CHURCH TO TRY TO BE A MISSIONARY TO A BUNCH OF PEOPLE WHO COULDN'T HAVE CARED LESS, those [DELETED] who had already crucified the Messiah & their King & some of the disciples & were out to get Paul if they possibly could, that was about one of the stupidest things I ever heard of!
130. IMAGINE GOING BACK THERE & STILL TRYING TO REHASH THE OLD APPEAL, thinking he could get those old hardened sinners converted! They had had Jesus & the 12 Apostles & thousands of Early Christians & supernatural signs & Day of Pentecost & healings & everything you possibly could imagine! They were still hardhearted & crucified Jesus!--And they would have done the same to Paul if a dear Roman hadn't save him.
131. IN OTHER WORDS, THE ONE TIME THE DEAR MISSIONARY DECIDED HE OUGHT TO GO BACK TO THE HOME FIELD & see what he could do to try to get the home folks converted, it nearly cost him his life! It nearly cost one of the best missionaries the World ever had, Saint Paul!
132. BUT WHEN THEY STAYED IN ANTIOCH & MADE THEIR OWN DECISIONS by the guidance of the Holy Spirit & sent out their own people & financed them & went out to the fields they were supposed to go to, they got along fine! Praise God! So for God's sake, you Westerners, stop asking us what to do! You know what you're supposed to do, read the Bible!: "Go into all the World & preach the Gospel to every creature!" (Mk.16:15.) Praise God?
133. "LEAN NOT TO YOUR OWN UNDERSTANDING!"--NOR OURS EITHER!--" In all thy ways acknowledge Him & He shall direct thy paths!" (Pr.3:5,6.) Amen? You ought to be able to make your own decisions. You're already self-supporting & self-propagating, now you need to learn how to be self-governing & stop asking us what to do!--Unless you can't afford it & you haven't got it or unless it's going to take more that what we give you.
134. THE WESTERN SURPLUS IS MORE THAN ENOUGH TO COVER THE EASTERN DEFICIT, & the Eastern field is where we're putting the money now & where it's the most needed & the greatest mission field with the most people & the most workers & the greatest need. So both North & South America being more a home field should not begrudge the greater mission field of the East & the biggest mission field & the neediest mission field their little pittance of a balance.
135. SO CONSIDERING BOTH NORTH & SOUTH AMERICA ARE ACTUALLY LIKE HOME FIELDS--supposedly great Christian areas with predominantly Christian religions--the Christian West should not begrudge the pagan heathen East a few thousand dollars to help them preach the Gospel!--And they shouldn't begrudge the workers either & they should be sending them here!
136. WE'RE DOING THE BEST WE CAN! We came out here & we're pioneering & testing & visiting & reconnoitering the field & trying to encourage the missionaries in the mission fields & supervisors, & I think we've done a pretty good job of it! But we've hardly made any progress on the PDQ. We're still not even decided on where we should have it, much less producing or testing it.
137. SO SINCE THAT PDQ HASN'T BEEN ABLE TO FIND ANY PARTICULAR PLACE TO LAND & doesn't seem to really know what to do, maybe this is one time we need to step in & tell him what to do! Because maybe the reason he doesn't know what to do is that's not the place to do it! When you don't know what to do, the best thing to do is what?--Just wait until you do know what to do! So that's one thing he could ask us & maybe that's one reason why.
138. SINCE THAT PDQ DOESN'T KNOW WHAT TO DO, MAYBE IT'S BECAUSE HE'S SUPPOSED TO GO EAST & PIONEER THAT FIELD! In the meantime, Madrid can continue to take care of World production & mailings, etc., until we get the Eastern PDQ going! That's what's holding up the works! Mordy's not holding up the works, we're still rolling in Madrid--producing, mailing & distributing!
139. I MEAN, IF YOU DON'T LEARN BY ANYTHING ELSE, YOU LEARN BY YOUR MISTAKES, BY EXPERIMENTING & TESTING! That's how science develops. Maria was telling me, "Boy oh boy, just think how these scientists spend years testing & experimenting before they find answers!" I got a little exasperated because I had to spend two or three hours testing different methods of recording on the new equipment here, various volume levels, various connections, various tapes.
140. THERE WERE A WHOLE LOT OF VARIABLES & I HAD TO TRY THEM ALL TO FIND THE BEST WAY TO DO IT! It took me two or three hours, but at least then I knew how to do it & I knew I had the best way figured out, & I did it! Whereas before, I was in such a hurry--haste makes waste!--I just punched a few buttons & figured, "I'll just do it like this because somebody else said so & that's what they say" & what I produced was not as good as it should have been.
141. BUT THIS TIME I WAS DETERMINED TO FIND OUT FOR MYSELF, especially since I had to learn this new machine. So I experimented, & out of about 20 different possibilities, only one really succeeded, so you can't always measure your success by the number of failures. After about 19 failures I succeeded with one, but that did the job! It was a success & I did it & it's great, TTL! It's done! So all the failures don't count--you just need one success!
142. WELL, MY GOD, IF MORDY HAS TO VISIT 20 COUNTRIES BEFORE HE FINDS THE RIGHT ONE, THAT'S NOT NECESSARILY A FAILURE! Mary Baker Eddy, founder of Christian Science, said that every fall is a step upward! I started to say every stall! Well, sometimes God stalls us to make sure we don't make the wrong step! If we can't find out what it is, at least, for God's sake, like the old coloured lady, we can sure know what it ain't!
143. WE'VE TRIED A FEW OTHER PLACES & FOUND OUT WHAT IT AIN'T, SO THE THING TO DO IS KEEP TRYING! Maybe that's not the place for Mordy! Maybe they can handle their own. Maybe by the time the War comes or maybe even before that time all the Family will be speaking Spanish & they won't have to have any English lit there!--And after the War they certainly won't need much.--Although I'm sure there will be plenty of people in Latin & South America who will still appreciate & need English lit even after the U.S.A. is gone, if we can still get it to them. So PTL!
144. WELL, IT'S THAT SIMPLE, THE WESTERN SURPLUS IS MORE THAN ENOUGH TO COVER THE EASTERN DEFICIT! I warned you folks that this was the way it had to be done, now why wasn't it done? I told you to do it & how to pay it: Rob Peter to pay Paul! Well, we don't want to rob Peter, but we want Peter to voluntarily offer it!
145. PETER REPRESENTED THE HOME CHURCH, I GUESS YOU KNOW, & PAUL REPRESENTED THE MISSION FIELD, so it was always the home churches & preachers who were screaming: "You're robbing Peter to pay Paul!" Yes!--Robbing Peter of 5% of his income to pay poor Paul the missionary five cents out of the dollar! Think of it!
146. THE SIMPLE ANSWER IS WE DON'T ROB PETER TO PAY PAUL, BUT WE ASK PETER, THE HOME WESTERN CHURCH: "WOULD YOU KINDLY SEND EASTERN PAUL ENOUGH OF YOUR SURPLUS TO COVER HIS DEFICIT?" They often did this in the Early Church. You'll find it in Acts & in Paul's writings, etc., "That your abundance might meet their need." (2Co.8:14.) They were constantly sending money back & forth from rich places & rich churches like Jerusalem to the poor places that needed it, like mission fields.
147. JERUSALEM & ISRAEL WAS THE HOME FIELD & there were still apparently tens of thousands of Christians there who should have been going to the mission field! But you know how those Jews love Israel! There they were, thousands of them stuck in the Temple! Thousands & thousands took over the Temple!
148. IN FACT, THEY TOOK OVER JERUSALEM & IF THEY'D STAYED LONG ENOUGH MAYBE THEY'D HAVE RUN THE [DELETED] UNCONVERTED JEWS OUT! But the Jews finally ran them out instead, which is of God because they were supposed to go out into all the World & preach the Gospel, not just sit down there in comfort & rich opulence in their, you might say, Western World of today, the home field.
149. SO THAT'S A SIMPLE SOLUTION FOR THE DEFICIT! Right off the bat, the Eastern deficit should be made up by the generosity of the Western churches. So the final point of how to meet this emergency & any emergency & Eastern deficits & all the rest is to do what?--Share from each according to his ability & to each according to his need, that the Western abundance might supply the Eastern lack! (2Co.8:14,15; Acts 2:44,45 & 4:34,35.)
150. OK, LET'S NAME THEM AGAIN & SEE IF WE GOT THEM STRAIGHT! How are we going to meet this financial emergency? Here's a good policy for anybody, good advice for any Home, any area, our Homes & churches in general: If you have a sudden financial emergency & you get in a tight spot with your finances, what are you going to do?
151. NUMBER 1: TRIM THE FAT! {\ul \i Number 2}: Live on what you've got. In other words, live within your income. {\ul \i Number 3}: Make a cut across the board of all your expenses, trim it down within the income again. {\ul \i Number 4}: Warn the people to pray & to give.
152. NUMBER 5: GREATER INDIGENUITY! You know your own problems, do it yourself! Take care of it yourself! Decide it yourself! Support it yourself! Govern yourself! I would say to abbreviate it, do it yourself! That's a term most Americans & most English-speakers today understand: Do it yourself! In other words, do whatever you can to meet the need. Be indigenous! And {\ul \i Number 6}: Sharing! Well, there must be seven points!--Ha!--God's perfect number!
153. NUMBER 7, I'D SAY LAST BUT NOT LEAST & ABOVE ALL, FOR GOD'S SAKE FOLLOW GOD & I KNOW HE'LL SUPPLY! Obey God! Where God guides, He provides! Follow God! Obey the Lord! Do His will! As long as we're doing what God wants us to do, I don't have the slightest doubt that He's going to pay for it.
154. WELL, IF HE DOESN'T PAY FOR IT, HE MUST NOT WANT IT OR MUST NOT LIKE IT OR MUST WANT US TO GET DOWN ON OUR PRAYER BONES & PRAY A LITTLE HARDER & get out & work a little harder & give a little more or whatever! There is some kind of message in it other than just trying to explain it away by every other kind of change in the weather & the climate & the geography & whatnot!--Not even moving South is enough of an excuse.
155. AS I'VE SAID BEFORE, YOU SHOULD HAVE RAISED ENOUGH SUPPORT BEFORE YOU LEFT THE NORTH!--Now as Southern missionaries you ought to have more support than ever & be better off than ever! You're on the field where you can demand it of your friends & family & supporters back home:
156. "LISTEN, I'M OUT HERE OBEYING GOD, DOING GOD'S WILL, DOING YOUR JOB FOR YOU!--YOU FOOT THE BILL! Pay me! I'm doing your work for you, the least you can do is foot the bill! Pay up, Buddy! It's not just a gift, you owe it! Send me some money to pay me for doing your job!"
157. GET SOME OF THOSE HOME FOLKS ENOUGH UNDER CONVICTION OF WHAT THEY OUGHT TO BE DOING, that they ought to be out there doing it themselves, & they'll sell their pants to keep from having to do it to support the other guy: "Let the missionaries do it! That's what we pay the missionaries for!" All right, let them pay the missionaries enough to do it! Amen? Those prayer letters going home ought to get those home folks under real conviction!
158. THEY OUGHT TO TELL THEM OFF & SAY, "LISTEN! I'M OUT HERE SACRIFICING EVERYTHING!--Risking my health, my wife, my family, my children & living under these dangerous conditions & in uncertain countries & governments & criminals & germs & whatnot, the least you can do is foot the bill! Send the money! I'm doing all the rest! I've got all the risks & all the trouble & all the work, so for God's sake, the least you can do is send me the money to do it!"
159. AND I'M SURE IF YOU WILL REALLY FOLLOW GOD & do your job of mail ministry & raising Home support & obeying the Lord, I know the Lord will support you & even encourage hearts at home to support you! You need to get on the ball getting out those prayer letters & mailing those pictures & mailing articles to the Good News so you can let the World know what you're doing so they'll give!
160. (MARIA: DO YOU THINK THEY SHOULD WORD IT THAT STRONGLY?) Why not? (Maria: Because most people automatically resist anything like: "You give it to me!") They need to get'm under conviction!: "Listen! You went home, you left the field!" Or, "You never got off your butt from home & went to the field!" Well, that's the way I word it. You can re-word it, if you want You shouldn't blow your supporters away, of course!
161. (MARIA: BUT THAT'S AN IMPORTANT POINT, BECAUSE THEY'RE GOING TO WORD TO WORD IT EXACTLY LIKE YOU SAY IT HERE!) That's what I told them, & here I am, & they're supporting us! (Maria: Did you write Prayer Letters exactly like that?) I've been writing them & you've been reading them! I said, "You'd better or else!"--And they're doing it, they're giving & tithing! (Maria: I know, but that's to the Family that love you!) Honey, what do you think they were to begin with, huh? (Maria: Well, they were, you know, different.)
162. ALL RIGHT, THEY NEED TO TELL THEM: "LISTEN, I'M OUT HERE DOING THE JOB YOU'RE SUPPOSED TO BE DOING! You're at home not doing it, so the least you can do is send me enough out of that money & the comfortable living you're making to help me stay out here & do your job for you!" That's the least they can do, right? (--Only for relatives & very good friends!)
163. THEY NEED TO GET THOSE HOME FOLKS & HOME FIELDS UNDER CONVICTION that it's not just something voluntary & "it would be nice if you'd send me a little money to help me keep from starving & have a roof over my head out here in the mission field," but that it's something they've got to do!
164. "I'M DOING YOUR JOB FOR YOU! YOU OWE IT TO ME TO SUPPORT ME OUT HERE! IT'S YOUR DUTY! It's your obligation! It's your debt! I'm your employee, in a way, out here doing your job, so you should be paying me! I am the reaper reaping down your fields, & God's Word condemns 'he that withholds the hire of the reaper has reaped down your fields.'" (Ja.5:4.)
165. THAT'S WHAT THE HOME FOLKS ARE DOING WHEN THEY DON'T GIVE ENOUGH TO SUPPORT THE MISSIONARIES: They are withholding the hire of the laborer who is reaping down their fields where they ought to be! So the least they could do is pay the missionaries to do the job & stop withholding their wages! Praise God! GBY all!
166. LORD BLESS & HELP THEM TO DO THEIR JOB & HELP US ALL TO PUT THESE SEVEN POINTS INTO EFFECT & to meet this financial emergency. We know that You will do Your part, Lord, if we do ours, in Jesus' name. TYL! Help them to figure out the details now of how to do it, in Jesus' name, amen. PTL! GBY! Thanks! WLY! DO IT!
Copyright (c) 1998 by The Family
