KEEP IT SIMPLE!  DO 2774 31/1/92
--Let's Get the Simplest and the Cheapest to the Mostest!

         1. Do you know what I believe the Lord is helping me to do, and what the Lord has always really helped me to do?--To make things simple! I got so sick of education when I was in college that I stood up in class and said, "It seems to me that the whole policy of education is to make things as complicated as possible!"--And the professor gave me a bad grade after that! I just always felt sorry for the poor students, how the professors were always getting way out of their reach.
         2. I think the Lord has given me such success with the Family because through me He has made things simple for them, and helped them to see things clearly that were pretty obscure in church. (Maria: I know that in my case, if I hadn't been in the Family all these years, I would have been so complicated, and tried to make everything so complicated! But now, because of your sample, I'm really simple! The church system for the most part makes things so complicated! Even when they try to make it simple, it just doesn't seem to quite hit the mark. But you've made everything so simple that anybody can understand it!) It's just the Lord, Honey. Give the Lord the credit.

The Greatest Men Preached a Simple Message!

         3. This has been true all through history. Unlike most of the church system, the few great men who stood out above the crowds usually preached a pretty simple message. That's why they were so effective and people were so drawn to them.
         4. The greatest men of God throughout history preached a simple message and made it clear, including the Lord! He made it very simple, especially in the Gospels. I can't quite say the same for the Apostle Paul all the time, but much of the time he made it quite simple. Of course, he had to reason with the Jews and get into pretty deep doctrine and prove things for their sakes, but when he preached to the Gentiles, he was the soul of simplicity!

Education Prides Itself on Complication!

         5. The further I got along in my education in school, the more I realized that education really prides itself on complication, not on simplicity. In fact, there's no point in your even getting a formal education if you can understand things pretty simply without it! The whole point to education seems to be to make things as complicated as possible so that you can be complicated and appear very complicated to others! It's a pride trip!
         6. Much of the simple-minded public worship complication and big words and deep concepts, just because they can't understand them! They think that the educated must be great and wise, because they can't understand them. I've found through all my experiences that the people who worship education the most are the ones who didn't have any, or very little.--And the people who had the most, if honest, were sick of it! I didn't have the most of it, but I sure got sick of what little I had!
         7. Too much education puts you out of reach of the common man! You get out of touch with humanity! The simpler and the clearer you can make your message, the better! I always think of that verse--and I think it was even Paul who said it--"But I fear, lest by any means, as the Serpent beguiled Eve through his subtilty, so your minds should be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ!" (2Cor.11:3).
         8. And they said of Peter and John, "Though they were ignorant and unlearned men, people took knowledge of them, that they had been with Jesus" (Acts 4:13). In other words, they were powerful! Their message was powerful because it was so clear and simple.--Whereas the highly educated Pharisees and Sadducees were the very essence of un-understandable complication and deep, dark, doctrinal divinity. And although the Torah--the five Books of Moses, the Law--is virtually the essence of simplicity, its Jewish commentary, the Talmud, is the essence of complication, taking a whole page to comment on one verse and just succeeding in making it obscure and confusing.
         9. Lord help us and deliver us from too much education! Thank God He delivered me! I think because of my own life experience with preachers and congregations, I was able to see what clicked with the people and what didn't. I saw that people in the average congregation were very childlike and simple-minded, and too often the preachers were not just deep, they just weren't clear!
         10. I remember that when I was still in college, psychologists estimated that the average American intelligence was at about the level of a child of 12 years of age! If it was that low then, imagine what it is now! It's probably sunk to about six or eight, about half that! (Maria: In spite of all their supposed technological advances and more complicated education, they go further and further back all the time.) Yes! The very very few have become very very technical, whereas the very very many have become more and more simple and even ignorant!

Our Presentation of the Gospel Is Simple and Quick!

         11. So God help us to keep it simple and clear! I think this is what has appealed to the Russians so much, because our literature is so simple and so clear. What can they have that's clearer than a picture?--And then the simple explanation on the back! You just couldn't have anything clearer than that! They love it and they're falling all over themselves to get it! Thank the Lord that we're falling all over ourselves to give it to them as fast as we can!
         12. Our presentation of the Gospel is simple, it's fast, it's quick! Jesus made it the simplest of all. And to illustrate it, He constantly drew pictures too--parables, picture stories for the simple-minded--and they loved it, they understood it and they believed it. And that's what we try to do! Thank the Lord!

You've Gotta Be a Baby!

         13. Don't get too high and mighty or complicated for people.--Keep it simple and childlike! As Jesus said, "Except ye become as a little child, ye shall in no wise enter into the Kingdom of Heaven" (Mat.18:3). If the children can understand it, everybody can! If you can help children to understand it, you're a genius! (Maria: A simple genius!) Yes, the wise geniuses have found out that it's better to be like a little child and be able to speak to little children and help them to understand you.
         14. I really admire childcare workers and people who can understand and help and train children--they're the smartest people we've got! Anybody can talk to the educated and the adults, it's not hard for them to understand you; but to have the little kids understand you, you've really got to be smart!--And that means simple! You've got to know what they can understand and how to present it in a way they won't forget it. Whether it takes pictures or actions or songs or simple rhymes or whatever it takes to put it across, use it!

The Easiest and Fastest to the Mostest!

         15. In a way we have found the ultimate, the maximum use of pictures and lessons in our posters! It all boils down to the simplicity of the Gospel! The simpler it is, the more effective it is! To put it bluntly: The easiest and the fastest to the mostest!--And that's what we have been specializing in in our missionary work. It's cheap, fast, mobile, multiplied and effective!--And pictured! We're talking about the lit, flannelgraphs, even videos where possible, but primarily literature. How much further can we condense the message to make it simple and vivid? It's cheap, fast, mobile and effective. It gets results!--And we've got the fruit to prove it! Amen? (Maria: Amen!)
         16. So God help us not to get away from the simplicity of the Gospel! The simpler the better!--And the cheaper and the many-er and the more mobile the better! I think that's one reason for our effectiveness, we can move fast! (Maria: Yes!) That's also a handicap in a way, because we're hard for the people to find.--But it's a great advantage with our enemies!--We're harder to find and stop!
         17. We're also more indigenous--which is a big word that most people don't understand, but it literally means "self-operating."
         18. That little saying keeps coming to me, something about "The Bestest with the Mostest!"--The bestest for the mostest for the leastest! The simpler you say it, the better and the longer they're going to remember it. So boiled down to the very barest bones of all, our message would be: Let's get the simplest and the cheapest to the mostest! Let's not get too complicated! Amen? PTL! GBY! ILY!--AMEN!

ADDITIONAL READING:

         For more from Dad and Mama on today's church system and the advantages of the Family, please see:

ML #1964, "Churchianity Today!" (DB 8, Pg. 530-542)
ML #1141, "The Doorknob's Too High!" (DB 1, Pg. 348-353)
ML #1336, "Declaration of Revolution!" (DB 1, Pg. 456-458)
ML #1385, "We're the Best!" (DB 1, Pg. 538-543)
ML #1401, "Expensive Bargains!" (DB 1, Pg. 605-608)
ML #1592, "We're Still the Jesus Revolution!" (DB 2, Pg. 105-109)
ML #1938, "Don't Say `No' to God!" (DB 3, Pg. 9-12)
ML #2094, "Celebrating Heaven!" (DB 3, Pg. 186-194)
ML #113, "A Shepherd-time Story!" (DB 4, Pg. 356-360)
ML #148, "Jesus People?--Or Revolution!" (DB 4, Pg. 445)
ML #2232, "What's in It for Me?" (DB 7, Pg. 423-428)
ML #2222, "We Are It!" (DB 8, Pg. 209-229)
"The Church--The Body of Believers!" (Treasures, Pg. 148-154)
"Investigation of the Apostle Paul!" (Treasures, Pg. 341-349)
MOP 1, "Churchianity and Organized Religion," Pg. 80-89
ML #A, "Old Church, New Church Prophecy!" (Vol. 1)



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