FLEE FUNDS!       DO 2027       7/85

       1. (MARIA: WE'VE ALWAYS OPERATED ON THE BASIC PRINCIPLE OF ACTS 2:44 & 45, THAT WE SHOULD SHARE ALL WE HAVE, having all things in common. But a question that has often arisen in people's minds is whether this also applies to personal flee funds, which we've told each person they must have on hand at all times. There are several reasons why some of our people at this moment have no flee funds, which we have made a requirement for all Family Members. We saw an example of how many people were caught short when the persecution occurred in [EDITED: "several countries"]. There could have been several reasons for this: Number one, they may have just been disobedient or negligent & not have given a high enough priority to collecting these funds. Number two, if they had flee funds, they then used them in an emergency & failed to replace them. Number three, they had them but they felt obliged under pressure from their Home to put any funds they've had in the common pot, or they were accused of holding back & not forsaking all, & therefore weren't 100-percenters.)
       2. WELL, HOMES THAT COLLECT THEIR PEOPLE'S FLEE FUNDS & DON'T KEEP THEM INVIOLATE FOR THOSE PEOPLE, TO GIVE TO THEM WHEN THEY NEED TO FLEE, ARE VIOLATING OUR RULES ON FLEE FUNDS! Just to collect everybody's flee funds & leave them with nothing & not plan to pay for their flight is not right at all! If the shepherd is going to hold the flee funds, then he should keep them in a fund that is absolutely totally kept intact & untouched, as I told dear Jethro to do in our early days, to make sure that the people didn't spend them & to keep it safe & on deposit, so to speak, so that when they needed it they could come & get it. Instead of that, he spent it, like some of these other shepherds have done!
       3. THAT'S A BAD CUSTOM & A BAD HABIT THAT JETHRO TAUGHT THEM FROM A LONG TIME AGO because he wanted all the money that was around. I think it's absolutely a sin, I think it's wrong, I think it's robbery & stealing from the poor to spend their flee funds! I think it's absolutely wrong! So to prevent that, I think that it might be better in most cases if everyone had their own little flee fund that could at least help them get somewhere & get started again, if possible, in fleeing from persecution.
       4. (MARIA: SO KEEPING INDIVIDUAL FLEE FUNDS IS NOT CONTRARY TO THE COMMON POT & ACTS 2:44 & 45?) No, I don't think so at all. I think they should keep their flee fund as a separate thing, each one of them, & anything they have above that, then it goes in the common pot.
       5. WHAT HAVE WE DONE? WHAT HAVE WE PRACTICED? Are we calling in all of the WS Reserves & using them ourselves & insisting that they be in our common pot? No, we consider that the common pot is spread out amongst everybody & is safer that way. We have all our goods in common because everybody has their own Reserves right now, so we don't have to dig it up for them when the time comes. We feel it's far safer to give it to them, better to give than to receive because then we won't have to take care of it, they've already got it! We're already sharing the common pot with them so that they're keeping their share for their emergency or their flight.
       6. (MARIA: IF THE INDIVIDUAL HANDLES IT HIMSELF, HE USUALLY HAS MORE A SENSE OF ITS IMPORTANCE TO HIM.) Yes. Of course it shouldn't be like somebody's $50,000 inheritance they decided to keep for their flee fund! I'm not talking about that! I'm talking about a bare minimum. Perhaps we ought to set a minimum figure. (Maria: Like a ticket for the next country they could get to & landing funds.)
       7. YES, IT SHOULD BE AT LEAST ENOUGH TO PAY FOR A TICKET for themselves & their family to the nearest alternative country, & as we used to say about the missionaries, at least two or three months' living expenses there until they can get a new start.
       8. I THINK IT IS ABSOLUTELY WRONG & AGAINST OUR PRINCIPLES & PRACTICE & IT'S CERTAINLY AGAINST WHAT WS ITSELF PRACTICES, TO TAKE EVERYBODY'S FLEE FUND. The only time that I can ever remember that we even asked our Units to send in part of their Reserves was when we were very hard up financially, way back at the RNR, but then we made very sure we replenished it. But we never left them penniless, not as long as we kept the Unit. Any Units that we mustered out, we provided for.
       9. THEY CALL IT "MUSTERING OUT" IN THE ARMY, WHEN THE ARMY GIVES YOU A TERMINATION PAY, & the rate when I was mustered out was $300. Our salary was only $30 a month of course, $1 a day. But when your service came to the end, they gave each soldier that was mustered out $300, & that was supposed to take care of his expenses in going home, etc. Maybe for those with overseas musters it might have been more, but for those who were mustered out within the U.S. they figured $300 was plenty, & it was enough to get anywhere you wanted to go in the United States. Usually it was to get home on, because most of the soldiers were young like me & still had their parents, & their parents had homes and money and could support them. The Army didn't have to support them further than getting them home & feel responsible for them any more than that.
       10. OF COURSE, NOW THE U.S. HAS A DIFFERENT KIND OF ARMY & MILITARY WHO ARE PAID HIGH SALARIES, who can save money, who get groceries at cut-rate prices in the PXs, who get all kinds of freebies & fringe benefits, clothing, medical care & dental care, etc. The military are the nation's pets today & that's why they cost so much. It's now costing the country more than anything else outside of social security just in their yearly budget, not to speak of the billions & trillions they already owe!
       11. IF WS WERE PAYING HIGH SALARIES & PEOPLE WERE SAVING UP THEIR OWN, WE WOULDN'T HAVE TO WORRY ABOUT MUSTERING-OUT PAY. We'd let them shift for themselves, & if they weren't wise enough to save it themselves, that's their tough luck. But since we don't pay salaries & we pay minimum budgets, we try to take care of every expected need, such as their eventual mustering-out & closing down. That's why we make sure that all of our Units have at least a minimum of Reserves so that they could survive until they get where they want to go or they manage to start being self-sufficient, etc.
       12. (MARIA: WE EXPECT OUR UNITS TO KEEP THEIR RESERVES JUST LIKE WE EXPECT THE INDIVIDUALS ON THE FIELD TO HAVE FLEE FUNDS.) Yes, as far as individual Homes, individual families, etc., they should have their flee fund just like we provide Reserves for our Units. We give our Units their complete Reserve & we don't keep it ourselves.
       13. WE BELIEVE THAT IT IS SAFER & IS MORE READILY AVAILABLE & IS GOING TO BE THERE WHEN THEY NEED IT, TO LET THEM KEEP IT. We just let them know that that's their mustering-out pay & their emergency fund or their flee fund or whatever, so that when the time comes they better not have touched it--& if they have, that's tough! If they have not kept it for that purpose, then that's their own fault, not ours! We provided it & let them keep it & they're not supposed to touch it except in some kind of a dire emergency. Sometimes they've had to dip into it for some unexpected emergency or need & that's fine, but we expect them always to recoup it & to replace it.
       14. I THINK IT'S BEEN A VERY GOOD SYSTEM & I DON'T THINK WE'VE EVER LOST ANYTHING YET. We've even lost people but the Units have not lost the money as far as I know. Some of them have even built up bigger Reserves, bigger than the minimum that we gave them. So some of them have been very faithful with their talents & have increased them. But when the End comes, they had better have it because we won't! They've already got it. They've had their separation pay & we won't have to worry about it.
       15. (MARIA: AND FOR OUR FAMILIES ON THE FIELD, THERE WON'T BE ANY MORE [EDITED: "EVACUATION SITUATIONS"] WHERE WE'RE ABLE TO HELP THEM WITH THEIR TRANSPORTATION TO THE TUNE OF THOUSANDS OF DOLLARS!) No, that's the end of that! There's no more financing of entire nationwide evacuations! We just can't afford it now! From now on they either keep their flee funds & take care of them & have their own ready individually, or as families at least, or else that's tough. If not, they'll have to go their home embassy & ask to be sent home, as we have told some families before who got themselves in trouble & then wanted thousands of Dollars from us!
       16. MARTHA & IMRAH, FOR EXAMPLE, WERE VERY UNWISE & GOT THEMSELVES IN TROUBLE, some fish was threatening [DELETED] her & all kinds of stuff, so they asked us to send four or five thousand Dollars to help them get out of there & go someplace else, blah, blah. It goes to show how spoiled they had been all that time when they were working in London, etc., & they expected us to pay for their mistake. And at that time, as I recall, we were really down & really low & we just couldn't afford it. They were talking about going home for some reason, they'd been on the field for a long time & they thought it was a good time to go home on furlough & maybe raise support, etc. They had all kinds of excuses, but apparently they just found it too tough & I presume they couldn't make it or something without our support. So I just told them to go to the American embassy & they'd take care of it, that's what they're for.
       17. OF COURSE THEN THEY TAKE DOWN ALL THE NAMES & ADDRESSES OF ALL YOUR RELATIVES & write to all of them & tell them the situation, or officially phone them sometimes if it is an emergency, & if your relatives say they cannot contribute & cannot send you the money, finally the government has to fork over & get you back at government expense. The usual procedure, as I recall, is the government takes away your passports until they are reimbursed.

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