8/94DO 2937

—The "Tools Fund"!

—God's Seed Corn!—Have you robbed God?!

1. I HAD A DREAM with a message that if the Lord's children gave abundantly, the Lord would more than give to them abundantly, & therefore they would have a tremendous income! In the dream the Lord was giving several examples of men who gave, like R.G. LeTourneau. He started off giving 10%, & the Lord so blessed him that by & by he was giving 90%. He started out giving 10% & living on the 90%, & the Lord so blessed him for it that pretty soon he was living on the 10% & giving 90%! He built a big factory in Georgia & supported the Toccoa Falls Bible Institute & many missionaries. The more he gave‚ the more the Lord gave, & he just couldn't outgive God!

2. It came to me that we should be blessed to overflowing to where we are extremely powerful financially! If we gave more, we'd receive more! (Maria: The Bible says, "Give, & it shall be given unto you; good measure, pressed down, & shaken together, & running over, shall men give into your bosom. For with the same measure that ye mete withal, it shall be measured to you again."—Luke 6:38.)

3. The picture was that the Family became very very blessed financially. Because we gave so much, the Lord gave so much. We not only would be a spiritual power, but the Lord would make us a financial power!

4. The question that I woke up with is: Who is not giving enough for the Lord to bless? Could it be that we, WS, are not giving enough? I figured that our administration is living on only 5% of WS's total income. In other words, we are giving back 95% of our missionaries' tithes to them in services, publications & financial support to needy fields. So I don't think it is us who aren't giving enough‚ since we are giving back 95%.

5. The message I got was that we would be blessed enormously financially, & the Lord would give us tremendous financial power, as well as spiritual power, & you might also add the power of the influence we are having all over the World.—And that He would give us far more if we ourselves were giving sufficiently financially.

6. The question was‚ "Who is not giving?" Somehow, somewhere‚ somebody is not giving enough. I don't see how we here in this Home could give any more, & our other Units are very frugal also.

7. I just know that you can't outgive God, & that if the Family were giving enough, the Lord would give us enough financially. The Family is giving more than enough of their lives & their services, but why is it that the Lord is not blessing them more financially?

8. Who isn't giving? I just know that God in this dream was very specific to say that if we gave enough, He would give us back more than enough. (Maria: The Lord has said several times in beautiful prophecy that He wants to pour it out, He wants to give us more than enough, so maybe this is the key—that we're not giving enough—along with the other things we listed in the "Finance" GN, of course. [See GN 598.] So thank the Lord!—I'm sure glad you had this dream because we really need something to jump-start our economy!)

9. The Homes barely scrape by & give their 10%, but the Lord promised to give us more than enough if we were giving enough. He said He'd "open the windows of Heaven and pour out such a blessing there wouldn't be room enough to hold it."—Mal.3:10. But He also said in the passage of Scripture I got, "Will a man rob God? Yet ye have robbed Me. But ye say, Wherein have we robbed Thee?—In tithes & offerings."—Mal.3:8. Could it be that they give their tithe, but they're not giving offerings?

10. Maybe you could count what they are giving out in the way of "consider the poor" ministries & various other projects that they have underway as offerings. Perhaps those are their offerings right in their fields, something above their tithes. (Maria: But they don't give financially to that.) Well‚ they do in a way, because it costs them money to go to these hospitals, institutions & places where they minister. (Maria: Yes, it's true, because it costs them what they would normally be doing, which is getting out & distributing the tools, etc. They don't do that because they are doing these other things for free. So that's true.)

11. I think your Letter brought out the crux of the whole matter in that our people are not asking enough. They're giving everything they can‚ but they are not asking enough. The Lord said specifically, "Ask, & it shall be given you; seek, & ye shall find; knock, & it shall be opened unto you."—Mat.7:7. He expects us to go looking for it, knocking for it & asking for it. Is that where we are lacking? I think you are right on that.

12. But the picture was almost unbelievable in this dream‚ that if we were giving as we should, & no doubt asking as we should, we could actually become financially powerful. Our enemies have plenty of financing, in the millions! Why should the Family be starving & begging? We're begging without even asking! (Maria: And we've got so much that we could do with the money.—So many projects & things that would be so helpful not only to the Family, but to outsiders as well!)

13. The picture was that God would so bless us financially that we could almost rule, rather than our present financial suffering. Then the Lord gave me a string of examples of the men who had given a great deal & how God blessed them mightily financially, giving them far more than they had given. Where are we lacking in giving? We know we are lacking in seeking & knocking & asking‚ therefore we don't have it to give. But the question was: What more can we give than we are giving?

14. (Maria: Our TRF Supporters are bigger financial givers per person than our DO Family. And I've heard stories of how our TRF Supporters have given finances & goods to the DO Family when it really hurt to give, & the Lord has given them back much more. In other words, they have been quite a good sample in this respect.)

15. Is the Family failing to give? Is WS giving all it can? (Maria: WS has wanted to give more, but we have tried to keep from dipping into our reserves‚ as you've always taught us.) Well, that's one thing that came to me, have we given enough? Are we to reserve or are we to give? To reserve means to keep back. Maybe we need to give out most of our reserves, sharing them with our Homes.

16. I think somewhere in the Family we are not giving enough, & as a result we are suffering. Perhaps the Homes are suffering for their failure to seek, knock & ask. And maybe we in WS are suffering for our failure to share enough. Maybe we need to give more. Maybe if WS would give more out of our reserves, the Lord would prosper us more, as well as the Family at large.

17. The picture the Lord gave me was that we could become financially powerful‚ & if we would give enough, we'd receive more. So somewhere we must not be giving enough. Surely it seems the Homes are giving almost more than they can afford.—Although there may be some Homes who are lacking in offerings—maybe because they haven't worked at it & aren't asking for it.

18. Maybe the reason we‚ as WS, have had to cut our giving this past month & cut down our budgets to Units & gifts to missions is because we are not giving enough. Could it be that we lost instead of gained by cutting down the size of these gifts by the percentage our monthly income was down? Maybe we should have made it up from our reserves instead of taking it away from our Units & missionaries. Maybe the Lord is holding back from us, & even from some of our Homes, because we are not giving enough to make it possible for them to give more.

19. It was a very very strong dream, a message dream just before I woke up—that's why I couldn't go back to sleep—that somebody somewhere is lacking in giving! Could it be us? Could it be World Services? Who is it? That was the message, that we are not giving enough. Maybe we're all not giving enough. Maybe the Family is not giving enough along with World Services, or God would be mightily blessing us financially, pouring out so much that we'd not be able to hold it, we'd have to give it away.

20. (Maria: Some of our Homes are so bad off financially that they don't even have enough money to buy the Posters, Tapes & Videos they need from the PPCs. So they run out of tools‚ & then they can't get out any of the tools in their witness, nor get donations as a result.)

21. Well, something is wrong somewhere! And the emphasis in my dream was that even what little the Lord is giving we are not passing enough of it on to others‚ or the Lord would just pour out such a blessing that there wouldn't even be room to hold it! He said, "Will a man rob God? Yet ye have robbed Me. But ye say, Wherein have we robbed Thee?—In tithes and offerings. Bring ye all the tithes into the storehouse, that there may be meat in Mine house, & prove Me now herewith, saith the Lord of hosts, if I will not open you the windows of Heaven, & pour you out a blessing, that there shall not be room enough to receive it."—Mal.3:8,10.—Tremendous financial blessing! God is willing to bless us enormously, to where we wield not only spiritual power & influence, but even financial power in this World today!

22. We give back all of the income to the Family, really, because even the small percent WS operates on all goes to benefit the Family. The only thing I can think of that perhaps we have not given enough of is the reserves we maintain for emergencies. (Maria: Although at various times‚ we have given a large percentage of our WS reserves to our Homes as well.)

23. What more can we give them? Our thinking has been that we do need to keep enough for any sudden financial emergencies. We need to keep enough on hand to survive at least for a few weeks when the Crash comes.

24. Are we withholding more than is meet?—Because that tendeth to poverty. But he that scattereth abroad, it increaseth!—Pro.11:24. Are we scattering enough abroad?—Or are we withholding too much reserves? I certainly would not say that the Homes are holding too much reserves in their various Home funds. But perhaps we need to give them more.

25. (Maria: One of our PPC Shepherds just suggested that one of the biggest needs of our Homes right now is funds to stock up on tools. It's really because of the Homes' poor management that they've gotten into such bad shape that they have no money to buy the Posters‚ Tapes & Videos, but he was asking if WS could do something to give them a boost. It might help our Homes to get on top of things again financially.)

26. Of course! Let's do it! Let's give the utmost we possibly can! Let's do it! I think they're failing to ask & we are failing to give. And I think this is an emergency!

27. I just couldn't go back to sleep until I gave you that message. Let's give until it hurts! Maybe we don't need to keep in reserve what we think is enough to carry us over. Maybe if we'd give more, we'd have more than enough to carry us over in case of an emergency. I'd say the Homes are in a state of emergency right now. (Maria: Most of them manage to make it, but barely; it's pretty rough.) Well, let's give them the tools so that they can do the job.

28. Churchill's motto during the early days of World War II was, "Give us the tools & we'll do the job!" So Roosevelt did everything he could to ship them the armaments they needed; he even gave them ships, but it still wasn't enough. So you could say that Churchill's motto then became, "Give us the fools & we'll do the job!" And so Roosevelt declared war & he did, he gave them the fools!—He gave them millions of men to do the job & win the war.

29. Well, we've got the "fools for Christ's sake" willing to get out there & do the job, but they need the tools! So let's give until it hurts—our reserve funds! Let's do it now! And that will take most of our reserve funds.

30. So praise the Lord! That's the vision & the message! Now let's obey it! Let's do it & see what happens. The Lord in His Word says, "See if I will not open you the windows of Heaven, & pour you out a blessing, that there shall not be room enough to receive it!" Let's get it there immediately! Tell the various CROs that this is a life–&-death emergency for the Family, & to get the money to them now. Praise the Lord! Thank You Jesus!

31. Lord, You never fail Your Word, & if we obey, You bless it. We got that Scripture, & apparently we have not been giving enough. We need to give away most of our reserves to supply the Homes with the tools with which they can do the job.

32. Praise the Lord! I feel better about it already! Lord forgive us for not giving them enough & not giving all we could & holding back too much in our reserves. Help us to give them away now to be a help to the Family, in Jesus' name. Amen!

33. Praise the Lord! I've delivered my soul. What the Lord showed me was almost unbelievable—the financial power that we could become & how He would bless us if we gave enough. I thought we were giving all we could, but apparently the Lord wants us to give more.

34. (Maria: Yes, I've had that question too about us holding reserves & wondered if we should go ahead by faith. And the reason I wondered about it is because the Lord said so many wonderful things about how He was going to pour out. So I was wondering if we should just go ahead by faith, knowing that He is going to pour out & we don't have to be afraid to lose.) Well, He started pouring already to encourage our faith, so let's go, go! Do it now! Praise the Lord!

35. Of course, I hope the Family realizes we're not saying you shouldn't hold reserves. We're just sacrificing most of our reserves so they can build up their reserves, knowing the Lord will repay. The Family has a need, and we want to do all we can to help them and to fill the need, but we're not trying to downplay the importance of reserves, and I hope they don't get that impression.

36. Reserves are important! That's why we've set up the HER funds for the Family and encouraged them to keep a Home Buffer fund and a reserve of survival food and equipment for emergencies. In fact, we hope they'll not only build up their tools fund but all their buffers and reserves so we can be prepared for the future, for whatever happens. I've taught this for years!

37. So when you see us giving away our reserves, dear Family, it's not because we don't believe in reserves‚ but because the Lord told us to give them to you. We have the faith that He is going to repay in a big way, and, in fact, He's already begun to. Praise the Lord!

38. That was a very encouraging dream. It just spoke so specifically about how if we'd give everything we've got, the Lord would give more until there would not even be room enough to hold it!

Copyright 1996 The Family