—MODecember 7, 1977DFONO.649

—Another Birthday Warning!—Burn Your sad Tidings!

© Copyrighted January 1978 by the Children of God

1. I WANT TO TELL YOU WHAT SOME PEOPLE HAVE DONE TO MY LETTERS. I was shocked a long time ago when I first found out about these mini-Letters, and since then the situation has been getting worse and worse!

2. WE HAVE RECENTLY DISCOVERED THAT IN SOME AREAS THE LEADERS HAVE CREATED NOT ONLY THE MINI-LETTERS BUT ALSO THE MIDGY-LETTERS, some were edited and reduced to less than one page of our original Letter!—10-, 12- and 16-pagers reduced to two pages!

3. SOME OF THESE SUPPOSED MO LETTERS WERE JUST RE-WRITES from my original Letters and they were changed so much that it was hard for me to even recognise them! Titles were completely changed, references were not given. In several cases they changed our official original illustration! Some of the artwork which was added from time to time actually sickened me—I've been ashamed of it!

4. THINGS WERE WRITTEN UNDER MY NAME WHICH I DID NOT EVEN WRITE! Passages of my Letters were woven together with the writings of someone else‚ so that it was impossible to tell who had written what!

5. THEY TOOK A QUOTE FROM HERE AND A QUOTE FROM THERE, a phrase from here, a sentence from there, they re-worded it and made me say things about specific subjects or countries that I never said!—Making it virtually a forgery!

6. THEIR "LETTERS" ARE NOT EVEN AS LONG AS THE CONDENSATIONS IN THE QUOTE BOOK! They are half the length of the same condensations in the Quotebook. These are not Letters, they are just little mottos! My God!

7. I THOUGHT THIS QUOTEBOOK WAS GETTING IT DOWN TO THE BONE‚ the absolute skeleton. Well, let me tell you, they don't even have a skeleton here! I'd say they hardly even have a little marrow or a ligament or an empty skin or anything! It's frothy, it's frivolous, it's flippant, it's shallow, it's superficial, it's sickening, it's disgusting!

8. I THINK IT'S BETTER NOT TO PUBLISH IT AT ALL THAN TO ABSOLUTELY SLAUGHTER IT, absolutely massacre the thing, hamstring it and put in just a few little paragraphs that we don't even know what they say or whether they even bring out the point.

9. I WOULD SAY THAT EDITING IS ONE OF THE MOST DIFFICULT JOBS IN THE WORLD! I know, I do it everyday! I take my own Letters and I slice them down—some from 30–some pages to 8 pages! But I'll tell you, it takes prayer and inspiration to make sure that I cut out all the waste only and just keep what is necessary.

10. BUT HE REMINDS ME OF THE MODERNISTIC PREACHER TO WHOM THE HEAD ELDER GAVE THE COVERS OF HIS BIBLE for a going-away present after he'd been preaching there for several years. And he opened it up and it was nothing but the covers of an old Bible, nothing in it! And the elder said,

11. "WELL PREACHER, YOU TOOK AWAY ALL THE REST, I FIGURED YOU MIGHT AS WELL HAVE THE COVERS TOO!—That's all I've got left!"

12. NOW BELOVED, IT JUST DEPENDS ON WHETHER YOU BELIEVE THAT WHAT GOD HAS TOLD ME IS THE WORD OF GOD OR NOT! But I want to tell you that I would with fear and trembling be afraid to slash the Letters down to that size! Maybe we ought to call this "Jehoiakim's penknife!"

13. AFTER ISRAEL HAD BEEN REALLY OUT OF TOUCH AND OUT OF FELLOWSHIP WITH GOD for so long, the Lord gave Jeremiah a prophecy against Israel and told him to write it down. When Jeremiah's messenger Baruch read the prophecy to the people, word spread rapidly to Jehudi, the King's priest who brought it to King Jehoiakim, and began to read it to him. And when the king heard what it said he got so mad he took his penknife and slashed it all to pieces and threw it in the fire! (Jer.36.) I feel like that's about the way they have done to some of my Letters!

14. THEY HAVE LITERALLY TORN UP THE LETTER AND GIVEN THE PUBLIC A LITTLE CRUMB!—Given them a little shred of paper! Can you imagine what they've done to the Word of God! I would be afraid to do that‚ literally afraid!

15. THIS REMINDS ME OF THE SCRIPTURES ABOUT FALSE PROPHETS and kings and those who withheld from the people and withheld the grass from the sheep and the water from the herds. There's a lot of prophecies in the last part of the old Testament, in the last days of Israel, about why God was going to destroy them! (Eze.34; Jer.23:1–4.)

16. "WILL A MAN ROB GOD? Yet ye have robbed Me! Will a man forget God? Ye have forgotten Me days without number!" (Mal.3:8; Jer.2:32.)

17. I SIT HERE AND WORK ALL DAY trying to grind out the corn and it may be pretty corny, but at least it's the truth!—It's the Word! It's what God gives me! But my God, what are they giving them there? Crumbs! Scraps!

18. HE SAYS, "GIVE UNTO THEM ALL THE COUNSEL OF GOD‚" in Acts 20:27, not just little shreds or just a crumb here and there!

19. "FOR I HAVE NOT SHUNNED TO DECLARE UNTO YOU ALL THE COUNSEL OF GOD." Then the next verse says, "Take heed therefore unto yourselves, and to all the flock, over the which the Holy Ghost has made you overseers, to feed the church of God which He hath purchased with His own Blood!

20. "FOR I KNOW THIS, THAT AFTER MY DEPARTING SHALL GRIEVOUS WOLVES ENTER IN AMONG YOU, not sparing the flock,"—They have already entered in‚ they didn't wait for my departure! "Also of your own selves shall men arise, speaking perverse things to draw away disciples after them." (Acts 20:27-30.)

21. LOOK AT THE DIFFERENCE IN THE WAY GOD'S BLESSING: Where we have gotten out the whole counsel of God, God has certainly abundantly blessed us!

22. OUR CIRCULATION HAS BOOMED EVEN THOUGH THEY HAVE ATTACKED US like mad! It has even done us good and we have doubled and tripled our circulation in Southern Europe as well as some of the countries of Northern Europe. I mean we're creating a furor! We're a sensation! God is blessing us!

23. GOD IS MULTIPLYING THE SEED AND HE IS PROSPERING US, AND THE MESSAGE IS GETTING OUT LIKE MAD!—Terrific!—The whole counsel of God, the whole Letters‚ the whole Word! But I call minis butchery, absolute butchery!

24. WITH GUYS LIKE THAT WANTING TO CHOP DOWN THE WORD and to get out as little as possible and make as much money off it as they can, you've got an almost unbeatable combination to assure doom! Those mini-midgies are not my Words, they're hardly anything!

25. I'M A SALESMAN, I HAVE A CERTAIN SALES PITCH GOD HAS GIVEN ME‚ AND I SELL AND SELL HARD, AND WHAT I SAY I THINK NECESSARY TO BE SAID! I believe it's inspired of God and I give the whole counsel of God. I hit from this angle and from that angle and from above and below to try to prove the Lord's case. You can't take just a word here and a word there and a sentence here and a sentence there and sell anything that way.

26. I'M "SELLING" THE WORD OF GOD!—That's my product, and you have got to give a good product, the whole product, if you're going to get customers. You've got do deliver the goods or it's going to be a one-time thing and they'll never want another one!

27. NO WONDER THEY'RE ONLY GETTING ONE OR TWO CENTS FOR THEM in Latin America, they're not worth that much! I don't know that if I was poor I'd give you that much for one of those little tiny crumbs of paper!

28. THEY'VE DONE A BEAUTIFUL JOB ON GETTING OUT SOME NEW LIT IN COMIC FORM, and that ought to really go, and it ought to reach almost anybody. But I don't think they're going to grow very much on comic books! That's weak milk even for a little baby.

29. I THINK THOSE ARE JUST STARTERS, just to make their mouths water a little bit, just to give them something to think about. I don't think that anything but the whole counsel of God is going to do the work.

30. I WOULD SAY THAT THEY HAVE DELIBERATELY‚ ALMOST INSOLENTLY DISOBEYED ME AND THE LETTERS and, as far as I'm concerned, the Word of God, in three major areas: first of all, they haven't published the Word, the whole counsel of God. They've only gotten out one whole MO Letter and that's the one we commanded them to get out, but it was so microscopic you couldn't read it!

31. THEY ARE ROBBING THE PEOPLE OF THE FOOD, AND GOD ONLY KNOWS HOW THEY'RE WATERING IT DOWN!—Or who knows but what they're contaminating it? Anyone who wouldn't hesitate to butcher it like that wouldn't hesitate to change it if he wanted to!

32. ANYBODY WHO WOULDN'T HESITATE TO CHOP IT UP LIKE THAT WOULDN'T HESITATE TO CHANGE IT! It's like making a distinction between different ways that I might kill you—whether I'm going to starve you to death or chop you up in little pieces—It's all the same end result: Your life is gone and you're gone, and that's what's happening with the Letters!

33. I WAS LEARY ABOUT IT EVEN IN CALEB'S TERRITORY WHEN THEY FIRST STARTED DOING IT. They said it was difficult because Japanese translations took so much room and the people couldn't understand it, so they had to simplify and condense and re-illustrate, and the mini-books and the mini–Letters were the answer. But you see, the minute you give people a chance to change it in any way, there is no stopping place. Look what's happened in both areas that have specialised in this:

34. I KEPT NOTICING FOR A LONG TIME THEY WERE AWFULLY SMALL. But my God‚ they've taken the jackets off and the coats off and it look like they've ripped off the shirt too, there's not much left! They have disobeyed in the worst way of all. And I'll tell you,

35. GO BACK AND READ "BIRTHDAY WARNING"—I was inspired and that was direct prophecy, and God gave some fearsome warnings about those who withhold the Word, that He was going to withhold from them!

36. WHAT THESE PEOPLE ARE DOING IS WITHHOLDING THE WORD, not withholding just a little bit of it, but withholding most of it! They're not giving anything but a few crumbs! My God, no wonder they don't have much success with the general public!

37. MAYBE GOD GOT FED UP with those ittty-bitty mini-midgies! Maybe that's why He wanted them to get kicked out of some places, maybe He was ashamed of them!

38. I KNOW ONE THING, GOD WON'T BLESS IT WHEN THEY WITHHOLD THE WORD from the people. That was considered one of the greatest of all sins of the priests and the prophets of God in Israel. They withheld the truth and the Word from the people and didn't give them the whole counsel of God.

39. OUR MAIN BUSINESS AND GOD'S WHOLE PLAN IS THAT WE GET THE WHOLE MESSAGE OUT. And if we don't do that, He might as well fire us because we're not getting the job done! Just because we manage to subsist and manage to rake in enough money to live on doesn't mean we're getting the job done.—Just because we're going out there begging—anybody can beg—but it doesn't get the job done!

40. THERE ARE LOTS OF BEGGARS IN THE WORLD, WE'RE NOT THE ONLY ONES! But what are they giving the people for their money? We're not out there just to beg! We do beg, yes, and I don't deny it‚ especially when I've heard the way some of you kids do it, which has been a shock to me!

41. THEY'RE NOT ACTUALLY SELLING LIT! ALL SOME OF THEM ARE DOING IS BEGGING! Why take the lit along at all, why not just stick out your hand if the money is all that you're after?—They'd get the point better, that you're just nothing but beggars! But you'll die on the vine for failing to get out the whole counsel of God!

42. "HE THAT WITHHOLDETH IT TENDETH TO POVERTY. He that scattereth abroad it increases." (Pr.11:24.) There's also a Scripture about "withholding bread from the hungry" and the punishment of God. (Job 22:7-11.)

43. WELL, THEY ARE WITHHOLDING THE WORD, THAT IS THEIR FIRST SIN. In the process, as far as I'm concerned, they are robbing the people of their spiritual food and robbing the kids financially.

44. THEY HAVE ROBBED GOD, ROBBED THE PEOPLE, ROBBED THE CHILDREN! They are also robbing me because I work hard on these Letters and I expect them to get them out. When they don't, that's robbing me of my time, my strength and my spirit.

45. THEY'RE ROBBING ME! Because all I've got to live for is to get out the Word of God, that's my job. I'm the channel through which they get it, and I pass it on to them to publish. But they are neither publishing the Letters nor are they obeying them. By not publishing the Word they are robbing us all!

46. THEY HAVE MOCKED THE MESSENGERS OF GOD, THEY'VE DESPISED MY WORD and they have misused me! So the wrath of God is going to rise against them! There's not going to be any remedy unless they repent real fast! (2Ch.36:16).

47. OKAY, WHAT TO DO ABOUT IT: We're now going to have to get tough and set down rigid rules of publication: From henceforth no Letters will ever again be printed in condensed or edited form unless an English version is first sent to us clearly showing the excerpts marked, identifying the condensations, showing every single change that has been made in the Letter. This will have to have our personal approval. Otherwise it must not be printed!

48. I DON'T WANT ANY CHANGES IN MY LETTERS or the format, the form‚ the type, the illustrations, the size, the title, no changes, absolutely no changes, even in a foreign translation!

49. I WANT TO SEE YOUR NAME ON IT IF YOU'VE CHANGED IT IN ANY WAY from the original format‚ size of type, anything. You not only have to get my approval, but I want to see your name as the editor on it, nice and big somewhere—"Condensed and edited by", "compiled by"—So you get the credit as well as the blame!

50. NEXT RULE: YOU ARE FORBIDDEN TO MAKE ANY ADDITION TO THE LETTER WHATSOEVER WITHOUT PERSONAL APPROVAL DIRECTLY FROM ME! This includes introductions, explanations, footnotes‚ commentaries, artwork and anything else.

51. THE TITLE MUST NOT BE CHANGED, THE DESIGNATION MUST NOT BE CHANGED, NOR THE ILLUSTRATIONS‚ WITHOUT EXPRESS PERMISSION FROM ME PERSONALLY OVER MY SIGNATURE! If you want to change it I have to receive a copy showing exactly how you want it changed, in English, and whatever new artwork you want to use. If you want to change the title you've got to tell me, and if I don't like it and I don't approve it‚ then you don't do it!

52. FROM NOW ON I DON'T WANT ANYBODY QUOTING ME UNLESS YOU PUT IT IN QUOTATION MARKS AND SAY I SAID IT AND WHERE IT CAME FROM. No more quotes unless my quotation is enclosed in quotes and you give the specific reference. The Letter number is not enough, and from now on I don't want just Letter numbers for references.

53. I WANT TO SEE THE LETTER NAME AND THE NUMBER AND THE PARAGRAPH NUMBER WHEN I'M QUOTED! (By Moses David, Letter So-and-so, Number so-and-so, paragraph so–and-so.) I think that's the only thing that's going to preserve the Word of the Lord that He's given to me. That's the only thing that has preserved the Bible, and that's the only thing that's preserved the Catholic works, God bless the Pope!

54. I NEVER AGAIN WANT ONE SINGLE PIECE OF LITERATURE PRINTED WITH MY NAME ON IT AS THE AUTHOR UNLESS I AM THE AUTHOR OF EVERY WORD OF IT! I don't want my name on anything that somebody else has written. If you've written one word in it I don't want my name on it‚ not one word of it! Don't use my name as the author on anything that I am not responsible for, that I didn't write every single word of and approve of!

55. IT IS FORBIDDEN TO PRINT LETTERS IN ANY SMALLER PAGE SIZE THAN THE ORIGINAL MO LETTER! That's the absolute minimum that is decent and readable and appealing and something you don't have to be ashamed of!

56. ALSO THE REDUCTIONS IN PRINT SIZE, EVEN OF A FOREIGN LANGUAGE TRANSLATION, TO ANY SMALLER TYPE THAN WE USE IN THE ORIGINAL LETTER IS FORBIDDEN! We picked that type face because we figured it was the smallest people could possibly conveniently and safely read without ruining their eyes.

57. IT IS FORBIDDEN TO REDUCE THE SIZE OF THE ARTWORK! If you want a reduction of the artwork for use within a mini-Letter, you can take the art out of the quotebook, in the quotebook size‚ but do not reduce further.

58. IT IS FORBIDDEN TO CHANGE THE COLOUR OF EITHER PAPER OR TYPE FROM THAT OF THE ORIGINAL WITHOUT EXPRESS EXPLICIT PERMISSION DIRECTLY FROM US!—Except if you want to print something in black and white that came in colour from us, you may.

59. NO FURTHER LOCAL PUBS SHOULD BE PRODUCED except a localised edition of the International NNN in the same style, format, everything, with all the same rules applying to complete articles.

60. THE APPROVED NNN OR ARTICLES THEREFROM MUST BE REPRINTED EXACTLY THE SAME size, format‚ art, photos, everything that has been laid down for the MO Letters.

61. THE ONLY CONDENSATIONS THAT YOU MAY USE WITHOUT DIRECT PERMISSION FROM ME ARE THE ONES IN THE QUOTEBOOK which I have already approved of, but no shorter than that.—Exactly the way those are printed, no different, no change in the title, no change in the illustration. And in that one case I might let you print it in that small a type‚ but only in that case. The only exceptions to these rules I've already voiced is the Quotebook, and also the Daily Might which is an authorised exception that also has our personal approval.

62. IF YOU WANT TO PRINT SMALL SHORTER LETTERS, THE ONES FROM THE QUOTEBOOK ARE THE ONLY ONES THAT I WOULD ALLOW. You would have to print them exactly that size type, those titles, those illustrations, those words and that's all. I have read it‚ studied it, prayed over it‚ and it's rich and it's enough.

63. THAT MEANS NO SHIRT POCKET BOOKS IF THEY CONTAIN UNAPPROVED CONDENSATIONS, except for the Quotebook condensations. This is the model and size for our pocket books. This was our design and whole idea, and as far as I'm concerned that's as small as it needs to ever be. Others must be approved!

64. NOTHING SMALLER THAN THE QUOTEBOOK SHOULD EVER BE PRINTED. I don't mean you have to print the whole contents of the Quotebook, but I mean you can take the Letters out of the Quotebook and print them that size if you want to. But that's the minimum!

65. ONE THING THAT MAY BE DONE WITHOUT SPECIAL PERMISSION IS COMBINATIONS OF LETTERS. A good sample guideline is that shown in the Quotebook of combinations of Letters under certain categories.—Whole or QB size only!

66. I'M SORRY I HAVE TO GET SO STIRRED UP AND ANGRY ABOUT IT‚ BUT I'LL TELL YOU, IT MAKES ME FURIOUS when I see what they have done to my Letters! I mean these Letters are just like my children, it's just like they've hacked up my kids!

67. IF THEY WERE JUST MY WORDS I COULD PROBABLY OVERLOOK IT, BUT WHEN YOU SEE HOW THEY HAVE WRESTED THE WORD OF GOD, as the Scripture says, twisted and torn it and ripped it to shreds, it is just almost unbelievable! (Ps.56:5; 2Pet.3:16)

68. THEREFORE ANYONE CAUGHT VIOLATING ANY ONE OF THESE PRINTING REGULATIONS or approving, authorising, condoning or permitting it, will immediately lose his position in either publications or leadership!

69. FURTHERMORE‚ THE EDITORS AND LEADERS RESPONSIBLE FOR THE CREATION OR SPONSORSHIP of all these non-conforming pieces of literature still in stock (not the poor printers‚ typists, layouters or artists!) shall hit the road with this lit personally immediately (including KQCs, Editors, etc.‚ on down!) until their present inappropriate illegal stocks are exhausted!

70. THIS MEANS YOU!—And you know who I mean!—And I want a report from you on how you did it!—This includes Jethro and Isaiah of Lima, Peru, in particular!—And Caleb and Josh of the Pacific in general!—Hit the road boys! You've got a new job!—See if you can pass that lousy lit you butchered!—And don't come back till it's gone! Happy New Year!

71. ANY LEADER OR DISCIPLE WHO DOES NOT APPROVE OF THESE REGULATIONS IS WELCOME TO HIT THE ROAD with or without the lit!

72. FEBRUARY 18TH, IS YOUR DEADLINE to either distribute personally all these remaining non-conforming pieces of literature or burn it!

73. BUT AFTER FEB.18TH, ALL LITERATURE VIOLATING THESE RULES MUST BE DESTROYED! If it doesn't meet the specifications, then we don't want it on the streets and will have to destroy it. Governments who don't approve of a certain kind of literature require it to be impounded and destroyed.—And we are a Government! (See the latest Letter: "Destruction of the Super-Blob!", No.650.)

74. IF YOU DON'T WANT TO PRINT AND DISTRIBUTE THE WHOLE COUNSEL OF GOD, YOU DON'T BELONG IN THE FAMILY! We're being merciful to let you hit the road with all this lousy diluted lit until you get rid of it by Feb. 18th—my birthday!—Or burn it!

75. THEN YOU COULDN'T GIVE ME A BETTER BIRTHDAY PRESENT than from now on to print only the whole counsel of God just the way He gave it! Thanks! GBY!

—Love,—Mad Sad Dad!

P.S. Let me see all your GP lit!

Copyright (c) 1998 by The Family