God's Supply--In response to Amos

from Christy - Saturday, May 22, 2004
accessed 2144 times

Amos,

I was reading some of your posts today and wanted to share some of my experiences with God’s supply. Since you’re a seventeen-year-old male, I’m going to assume that you are not the primary person actually doing the provisioning and fundraising. You are young and idealistic and I get that. I was a hard-working dedicated Family member for many years. While I certainly had my doubts about doctrines, I was convinced that the Family was still a good place to serve the Lord and to make a difference in the world. As someone who was often one of the main (and most successful) fundraisers in most of the homes in which I lived, I want to relay to you a few of my experiences.

About seven years ago, I was sitting in the backseat of a rental car heading to yet another hotel to try to provision a room for the night when I made my decision that whatever it took, I was going to go to college and have a career. I was on the road in Western Europe, raising funds to keep my home in Russia running. In fact, I had been on the road fundraising for almost that entire year. Sure, I had done fundraising since I was about six years old, and sure, I had almost left the Family when I was 18, 20, and 21, but this time it was different.

Before I started going to Western Europe to raise funds for my home in Russia, we had tried to support ourselves on a local level. At the time, we had established an outpost in a city that was practically located in the Arctic Circle. At first we were able to support ourselves, at least to some extent, locally. But there were really only a few people and businesses with any money in that town, and pretty soon our resources began to dry up. We spent months in the dead of winter (-40 degrees Celsius) living on tea, bread, and sugar). I lost about 20 lb., which for someone who already tends towards the slim side, is quite a lot. I spent about six months sleeping on the floor in a sleeping bag. Ok, it was made a little easier for me since the guy in the sleeping bag next to me was a truly good person and a great friend. But anyway, this was while we were working hard on the mission field and working hard to raise funds. I’ll just say that unlike what Berg often said, I have missed meals for God’s lack of supply! We were willing to go through this because of the excitement of our ministries and because of our “flock” to whom we were ministering.

When some of my friends and I opened our own home, we decided that we should have road teams to Western Europe to help support our effort. This would help us to avoid the poverty we had experienced in our previous outpost. Most of the time it would be me teaming up with people from another home to go on fundraising trips. I would get back from my road trips only to find that my home really hadn't accomplished much. There were only two people, besides me (out of 6-8 home members), that actually participated much in witnessing or "volunteer" work. The others were more than happy to stay home and sit around or occasionally be a partner for one of us in our projects. When I would return from one of my fundraising trips, I would hear comments like, “We were waiting for you to get back to begin on such and such a ministry or project.” This was what people were donating their hard-earned money to.

Most of the people in that home were really great, solid people. I’m still in contact with many of them. They simply were not cut out to be missionaries. Yet, they felt like they would be failing God or missing out on future heavenly rewards if they were to go and get a regular job. This scenario was not unique to my home. Before leaving my field I attended a delegates meeting with representatives from about 20 homes in the country. Almost every home complained about the same problem. Many F. members seem to believe that they are fulfilling God’s will just by physically being on a mission field. Even if they are distributing gospel tracts (as you mentioned that your team has been doing), how much good is that really going to? And, are these people that are repeating a prayer after you really going to change their lives? You’re not going to stick around long enough to really establish a church in your area and feed these people. You’re simply hoping that if there is enough interest, these people will write to the address and get further taken care of through the mail.

I’m not just saying this to challenge your dedication. It’s simply a fact that most F. members don’t stick to a field or ministry long enough to make a lasting difference. It’s just not the focus of the group. There’s always some new push or phase that gets people to leave their fledgling work and go off to start something else on the other side of the world.

There were, of course, those times that I really felt like I was making a difference, and that I was doing something worthwhile with my life. But now I realized that I didn't want be 40 (or 50) years old, without any steady source of income and still going around asking for donations of money, meals, or a place to sleep for the night. Yes, I stayed in many a five star hotel and ate in many a five star restaurant. However, there were also the nights when I slept, squeezed into a tiny car in the middle of winter, under as many coats and sweaters at I could pull together since I didn’t have blankets with me. This was after hours of trying unsuccessfully to provision a hotel for the night.

I work a lot harder at my job now than I ever did in the F. But, at least now I know that I’m actually doing a service to society, rather that leaching off of hard working citizens. I’m also preparing for a real future, not one in which someone comes riding through the sky on a white horse to whisk me and my fellow believers away to rule the earth for eternity. I’m still a Christian, and I don’t negate that all those Biblical prophesies may someday come true. I’m just not hinging my future on the belief that it’ll happen during my lifetime. I saw what it did to my parents’ generation and I don’t want to let it happen to me.