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Faith on the March
A.H. Macmillan
Copyright 1957
| CHAPTER 15
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| JEHOVAH PROVIDES FOR HIS FAMILY
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| PAGE 205
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"SEATS FREE, no collection" is a slogan that Jehovah's witnesses are glad to use. We know of no other organization that has operated on any large scale with absolutely no solicitation or collection. Yet from its small beginning in Allegheny, Pennsylvania, in 1872, the Society has reached its present worldwide extent, owning property worth millions of dollars paid for and maintained completely by voluntary contributions.
This policy of operation was stated by Jesus in sending out his twelve apostles to preach: 1 "Freely ye have received, freely give." This text is often quoted during the "offertory" service at churches, but it was not money Jesus was asking them to give when he said that. It was works of service in the ministry they were to give. Read the entire chapter and note what he said. Then he told them not to worry about their financial return because he promised: 2 "The workman is worthy of his meat."
It was in line with this commandment of Jesus to give freely
that C. T. Russell published in the second issue of the Watch Tower magazine: "'Zion's Watch Tower' has, we believe, JEHOVAH for its backer, and while this is the case it will never be, nor petition men for support. When He who says: 'All the gold and silver of the mountains are mine,' fails to provide necessary funds, we will understand it to be time to suspend publication." That was published in August of 1879 and today, without ever having missed an issue since it started, three million copies are printed each issue. C. T. Russell used his own personal fortune at the outset, which helped give the work a good start. Rutherford financed many of his preaching trips out of personal savings accumulated before he became associated with the Society. And today, much of the money that is used to carry on the work is spent out of the pocket of the individual minister of Jehovah's witnesses as he engages in the work himself.
| VOLUNTARY CONTRIBUTIONS PAY IT ALL
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You may never have realized it, but when Jehovah's witnesses come to your homes and knock on your doors it is costing them money. They pay their own carfare or automobile expense and the cost of any literature they give away. They pay the printing cost of books they receive from the Society and contributions they receive for them are used to obtain more. If they give literature away, this money is out of their own pocket. Do you have any idea how much is contributed to the work in this way? It is nothing for one of the witnesses in most countries to spend two dollars in a month for travel expenses carrying on his ministerial activity. Multiply that by six hundred thousand ministers throughout the world and you can see what it amounts to. Millions of dollars every year are spent by Jehovah's witnesses personally just to visit you and your neighbors in your homes. In addition to their own individual ministry, each one contributes voluntarily to support the local congregation's expenses, such as rent, electric light,
heating and so on. At none of these meetings is a collection ever taken. Boxes are provided at the rear of the hall for anyone who wishes to make a voluntary contribution. No one knows who gives, or how much. But what about the other features of the work? Building and operating large printing plants, shipping millions of pieces of literature all over the world, maintaining hundreds of missionary homes in over one hundred countries--that all costs money. Where do Jehovah's witnesses get the financial support for all of this activity? One thing you can be sure of. The contributions we receive for literature at the doors wouldn't begin to pay for it all. In the first place, the amount of contribution is figured to cover little more than printing cost. Then, besides that, much of the literature is given to full-time ministers at considerably below printing cost to help them defray their own distribution expenses. So money for these other features of the work must come from another source--and it does. For many years now the Society has put a notice in The Watchtower once a year requesting each one who wishes to contribute during the year to state how much he wants to contribute and how the contributions would be sent, whether all at once or a certain amount at a time. The reason this has been done is in order that we might know how to lay out the work for the year to come; and the work is planned or expanded on the basis of what is indicated by these expressions. This would indicate the leading of the Lord in spreading the work. These statements of their good hopes Jehovah's witnesses have never considered as promises or pledges, just simply what they hoped to be able to contribute toward the spreading of the work the coming year. Sometimes some would fall down
on them while others would double up what they had anticipated giving. New ones would come in to the organization and many contributions would be made by those who did not send in any expression of their hopes. This has proved very satisfactory in arranging the year's work, and does not constitute in any way a solicitation because no one is asked to give a penny. Neither is an amount established as a goal to be attained. The work progresses only to the extent of the voluntary contributions. That means those entrusted with spending this money have a real responsibility, and all three presidents of the Society have been extremely careful not to spend it for things that would not bring some advancement to the work. Yet when it is necessary they will spend thousands of dollars for equipment and millions for new buildings to expand the preaching program. In doing all this, Jehovah's witnesses have always managed to pay as they go.
| THE PEOPLE BRING MORE THAN ENOUGH
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There is an interesting story in that connection I'd like to tell you. It has to do with building our first factory at 117 Adams Street in Brooklyn. After the work was revived in 1919 our expansion was so rapid we outgrew one place after another and finally the question arose about building a real plant of our own that would meet all of our requirements. Plans were drawn up and we concluded that it would require an eight -or nine- story building. This was in 1926. It was going to cost a substantial sum of money, so Martin, the factory manager, and I got together and talked it over. We went to Rutherford and said, "Brother Rutherford, if you would issue notes at a reasonable interest and offer them to our
own people you'll get all that is necessary to build the factory and it would be in the family." "Oh," he said, "if I set out something like that in The Watch Tower, that would cause a furor, it would disrupt the organization. They'd say, Look at them now, they've started in begging." "But you wouldn't be soliciting or asking for contributions. Just a loan. Why don't you do this? Put a little supplement in there, not as a regular part of the Tower. Tell the friends all about it, what the money's for and how it will be used, and I'll guarantee you that in no time at all there will be sufficient funds to build that factory, because everybody in the truth that's devoted to Jehovah is as interested in it as we are and I think it will thrill them to think they can have some part in it." Well, Rutherford didn't say much after that but he became quite serious and thought about it. Sure enough, he did issue that special edition of the Watch Tower and sent it out. I left on a trip about that time and got back in five or six weeks. Rutherford came to me with a very serious look on his face, and said, "Brother, you were so sure that a few weeks after the Tower would get out with that special notice in it that there would be enough funds come in here to build the factory. Here it's been six or eight weeks and just a few little dribbles have come in." "Brother Rutherford, you haven't been out amongst our people as I have. The friends have their money in savings banks or hidden away in a glass jar under the cellar stairs or in the rafters of the barn--who knows where it is? Give them a little time. They'll think it over--it will be two or three months before it will begin to come in. Now I'm going away on another trip and I'll be back in about two months, and if there's not enough in here then to build that factory, I'll take you out and get you the finest chicken dinner we can get in Brooklyn." (He always did like chicken.) "And if there is
enough in there, then Brother Martin and I will be looking for that chicken as your treat."
I left on my next speaking trip then and came back in eight weeks. I met Rutherford in the hallway and I said, "Well, Brother Rutherford, how are the subscriptions for loans coming in?"
"Oversubscribed--had to send some back."
"Well," I said, "I have a thousand dollars in my pocket that's been offered."
"Send it back, we don't need it." And we certainly didn't; we had more than enough.
Instead of borrowing money from a bank, we had borrowed it from our own people and the Society gave them a note at the regular rate of interest, although many of Jehovah's witnesses waived the interest. It was understood by those receiving notes that they could request their money in full at any time if they might unexpectedly have need for it. These received their money at once and the rest were paid off as the regular voluntary contributions made it possible. Before the notes had matured, all had been settled.
This arrangement certainly reminded me of the account in the Bible when Moses was told to build the Tabernacle for Jehovah in the wilderness.3 Moses called the nation of Israel together and itemized the materials that would be needed and asked those of willing heart to contribute what they had. After awhile the men assigned to do the work told Moses: "The people bring much more than enough for the service of the work, which the Lord commanded to make.... So the people were restrained from bringing. For the stuff they had was sufficient for all the work to make it, and too much."
By 1946 we needed additions to the factory and in 1955 we needed an entire new building of thirteen floors. Both were built with money loaned the Society by Jehovah's witnesses themselves. In neither case were new notes given out until all previous ones were settled.
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| THE FAMILY FORMS A PATTERN
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Such an arrangement would not be possible except for the fact that all of Jehovah's witnesses feel themselves a part of the organization. Actually, they are. The New World society is a family and Jehovah's spirit of giving poured out on them prompts them to support the work without their having to. Since 1901 my home has been in and out of Bethel. All this while I have enjoyed the close relationship that exists in our headquarters family. Our seventy-eight branch homes, too, while not nearly so large, operate on the same principles. So do our more than two hundred missionary homes. Like any family, we have our own rooms where we can withdraw for privacy, but we eat together and work together; our laundry is taken care of; our beds are made and our rooms are cleaned, all the work being done by those assigned to their particular tasks. The whole family is a happy lot and extremely considerate and thoughtful of one another. Our meals are particularly sociable. At Bethel we have about fifty tables, each seating ten persons, and our entire family of 450 sits down together. The Society's president, N. H. Knorr, is head of the family and presides at our meals. He and his wife live at Bethel with the rest of us and so do all the directors of the Society. Like all the rest of us, in addition to board and room, they all get their $14 a month allowance for personal needs. At breakfast we always have a short period of worship with a discussion of a Bible text for that day. This is always a stimulating period and gives us the right mental and spiritual start for the day's activity. After breakfast Knorr always remains in the dining room for a time so that any member of the family who has a question about his work or some personal problem can have it settled without need to make an appointment. For a man with the responsibility he has, Knorr is one of the most
approachable men I have known. He has a deep personal interest in every member of the family.
Almost every family of Jehovah's witnesses I know who are all, or almost all, active in the Christian ministry follow about the same pattern of living. I've traveled around this country and Europe for many years, and practically all of the time I have been entertained in the homes of Jehovah's witnesses themselves. Everywhere I go I find the family arrangement is always the same amongst those who are really a part of the New World society; and at once I am made to feel a part of the family.
When they get up in the morning they always have the morning text read, then perhaps a brief discussion, with the father usually summing it up from printed comments for the day in the current Yearbook of Jehovah's Witnesses. The children are encouraged to participate and generally show real aptitude.
This sort of family relationship is something that the world has almost forgotten. Even modern churches don't have it. It's old-fashioned now for people to associate together as a Christian family. How many families do you know that read the Bible in the home and have family worship? or even return thanks at their meals? Yet this failure is considered by many sociologists and by many who are concerned with the problem of juvenile delinquency as one of the outstanding causes for broken homes and criminal youth.
| IDENTIFYING THE FAMILY OF GOD
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The family is the foundation of society, of the world. And just as the family is, so you might expect the whole nation to be. That is why, with the strong family unit built up in the homes of Jehovah's witnesses, the New World society is really a large family. When they come to their congregational meetings, or
share in their house-to-house ministry, the individual family groups make up the larger family group, for they are all acting in the same way. They all live under the same principles at home. When they come to their "Kingdom Hall" for their meetings they come there to study, to be informed on the Doctrines of the Bible and proper methods of preaching, to ask questions or to offer their comments. Then when they come together in a large convention it is just another family arrangement on a larger scale. Instead of having a few in a home, or 50 or 150 in a Kingdom Hall, they have 50,000 or 100,000 in a great stadium. It is the same family, all "brothers" and sisters" in the New World society, bound together in relationship through Jesus Christ and the true worship of the Most High God, with prospects of some day filling the earth with their way of life.
That's why our movement is truly international. It bridges all national barriers, for it is the same world-wide. We live according to one standard, a rule that unites us as one regardless of any other affiliation, for it has its origin in the one Book, the Bible, and operates under the one unifying active force, the holy spirit of God. Do you think that is possible? Consider what the Bible says about the family of God. Jesus showed the closeness of this relationship even beyond that of fleshly ties with his mother, Mary, and his natural brothers, for he said: 4 "Who is my mother? and who are my brethren? And he stretched forth his hand toward his disciples, and said, Behold my mother and my brethren! For whosoever shall do the will of my Father which is in heaven, the same is my brother, and sister, and mother."
What reason do we have for saying it should be different on earth today? This unity existed within the early congregation. Why not now? Do you find it in your church?
Wouldn't you like to feel yourself a part of the family of God? You can. As surely as I have. From out of this world of people who do not know where our civilization is heading,
you can find the right religion that will answer your questions about God as mine have been answered and make life worth living. It may be a struggle but it is worth it, and you can find it if you follow the way God has outlined for us in his Word.
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