PERSONAL EVANGELISM VS. MASS EVANGELISM! DFO 1649        10/83--Which Really Pays?

       1. THE FAMILY MEMBERS IN THOSE PLACES IMPRESS ME AS A BUNCH OF HALF-HEARTED COMPROMISERS THAT HAD TO COMPROMISE TO PLEASE THE CHURCHES, had to compromise to please the government & had to compromise for support! They didn't have far to go to get there from the United States & they didn't have much sacrifice to make. It doesn't cost very much to live there, they have cheap rents, cheap cost-of-living, comfortable luxurious surroundings & easy living, so it doesn't take much of a sacrifice to be a missionary there, especially when you work with the Church people & Christians!
       2. I WOULDN'T SAY THAT THE FAMILY IN SOME FIELDS ARE VERY REVOLUTIONARY OR MUCH REBELS OR ENOUGH DIFFERENT FROM THE SYSTEM OR FROM THE CHURCHES TO MAKE THEM EVEN APPEALING TO REVOLUTIONARY DISCIPLES! Why should they leave their Church or religion when the local Family is so much like them & accepted by the churches & the government? What makes the Family in those areas different? A little private sex & secret doctrines doesn't require much in the way of dropping out or forsake-all! Some've been there for years, & yet how many actual natives have they got in the Family? I'd like to know the stats, whether they're men or women & how did they come in, by marriage or genuine discipleship?
       3. THAT'S WHY THEY'VE PROBABLY BEEN ABLE TO SURVIVE IN THOSE FIELDS SO LONG, THEY HAVEN'T BEEN DIFFERENT ENOUGH TO BE DISLIKED OR RECEIVE ANY PERSECUTION, but neither have they gotten many disciples! I'll grant you it's a whole lot safer & easier with less sacrifice, less danger, more support, more churchy cooperation & governmental toleration, but it doesn't make for real revolutionary disciples, not even real revolutionary missionaries!
       4. YOU CAN'T EVEN SAY WITH CATHOLICS, "DO YOU HAVE JESUS IN YOUR HEART?", BECAUSE A LOT OF THEM WOULD SAY YES & THAT THEY ALL LOVE JESUS. But the real $64-question with Catholics is, "Do you know you're saved & going to Heaven?" And when you say, "Are you born again?", they don't even know what that means! (Maria: So that normally means they're not, right?) Exactly. And none of them know they're going to Heaven because it's just strictly a works religion. But of course they'll all say they love Jesus & Mary & the Saints too & they'll all say they believe the Bible, but they don't know it. They don't even know the simplest Scriptures on Salvation!
       5. BUT I'VE FOUND MOST CATHOLICS ARE EAGER TO KNOW HOW TO BE SAVED & BE SURE THEY'RE GOING TO HEAVEN, & they're very thankful to be given the Scriptures & ready to pray to receive Jesus--but very reluctant to leave their church! That's where the crunch always came! Boy, I got several Catholic families converted in my visitation, but as soon as they began to tell their relatives & friends & all that they were going to leave their church & come to my church, oooh, all Hell broke loose! The priest & the nuns & their fathers & mothers & family & everything else descended on them! Talk about 10:36ers! Ooh! I mean, it was as bad in my churchy days to try to get a Catholic converted & come to my church as it is today to try to get one of these so-called Christians converted & join the Family!
       6. SO IF YOU COMPROMISE & PULL YOUR PUNCHES & YOU DON'T OFFEND THEM & you don't insist on them dropping out & forsaking all & joining the Family & becoming a real red-hot rebel, revolutionary disciple, then of course they'll agree with you all the way. They'll be even happy to believe the Scriptures on Salvation & receive Jesus & be saved & go right back to the Catholic Church better Catholics than before--but you won't get any of them to join the Family, not that way! You've got to have something different to offer, & if it's only going to be private sex & secret doctrines & conversion by marriage, it's not going to get too many disciples!--Not real genuine all-out drop-out forsake-all disciples who are really sold & hot & on-fire & willing to fight & die for Jesus & the Truth!
       7. YOU'LL GET A BUNCH OF MILK-&-WATER, LUKEWARM, SICKENING, SHILLY-SHALLYING, CONVICTIONLESS SO-CALLED CHRISTIANS who are no different from the people in the churches hardly, except they happen to like the Family a little bit better since they managed to marry into it & get themselves an American or European husband--or a wife in some cases where the natives want to marry the American or European girls! But mostly it's the native women who want to marry the European or American men. They figure they're gonna treat'm better & they'll be richer & better off & at least have a home & a place to lay their heads & be well-fed & somebody to help take care of the baby.--Not because they really want to be an all-out on-fire flaming evangelist willing to be a martyr for the Lord!
       8. THAT'S ALWAYS THE TEMPTATION, TO COMPROMISE & SOFT-PEDDLE & TONE DOWN THE MESSAGE & THE DOCTRINES & THE METHODS TO PLEASE THE PEOPLE, particularly the Churches & the Church people & the governments for sake of support & to escape any kind of approbation or persecution. I don't blame'm much, I don't like persecution either, but it doesn't make for good strong genuine Revolution-for-Jesus disciples who are all-out, sold-out, on-fire & willing to die for the Lord & the Truth, & neither does it gain'm many genuine disciples.
       9. THAT'S WHY I HAVE REALLY CONDEMNED HIGH-PUBLICITY MASS-MEDIA MINISTRIES, because they have sacrificed personal witnessing & winning of real whole-hearted all-out disciples who are really willing to live & die for the radical Message that we're supposed to preach! They have sacrificed all of that for their high-profile extremely public Mass-Media Ministries & greater acceptance & support!
       10. THEY'RE NOT AFRAID FOR THEIR LIVES! THEY'RE NOT LIVING UNDERGROUND! They're not making secret disciples who really understand the full Message & move in & are willing to fight & die for it! I can't see that the Family in those areas are very much different from the Churches & the Church people & the Christians to whom they're ministering, therefore I don't see that they're getting very many disciples either. I think their record is very poor for having been there for years & having so few Nationals, genuine native disciples, except by marriage.
       11. I MEAN, YOU CAN PILE UP THE MASS-MEDIA STATS BY THE MILLIONS, & YOU CAN EVEN PILE UP THE MASS MEETING SALVATIONS BY THE THOUSANDS, BUT WHERE ARE THE DISCIPLES?--The real all-out, uncompromising, sold-out, forsake-all, dropped-out, whole-hearted disciples? Where are they? I certainly haven't seen very many.
       12. I WOULD BET YOU 10-TO-1 THAT THE AMERICAN & EUROPEAN MISSIONARIES STILL OUT-NUMBER THE NATIVE DISCIPLES IN THOSE PLACES AFTER ALL THOSE YEARS IN THE FIELD! All those years of ministering & I'll bet there still isn't one native disciple per Northern adult! (Maria: I think you're right, there're probably not as many.) I'd like to see the stats on that. I think they're quite comfortable & they don't really want too many disciples, just a few marry-ins, & that's about all they've got!
       13. I'LL TELL YOU, THAT'S NOT WHAT MADE THE FAMILY! THAT'S NOT WHAT MADE THE JESUS REVOLUTION! They have made peace with the System & the Church & the government, whereas the thing that really started the Jesus Revolution was an all-out declaration of war against the System & the Churches! It was a call-to-arms, come fight & die with us for the Truth & the Lord! At the rate they're going, they're just going to be another Christian denomination there, & if it weren't for sex they'd probably be accepted right now & could start building their churches!
       14. IT'S OUR MESSAGE ON SEX & EVEN NUDITY WHICH HAS DIVIDED THE MEN FROM THE BOYS--OR I MIGHT SAY THE WEAK SISTERS FROM THE REAL FIGHTING MEN! Thank God as long as we stick to that they'll never have anything to do with us! But I don't think they preach that there very much, in fact I think they even hide it. They wouldn't dare let it be known because they're afraid for their necks, for which I don't blame them!
       15. ALL THE CHURCHES, DENOMINATIONS, SPLINTER GROUPS, NEW CULTS & ISMS & SECTS HAD TO EVENTUALLY MAKE THAT CHOICE, whether to stick true & all-out for their messages & doctrines & preaching them & practicing them, or choose safety, comfort, convenience, compromise, peace & support, & you can see what virtually all of them did! I don't hear of any radical revolutionary groups there except the political revolutionaries who are willing to fight & die for their faith! (Maria: Those are the ones they should go to then, huh?) That would be the most dangerous thing they could possibly do in their now friendly relationship with the government, but those are the ones we went to in our early days in the U.S.A., the hippies who were already at war with the System, & we got disciples from them by the thousands, many of whom are still with us today!
       16. (MARIA: BUT SEE, WE'VE TOLD THE FAMILY, "WELL LOOK, YOU'RE GUESTS IN THESE COUNTRIES, DON'T VIRTUALLY EVEN LOOK AT THE OPPOSITION because you have to favour the government, because they're your host.") Yes, it's a little different ticklish situation in foreign countries where you're guests of the government, you do have to be more careful. But if they had won national disciples with the real Message, by the time they had enough of them, they could've gone ahead & preached it all-out in their own countries no matter what! The foreign missionaries would've been chased out, but they might have been able to at least leave a strong, radical, all-out, dropped-out, forsake-all National Church behind! Now as far as I can see, they've got virtually no strong indigenous National Churches, almost none, & if all these foreign missionaries moved out, I wonder if the National Family that are left are strong enough to survive?
       17. I WONDER HOW MANY REAL, GENUINE, SOLD-OUT, ALL-OUT, DROPPED-OUT, FORSAKE-ALL, REVOLUTIONARY, OLD-FASHIONED FAMILY NATIONAL DISCIPLES THEY HAVE? I sometimes wonder how many of our own Family missionaries like that we have in those places? In some of those areas the leadership in the early days were the biggest compromisers & didn't receive the radical message of FFing--didn't preach it, didn't practice it & in actual practice lived against it!--Old-bottle Chain leftovers! (Maria: As far as FFing, they nearly all finally had to do it for support, so I think almost all of them FFed. I know they FF a lot there because they have to for support, they couldn't survive otherwise. I think that forced them.) They finally found it paid so they finally accepted it! Horror of horrors! They had to.--Not for souls!--Ugh!
       18. WHAT A DIFFERENCE BETWEEN THE FAMILY THERE & THE JAPANESE FAMILY FOR EXAMPLE, WHO WE'VE RECENTLY BEEN WATCHING ON VIDEO! Don't tell me it can't be done! The leadership didn't compromise there but instead preached it & practiced it all-out, & as a result, the vast majority of the Japanese Family are now Nationals!--Strong, indigenous, self-supporting, self-governing, self-propagating, all-out, dropped-out, forsake-all, genuine, radical, revolutionary, Jesus-Revolution disciples, accomplishing one of the biggest toughest jobs of the entire East!
       19. I WOULD SAY JAPAN IS PROBABLY THE STRONGEST NATIONAL FAMILY IN THE WHOLE EAST & where we have the most national disciples & the fewest Western Family members & Western leadership. There's a dandy good example!--In spite of the fact that they've got strong Oriental family & religious ties. The Family has done better there in winning National disciples than it has in the so-called Christian countries! (Maria: Yes. I'd say that the Family in Japan hasn't been very radical in comparison with Family in some other countries, but considering the heathen background they have come from, they've really made great strides & great progress--& therefore are quite radical considering everything!)
       20. 98% OF THE JAPANESE FAMILY ARE TRFING FAMILY MEMBERS & 60% OF THE JAPANESE FAMILY ARE JAPANESE! Let's take the number of TRFing Homes, that way you get the actual number of genuine Family Homes.--And 98% of the Family in Japan are TRFing Homes!
       21. NOW LET'S LOOK AT THE NON-NATIONAL STATS. In Japan, of the 528 TRFing population, 212 are non-Japanese. That leaves 316 nationals, which means that 60% of the Japanese TRF Family are Nationals! (Maria: That shows you the difference, huh?) That shows you the difference & why in Japan most of their leadership are National Japanese! So there you have it--what's the difference & why!
       22. I'M TELLING YOU, SOME COUNTRIES ARE IN A MESS, REALLY A MESS! (Maria: See, they didn't get disciples in the beginning, whereas we went into Japan & pretty soon got the Catacombers, who generated other Japanese disciples. But in some countries they just never have gotten many strong native disciples.)
       23. LOOK AT THIS! LET'S JUST COUNT TRFERS & TRFING HOMES. Japan has 71 TRFing Homes, & Japan has 528 TRFing Members!--88% of the Japanese Homes are TRFing Homes & 98% of the Family population are TRFers of whom 60% are Japanese!
       24. COULD THAT HAVE ANYTHING TO DO WITH THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN THE SUCCESS OF THE JAPANESE HOMES AS COMPARED WITH THOSE IN SOME OTHER COUNTRIES? Could it be because some others were depending more on mass meetings & Mass-Media Ministries rather than personal witnessing & genuine discipling?--Whereas Japan has had virtually no mass meetings or Mass Media witness, but has twice the percentage of National disciples, more than twice as many TRFing Homes & 57% more TRFing disciples!--Over twice as many TRFing Homes & over half again as many TRFing disciples as some others!
       25. I THINK THAT PROVES THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN THE QUALITY OF MASS MEETINGS & MASS-MEDIA MINISTRIES AS COMPARED TO THE QUALITY OF PERSONAL WITNESSING, soul-winning & discipling. Japan, which has relied almost entirely on personal evangelism with virtually no mass meetings or Mass Media witness, has more than twice as many TRFing Homes & over half again as many TRFing disciples, & twice as many Nationals & National leadership than the others!
       26. AFTER ALMOST AN EQUAL AMOUNT OF TIME, ABOUT TEN YEARS OF FAMILY WORK IN THESE NATIONS, the Japanese TRFing Family is 56% larger! Some other smaller Family nations contain more non-Nationals than the much larger Japanese Family, actually numerically, & nearly twice as many proportionately, even though the others have been labouring for years in predominantly Christian nations, whereas the Japanese Family have been labouring in a predominantly Oriental religion country.
       27. WHAT DOES THIS SAY ABOUT THE MEASURE OF SUCCESS IN MASS-MEDIA WITNESS TO CHRISTIANS WHEN IT COMES TO ACTUALLY GAINING DISCIPLES, as compared to a personal evangelistic witness to a non-Christian country? The percentage of success in actual discipling has been far greater in a non-Christian, Oriental country with virtually no mass meetings or Mass-Media witness, as compared to the low percentage of success in almost entirely Christian countries with a vast amount of mass meetings & Mass-Media Ministry!
       28. DESPITE THE FACT THAT THE COUNTRIES WITH THE LOWEST PERCENTAGE OF BOTH NATIONAL POPULATION DISCIPLESHIP & THE LOWEST NUMBER OF FAMILY HOMES ARE CHRISTIAN, it looks to me, Family, like you'd have a lot better success if you'd go to some non-Christian countries rather than wasting so much time, effort, Mass-Media witness & population on a Christian country where your results have been much poorer amongst Christians with a Mass Media witness, than in a non-Christian country with no Mass-Media witness & only personal evangelism!
       29. HOW'S THAT FOR A COMPARISON BETWEEN THE EFFECTIVENESS OF PERSONAL EVANGELISM AS OPPOSED TO MASS EVANGELISM? Even though the mass evangelism has had the advantage of working in Christian countries, it's had less success than personal evangelism in non-Christian countries! How's that? That should help you decide which form of evangelism is actually the most successful & the most effective & the most efficient & the best!--Mass evangelism?--Or personal evangelism! Which will you choose? God help you to make the right choice & to go to the right country where you can be a more effective witness, soul-winner & winner of real disciples for the Lord!--In Jesus' name, amen!
       30. --ALL THAT FROM MY IRE OVER THEIR TIMIDITY OF PUBLISHING THE HEAVEN POSTER IN SOME COUNTRIES! They'd probably do better with it in Japan! (Maria: They probably will have a better chance in Japan because they have all kinds of nudity there that's open & free. But what about a country where nudity is actually banned from the streets? Would you go so far as to break the law to put it on the street?) Well, you've gotta use wisdom according to local conditions, & especially foreigners should be careful as guests not to offend their hosts. But the Nationals should be able to do it some places. However I never recommend outright breaking the law if you can possibly avoid it.
       31. BUT IN FREER COUNTRIES YOU SHOULD BE ABLE TO DISTRIBUTE THOSE SMALL BLACK-&-WHITE HEAVEN POSTERS EVEN ON THE STREETS! The pix are so small you can hardly see the nudity!--And if you're afraid of that, then dress up the nudes on the original before you dupe'm or print'm!--Ha!--Maybe a few bras or bikinis would suffice! We often have to draw'm onto the nude fotos we receive before publishing'm! So pick your poison!--Or forget it!
       32. BUT I THINK YOU'LL BE LOSING A GREAT WITNESSING TOOL IF YOU DON'T USE THE HEAVEN PIX!--Already they're arousing terrific interest in some fields, especially among the more liberated & radical students! They're hungry for the truth & the answers, & sure as Hell most Churches haven't given'm to'm!--And if you don't give'm anymore than the Churches, what've you got to offer'm?--What's the difference?--Why drop out, forsake-all, join & fight & live & die for no more than the average Church has to offer? They might as well stay put & go down with the Churches!
       33. SO WHAT'VE YOU GOT TO GIVE'M MORE THAN THEY'VE ALREADY GOT? The Lord's got plenty! Have you got the guts to give it to'm?--And win'm to fulltime service for Him & others to free'm from such bondage?--And show'm what Heaven's really like?--We'll see! GHU!--And GBAKY busy making real disciples!--Amen?--In Jesus' name, amen!

Copyright (c) 1998 by The Family