—MODecember 2, 1971LTA No.143A

59. AND SPEAKING OF VIGILS, for God's Sake and your own sake, don't look so stoned and glassy–eyed that you actually do look drugged or hypnotised! Some of you look so unconscious or even were so unconscious that you had to be tapped on the shoulder several times to get you to turn or move!! Please show a little animation, move your position frequently, legs apart, legs together, hands up‚ hands down, head up, head down, all the while looking sweetly sober or even esthetically ethereal with maybe even your eyes hopefully on Heaven‚ somewhat expectantly ecstatic! But not like you're a walking zombie or a mindless robot!—They're apt to run you in for being high, when you and I know you're only high on Jesus, or the Most High!! Leaders, let them move around more‚ march more‚ rotate more‚ turn more, and relax a little more! We found out in the Army you can keel over in the dead faint just from standing too stiffly at attention for too long! Don't do it!

60. INCIDENTALLY, BURLINGTON, WHEN I ASKED THE LORD WHY THE LOCAL COMMUNITY THERE WAS GIVING YOU SUCH FAVOUR from the local paper to the sheriff, I got a picture of your gas bills, or fuel bills! So don't gripe about them! They're buying you the favour and hospitality of the local System! Money talks! Your local investments are purchasing not only needs, but good local public relations. They not only like you‚ but they also like your money! So thank God for it!

61. YOU CERTAINLY HAVE GOTTEN GOOD PUBLICITY, and we also want to commend you on your quick action in contending for the faith, by calling the police in the time to catch your attempted kidnappers! Good work—both there and in some of you other Colonies recently, along this line! You have your rights, and one of them is police protection from those attempting to commit crimes against you, such as kidnapping, assault and battery, threatening with a deadly weapon (which could be anything from a baseball bat to an automobile!), trespassing, breaking and entering, disorderly conduct, disturbing the peace, etc. Don't hesitate to call the police immediately! And when an welcome visitor, such as a wolf in sheep's clothing invades your property and starts breaking down doors, windows, socking disciples, and ripping off your sheep, don't hesitate to defend yourselves until the police come! You have a perfect right to do so! The Church has too long misinterpreted some of these Scriptures about resisting not evil, turning the other cheek, giving them your vest, and agreeing with your adversary! There are also other Scriptures about contending earnestly for the faith, fighting the good fight of faith, and Jesus Himself said, "A strong man armed keepeth his goods in peace!" (Luke 11:21). You'd better be sure you ask the Lord which Scripture to apply in which case, and act according, as you feel led according to your faith!

62. BUT WHATEVER YOU DO, REMEMBER TO PRAY AND ASK THE LORD WHAT HE WANTS YOU TO DO in each case! Consult with a leader if you have time, but if not, act quickly or you may be too late! Always have someone ready to phone the police instantly in the case of such an attack, while you are involved in attempting to stave it off. It's better for you to call the police first, showing your own innocence, openness, and need for help and protection against a threatened assault or assault in progress than to have them calling the police first, afterward, complaining of your behaviour! Always call the police immediately and try to let them handle it, so you won't have to take the law into your own hands! That's what they're here for—our protection! God said so!

63. IF YOU ARE COMPELLED TO RESORT TO SOME SHOW OF FORCE TO PROTECT LIFE OR PROPERTY, do so as moderately and restrained as possible, so that you yourself cannot be charged with assault and battery! It is perfectly legal, however‚ for you to defend life or property by whatever means necessary, and if you are a good shepherd and faithful undershepherd, you will not allow wolves to invade or damage your fold, much less injure or carry off your sheep!

64. USUALLY THE BEST PROTECTION AGAINST AN ATTACK, BESIDES THE LORD‚ IS A STRONG VISIBLE SHOW OF STRENGTH, MUCH MANPOWER, AND MANY WITNESSES! This can help deter even the thought of any action against you when they see themselves outnumbered by a force quite ready to defend the fold and its sheep‚ particularly if you give them an oral warning and tell them loudly and plainly what you are going to do if they step through that door or come over that fence or touch one of your people. Every Colony should always have enough greeters and guards‚ either on duty or quickly available at the sound of a general alarm‚ such as a bell‚ honk, gong‚ or even a loud yell, so as to present a sufficient show of force and forces to discourage any attack! Obvious weakness only invites attack! Never let them through your front door or gate unless you're fairly sure their mission is peaceful, and even then have plenty of people keeping an eye on them, ready to summon help. You can even do this from a polite distance without intruding on the privacy of their interview, but close enough to offer help if needed and asked for. Relatives you can handle if you have to, but never resist an officer, or interfere with the performance of his duty!

65. WELL, PRAISE THE LORD! WE HADN'T INTENDED TO GET INTO A LONG THING ON THIS MATTER OF SECURITY in this Letter, but perhaps since it's such an issue now, maybe we'd better deal with a few more points on the subject while the matter is urgent at the moment. Remember, God's Word says that if you resist the Devil, he will flee from you! That doesn't mean lying down and letting him walk right over you. This was a subject I was going to admonish Seattle on anyhow‚ so we'll include an illustration of a recent dandy-bad example there of poor security:

66. SOME TOUGH EGG KNOCKED AT THEIR DOOR early one morning recently, and apparently the guards must have been half asleep, because the first mistake they made was in opening the door to an unfriendly visitor already known to be unfriendly. You should never open your door or gate at any odd hours of the day or night when you are not normally open to the public before finding out who's there and making sure they're friend, not foe!

67. WE HELPED SOLVE THIS PROBLEM AT TSC and some other Colonies by putting up a warning sign plainly visible, that only friendly visitors were welcome, and then only during our certain open hours, warning them that all others would be counted as trespassers and we would call the sheriff if they attempted to invade the property. Also have several "No Trespassing" signs posted at frequent intervals around your property! State laws usually require them every so many feet, plus a repeated warning to any intruder that he is trespassing and that if he does not leave the property immediately, you will take whatever action is necessary to expel him. Just the threat of such action will usually do the trick unless they're pretty stubborn or crazy! Then you may have to use stronger measures!

68. AT THE RANCH, WE WORKED OUT A SYSTEM OF WARNING STEPS TO BE USED IN THE EVENT OF AN UNFRIENDLY INTRUDER: First was the sign at the gate, or you could put one on the outside of your front door. Next, if they did not leave as warned on the sign, we warned them orally over the PA system. The guards in Seattle should have talked to this man through the door without opening it until they found out who he was. A peephole, door window, or other nearby window covering the door area would be helpful in checking out visitors by visual contact first!

69. NEXT AT THE RANCH, WE FINALLY WARNED THE UNFRIENDLY INTRUDER that if he did not leave immediately, we were calling the police and summoning our entire security force. If on this third and final warning the unknown or unfriendly intruder still refused to leave or came over the gate or kept on coming, the watchman on the wall blew the trumpet sounding a general alarm to warn the people by blowing one long continuous blast of the guard-car horn—you could use your fire bell, a gong, or even some loud shouting, if necessary, and even this might be enough to scare them away, knowing that you were obviously beginning to take actual action against them!

70. UPON THIS PRE-ARRANGED SIGNAL, ALL THE ABLE-BODIED MANPOWER in the camp had already been warned to assemble immediately at the guard post for further instructions, and that if even en route to the guard post they caught sight of the invader‚ they were to tackle him on the spot, not trying to hurt him, but just restrain him until the officer in charge of security arrived who would then have the choice of having our forces merely expel him from the property or persuade him voluntarily to leave, or if the offense is serious enough, to hold him in custody until the police arrive! This is your legal right in case of any intruder or trespasser who has been warned that he is trespassing‚ but refuses to leave! Use it!

71. I DON'T KNOW ALL THE EXACT DETAILS OF HOW IT HAPPENED IN SEATTLE, but for some reason or other, the boys let this bruiser in! Perhaps he threatened to break down the door if they didn't. If so, they should have immediately given the general alarm to call up all their able–bodied manpower and at the same time have someone phoning the police, even while he's breaking down the door. "Breaking and entering" is a serious felony subject to heavy fine and a year or more imprisonment, whereas if you simply open the door and let him walk in or even push his way in, it would be a little hard to prove that you didn't voluntarily invite him in or permit him to come in, in which case he could not be blamed, unless he refused to leave when you thereupon ordered him off the property.

72. BY THE TIME HE GETS THE DOOR BROKEN DOWN, HE IS AS GUILTY AS CAN BE, obviously bent on violence, and your assembling security forces should line up in his way to prevent any further access to any other parts of the building. A group of one or two dozen men or more facing him should be enough to discourage him from going any further, but if not, don't be afraid to tackle him on the spot and hold him by force until the police come. You are shepherds‚ responsible for your flock and you owe it to your sheep to protect them from wolves, even by force if necessary. Jesus used force on the moneychangers—actual physical violence—to throw them out the Temple‚ break up their furniture, and let them know who was Boss! And believe it or not‚ He did this on three separate occasions, according to the Gospels! If Jesus was willing to do this single-handed, to keep his little sheep from being robbed by these moneychangers‚ certainly you can do it en masse to keep your sheep from being actually physically harmed, attacked, beaten, or kidnapped by such wolves! So you have Christ Himself as your Spiritual precedent!

73. IF YOU ALONE ARE THE ONLY ONE PERSONALLY INVOLVED AS THE OBJECT OF SUCH AN ATTACK, you can turn the other cheek if you want to! That's up to you. But when you are a responsible watchman on the wall, you'd better work with your sword in one hand and your trumpet in the other, because it is then your duty to protect others, and you cannot merely turn the other cheek to violent invaders! Because God's Word says that if the watchman fails to warn the people and the city is invaded by the enemy and any blood is shed as a result, the watchman will be held responsible for that bloodshed, and his own blood is to be shed as payment for his failure to warn the people of danger! In other words, he himself is to blame for the bloodshed! Don't let it happen to you! Blow that trumpet‚ ring that bell, or scream your head off to arouse your people!

74. IN THE SEATTLE CASE, THE BOYS LET THE MAN IN, but then, when too late they found that he was violently unfriendly, they refused to unlock the interior doors through which he wanted to pass to get at what he wanted! So this big muscle-bound weightlifting bully who claims to be a Christian threatened that if the boys didn't get out of his way, he was going to walk right on over them—and since apparently there were only two of them and they had not summoned any help—he probably could have! So evidently, they just had to step aside, or were afraid to put up a fight for fear of getting hurt! I've got to admire little Medad the other day in Dallas who screamed for help while some parents were attempting a kidnap, but didn't wait for it or the help might have come too late: he just jumped on this big father's back and pulled him to the ground while the others were coming, and he did it single-handed! Certainly two of you could have done something, but of course, by this time, you should have sounded the alarm to bring more forces.

75. ANYHOW, THIS BIG BULLY IN SEATTLE THEN PROCEEDED TO FORCIBLY AND VIOLENTLY break down two more interior doors to get at what he wanted, and apparently then everybody just let him walk right out scot-free without even calling the police, when they should have caught him red-handed, held him for cops, and charged him with the serious offense of breaking and entering, so as to discourage any further such assaults by others!

76. THE WORST MISTAKE YOU MAKE IN THIS SORT OF THING IS THAT BY LETTING THEM GET AWAY WITH IT scot-free without any resistance, you are encouraging both them and others to repeat this performance on later occasions, and every time you let them get away with it, they and others will be back for more! If the wolves find they can invade the fold easily and make off with the sheep without resistance, they're going to pass the word along to the rest of the wolf pack, and you're apt to get mobbed if they find out you're not going to resist them—just like that bunch you let invade your press conference, Seattle!

77. YOUR BEST PROTECTION, OF COURSE, IS SUCH AN IMMEDIATE MANIFESTATION OF YOUR OWN SUPERIOR FORCES AS TO DISCOURAGE ANY FURTHER INVASION OR ATTACK AND ACTUALLY PREVENT VIOLENCE by such a show of superior force before it occurs, rather than actually inviting attack by your weakness! Again, as Jesus said‚ "A strong man armed keepeth his goods in peace!" An obviously well-protected household, or even a well-armed nation is less likely to be attacked than an obviously insecure one, because wolves are usually notorious attackers of the week, cowards who are afraid to attack the strong! Don't show yourself to be weak! Be strong in the power of His Might!

78. SO, REMEMBER, THE QUICKER YOU SOUND THE ALARM and show your forces and that you're ready to use them if necessary, the less likely you are to have any trouble or suffer actual violence. The cowardly wolves will then be afraid to attack! They themselves like to pounce in numbers on one single little sheep, singled out alone for their attack! Don't let it happen if you can help it—certainly not if you know that's what they're up to!

79. IF THE INVADER STILL MANAGES TO EVADE YOUR MAIN SECURITY FORCE‚ and keeps running on into your property looking for whatever he's after, don't be afraid to give chase and tackle him on the spot. You may have to use a little force to prevent even greater violence. Try not to hurt anyone, but definitely‚ forcibly, restrain them from further trespassing and violence with whatever force it takes to do so. Jesus drove the wolves out of the fold with a whip! You may have to do the same! Don't use guns or weapons or anything which could seriously injure someone‚ if possible. Usually if you have enough strong hands and arms, these will be sufficient to grab him and hold. He may himself get in a few licks at you, but try not sock him back if you can help it! Your main purpose is just to grab and hold him and restrain him from further violence‚ damage, or injury until the police come! Whether you then actually press charge against him or not depends on the seriousness of the case.

80. IF YOUR ATTACKER HAS DONE SERIOUS DAMAGE or caused injury‚ and may have to press criminal charges against him with the police in order to teach him and others a lesson not to try it again‚ giving them fair warning in a well-publicised court case, such as they are doing in Dallas with their million dollar libel suit against the liars who attacked them there! What have you done, Seattle?—About these same parties who attacked you there? Because if you don't do something about it, you are only encouraging both them and others to do you even greater damage! The best way to stop an attack is to counterattack! The best defense is an offense! Don't let them get away with it, or they'll merely round up other wolves and come back for more! Show that you intend to give them as much trouble as possible and this may help to discourage them and others from further attacks!

81. HOWEVER, IF THE OFFENSE IS VERY MINOR, the damage light, and the offender is obviously sorry, ashamed, and asks your forgiveness‚ you are bound as a Christian to forgive him and not press charges against him, but be sure to warn him that you'll drop the charges providing he is sorry, pays for the damage, and promises not to try it again! You may even change him into a friend by your forgiveness!

82. HOWEVER, IF HE IS OBVIOUSLY STILL BELLIGERENT AND UNREPENTANT AND THREATENING to come back for more, you can either press charges against him and have him fined or jailed for the offence to teach him a lesson and discourage him from further attack. Or, if you feel a little temperance in the matter would help to cool the situation, but you still want to let him know you don't intend to let him do it again, you can have the police bring him before a judge and make him post what is known as a Peace Bond, which means that he is not actually fined or imprisoned, but has to put down several hundred dollars deposit with the court and a promise that he will not do it again, but that if he does, he will have to forfeit the peace bond to the court! In other words, it's sort of like a fine in escrow! Peace bonds are usually limited to a certain period of time after which if he's been a good boy, has proven his penitence and hasn't caused any further disturbance, he can get his penance back. This is an sort of in between course to take in mild cases! But whatever you do, don't let them get away with it completely without paying for it somehow, unless they're really sorry, ask you to forgive them, and promise they won't do it anymore! Otherwise, you'll only encourage them to come back and try it again, maybe with seven other devils next time, and the latter estate of your house is going to be worse than in the beginning!

83. REMEMBER, FORCE, OR AT LEAST A SHOW OF FORCE, OR THE THREAT OF ITS POSSIBLE USE by your forces on behalf of your Colony or one of its sheep is the only kind of language some wolves understand. And you may have to use it or at least threaten to use it if the wolves come any closer or go any further! So it's to your advantage to show it and threaten to use it before the damage is done!—Before they start jumping over your fence or battering down your door! The quicker you show the force you can use and threaten to use it, the less likely they are to start anything!

84. WHY DOES THE "STRONG MAN ARMED KEEP HIS GOODS IN PEACE"?—BECAUSE HIS ENEMIES SEE AND KNOW he is armed and prepared to defend himself, so they don't even try to attack him!—So he doesn't even have to fight! A stitch in time saves nine! Better a fence at the top of the cliff than a hospital at the bottom! An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure! A strong peaceful show of force and the gentle hint that you'll use it if the enemy tries anything, trespasses any further, or refuses to get off the property or climbs over the fence or breaks down the door, may be all you will have to do, and may be the best thing you can do to keep the peace, prevent invasion, and keep any violence from even starting before it happens!

85. BUT SLEEPY GUARDS or poorly prepared or instructed guards who don't leap to quick action or warning in order to prevent trouble, will only invite trouble by your obvious stupidity or weakness! We are in a war, Brethren!—And it is not altogether spiritual! We don't like violence and we don't believe in violence!—But our enemies have made it violent, so you may have to use the threat of violent defense to prevent their violent attacks!

86. JESUS SAID THAT THE GOOD SHEPHERD IS WILLING TO LAY DOWN HIS LIFE FOR HIS SHEEP!—BUT THE HIRELING FLEETH WHEN HE SEES THE WOLF COMING! In other words, the false shepherd, the one who does not really love the sheep, who is himself only in the fold for what he himself can get out of it, makes no effort to defend the little lambs‚ and even runs when he sees trouble coming! Whereas the good shepherd, the true shepherds who truly love the sheep, are willing to lay down their lives to defend them if necessary! Brethren, where is your love? Where is your fight? This is war! The Enemy has made it so, so you must prepare to fight if necessary to defend your sheep! Jesus said so. He didn't say to lie down and do nothing when attacked! What He clearly indicated was that good shepherds must even be willing to give their lives in defense of their sheep—or you're no shepherd!

87. I HAVE SUGGESTED to some of your leaders that one of the things you might do to prevent trouble before it happens in some of these hot spots where you might be expecting it because of threats‚ know 10:36ers, adverse publicity‚ etc., is either to request police protection because of proven threats by phone, letter‚ or in person‚ in which case the police themselves may be persuaded to post a uniformed armed officer at your gate or door themselves. They are obligated to do so by law in cases of obvious danger‚ since they owe their existence to their duty to protect you, even if it necessitates an armed guard!

88. WE HAVE DONE THIS IN SOME CASES‚ and it has sometimes succeeded! When a Fascist gang in Miami threatened to kill my Mother and finally threw a large boulder at her, with which they intended to kill her and almost did if it had not been for a miracle of God, we requested police protection!—And they gave it! And for a while, armed guards patrolled our grounds 24 hours a day! Even the FBI was called into the case because of this gang of thugs' international connections with the Fascistic Black-hand Mafia of Italy! They had already "executed" several people in the vicinity and they were after us because the local gang leader's sixteen-years-old gun' moll girlfriend was a friend of our family and had been committed to us by the court into our custody for her probation, and he was threatening to get her back and to kill anyone who stood in his way!

89. ONE NIGHT WHILE HE WAS CUTTING THE SCREEN ON HER BEDROOM WINDOW IN OUR HOUSE, she awoke and her screams aroused the whole household of about a dozen people and frightened him away! Another night‚ when he and one of his henchmen ran their motorcycle alongside our car and one of them started to jump on the running board, our housekeeper who was following us in her car gunned her vehicle into the rear of the motorcycle and knocked them both into the street, but they got away!

90. FINALLY, BECAUSE THIS GANG HAD ALREADY COMMITTED SO MANY MURDERS and were threatening so many lives and were so dangerous, themselves declaring they would never be caught alive, that the police had to issue the order to shoot to kill! Three of them were mowed down in one gun battle, and the leader Tom, was shot as he wounded a policeman! As the famous conscientious objector and pacifist, Alvin York, said during World War I, when he hand grenaded several German machinegun nests which were mowing down hundreds of his American buddies: "I finally decided I had to take a few lives in order to save hundreds!" Whereupon he walked back to his own lines thereafter, herding over 800 Germans that he had captured single-handed! He had worked and shot so fast that in the heavy fog they thought they were being attacked by an entire battalion! This was the story of the world famous "Sergeant York" which was made into a movie, which I hope you get to see some day, because he was a fine Christian who loved the Lord whom I met personally when he gave his testimony at our church when I was a boy!

91. WE CERTAINLY DON'T WANT YOU TO KILL ANYONE OR EVEN HURT ANYONE if you can help it! But Brethren, it is your Scriptural duty to protect your sheep, or at least try to, even if it costs you your life! If you don't, it may cost your sheep's life or liberty, in which case, the Lord will hold you responsible for not defending them! Again I say that we didn't want it this way, but the Enemy have forced us into a hot war in which they are using violence against us, so you're going to have to do your best to try to prevent then from using such violence by showing yourselves strong, able, and ready to defend yourselves with force if you have to! The Lord, of course, is your best defense—so stay close to Him and follow His orders! But He has already ordered you to protect your sheep, so you are obligated to do so as a good shepherd against the wolves! As the famous martyr Wurmbrand said when asked by his shepherds of his flocks behind Communist lines if they should ever have to resort to force to defend those flocks: "If I am a good shepherd as Jesus said, and I see Mr. Wolf attacking Sister Sheep, I'm going to smite him the best I can to save her!" I hope you don't have to, but you might be called upon to do so by the Lord some time!

92. I MYSELF WAS A CONSCIENTIOUS OBJECTOR in World War II because I did not believe in killing my fellowman, much less sending Japanese to Hell who had never heard the Gospel and whom I didn't even know or have anything against and whom our own nation had deliberately provoked into war against us for economic reason to destroy the Japanese Empire as a serious competitor to our world trade and to help pull our country out of the Great Depression with a war boom!

93. HOWEVER, WHILE IN THE ARMY I DISCOVERED THAT ONE OF THE GREATEST PROBLEMS in witnessing to soldiers was the age-old question: "How can I become a Christian if I'm going to have to go to war and kill?" So when I landed in the Army hospital for several weeks, I made this question a subject of intensive Bible study, finally coming to the same conclusion as Sergeant York: that sometimes you have to use force to prevent even greater violence. God does!—And if the police out there in the streets right now did not bear weapons, your life in here would not be safe for a moment! Rom.13!

94. IF IT WERE NOT FOR THE LAWS AND THE PROTECTION OF THE POLICE, some of these church vipers or parental wolves would have gotten some of you long ago! Thank God for the laws and the police which are usually on the right side! Sometimes they make mistakes because they're human, and sometimes they get the wrong people‚ including us‚ instead of those who are really to blame! But usually they're on our side and have protected us from our enemies! So don't hesitate to call them when you have to!

95. SINCE ACTUAL POLICE PROTECTION or the posting of one of their uniformed officers at your gate or door costs the city or country money and takes that officer away from other duties‚ instead of asking for police protection of an armed guard in cases of dangerous threats for your security, it would probably be better for you to request of your local law enforcement agency the deputising of one or two or more of your own men, particularly those of previous police experience who knows the rules, like Brother Cornelius and others.

96. HE, OR THESE‚ COULD THEN BE UNIFORMED AND POSTED AT YOUR GATE or door as an obvious warning to your enemies that he is there officially to keep the peace, and this would definitely help to thwart any attempts on the part of our enemies of illegal violence against us! You see, you don't always have to use force to keep the peace! All you have to do is to show your enemies that you have it there to use, if you have to, so they'd better watch out and not try anything!

97. I have even thought that perhaps if our own guards wore sackcloth and carries good sturdy staves which the enemies could fear that you might use against them in case of emergency, this too, might help to prevent any such emergencies or discourage the enemy from trying it! However‚ such sackclothed guards could not stand there like immobile zombies‚ but would have to shown an obvious potential of action and force if need be by striding back and forth with their staves just inside your gate‚ as guards so often do. Or maybe you could seat or stand them in your greeting room when threatening visitors are present!

98. I REMEMBER ONCE WHEN THE LORD FIRST TOLD US TO WEAR THE SACKCLOTH ROBES rings, rods, and yokes, some of the kids even went witnessing that way on McGill University campus in Montreal‚ and when one heckler asked one of the boys what his rod was for, he picked it up and jabbed it in the heckler's direction, saying, "To drive off the Devil!" Whereupon his harrasser turned tail and ran, afraid that he might actually use it! And you can believe it or not, I believe the presence of those rods God has used to discourage any action against us at some of our demonstrations. God knew what He was doing when He told us to carry them, although we've never yet had to use them, thanks to His protection and possibly even the obvious presence of those rods in our hands!

99. SO DON'T UNDERESTIMATE THE POWER OF OBVIOUSLY AVAILABLE FORCE TO ACTUALLY DISCOURAGE AND EVEN PREVENT VIOLENCE! Use it!—But don't abuse it! But there's no excuse for your just letting these people walk all over you! If they threaten you, call your troops and show them you're prepared to defend yourselves, and do so if have to. If something's not worth dying for, it's not worth living for! If you're not man enough to fight for something if you have to, it shows you don't really believe in it! I they're only slapping you, taking your coat, or asking you to walk a mile, you can let them do it if you want to! That won't hurt you much! But if they're breaking and entering and violently attacking your sheep, it's time to defend them! Amen?

100. WHAT DO YOU THINK NEHEMIAH'S MEN WERE DOING ON THE WALL, working with a trowel in one hand and a weapon in the other, with watchmen standing nearby ready to blow trumpets to warn the people in the case of an attack by the enemy! Do you think they were playing some kind of a game? No! They were not attacking the Enemy or initiating the violence, but they were showing the enemy that they were quite obviously prepared to withstand any attack and to fight to defend their city in case the enemy got any such an idea. Therefore, their enemies decided to abandon such ideas!

101. WHEN I WAS ONLY SIX YEARS OLD, in the first grade in Harlan Kentucky, one of the toughest towns in the State where they were always fussin', feudin' and fightin' and shot a sheriff nearly every week, there was this great big bully who was always teasin' my girl! Finally, I told him to cut it out or I was going to let him have it! He just laughed and took a poke at me, and I lit into him! What I lacked in brawn, I made up for in righteous indignation, and even though I got the worst of the fight, I won the girl! I'll never forget when I was a school teacher and little Ho was in first grade and this big Mexican accidentally knocked him flat, he came up fightin'! Ho was so mad that he was really flailing away at my high school student who could only stand there and laugh and try to hold him off at arm's length, admiring his guts! I guess our family were just born fighters—always fighting the good fight of faith, contending for the faith, resisting the Devil, and showing ourselves strong to keep the peace, fighting for some righteous cause! If we hadn't, there would never have been a Revolution! What some of you guys need is guts! Die for 'em!

102. GOD'S NOT ONLY TESTING OUR SHEEP IN ALL OF THIS, BUT HE'S ALSO TESTING YOU SHEPHERDS TO SEE IF YOU'RE WILLING TO LAY DOWN YOUR LIVES FOR THE SHEEP! IF NOT, YOU ARE NO SHEPHERD—just a hireling who's in it for what he can get out of it—not to die for his sheep! Even some of our own women have proven they've got more guts than some of you have! You've been overprotected when you shouldn't be, and underprotective when you should have been more protective! Usually all it takes to protect the sheep from the wolves is just the presence of the shepherd standing there with his rod and ready to use it on them if he has to, so the wolves turn tail and hide! In some of these cases lately, it's the shepherds who have been hiding instead‚ leaving the sheep to the wolves! That's pretty sure proof you're an hireling! Which are you?

103. THERE WERE TIMES WHEN JESUS AND HIS DISCIPLES DID HIDE OUT TO AVOID UNNECESSARY TROUBLE but there were times that they had to stand up and protect the sheep, especially from the verbal attacks of the enemies of the truth. They usually tried to avoid contact with the religious Pharisees, but when the vipers kept picking on them to the point that it was confusing the sheep‚ Jesus would sock it to them so hard, refuting their lies‚ so that he made them so mad that they wanted to kill Him! On these occasions He didn't try to hide—He was contending earnestly for the faith and the sheep! What do you do?

104. WHEN THE UNGODLY ENEMY LIBEL AND SLANDER YOU ON THE NEWS MEDIA, DON'T TAKE IT LYING DOWN! IT'S ANOTHER OPPORTUNITY FOR YOU TO PROCLAIM THE TRUTH! The Lord has let the Devil challenge you with a controversy so that it will publicise your answer of truth! But if you don't say anything—you don't reply, you don't stand up and fight, people will think you are guilty‚ as silence usually breathes consent!

105. BUT EVEN THE WORLD WILL ADMIRE YOU IF YOU STAND UP AND FIGHT FOR YOUR CONVICTIONS, even though they don't agree with you. Even when we fought Evolution in Miami's schools, we had a University of Miami professor who was an evolutionist fighting on our side, defending our right to free speech and freedom of religion and freedom of the press!

106. WHEN THEY ATTACK YOU IN THE PRESS‚ CALL YOUR OWN PRESS CONFERENCE AND ANSWER THEM! But for God's Sake, don't invite them! They've had their turn! Now it's yours! When they attack you on TV‚ insist that the TV cameramen come down and film the truth! News media ethics prohibits them from reporting only one side of a story! Insist on your side's right to be heard! But when the news media comes around looking for your answer and can't even find you‚ then you're letting the Devil have the field to himself, like in San Diego recently!

107. THERE'S A TIME TO HIDE, BUT THERE'S ALSO A TIME TO STAND UP FOR THE FAITH and be counted in order to answer the lies of the Devil, even if it costs you your life, like it did Jesus, John‚ Stephen, Paul, and all the other martyrs. Some of you guys seem to think that you're having persecution just because of a few verbal attacks, so you use this as an excuse to run and hide! You don't even know what persecution is yet! Ye have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin! Consider Him that endured such contradiction of sinners against Himself, lest ye be wearied and faint in your minds. Jesus also suffered without the gate! Let us go forth therefore unto Him without the camp, bearing His reproach! See Hebrews 12:3-4; 13:12-13!

108. SOME OF YOU ARE EVEN ASHAMED TO BE CALLED THE "CHILDREN OF GOD" ANYMORE, afraid they'll know what you stand for and give you some persecution! Do you think the early Christians were ashamed to be called Christians, or do you think they would have denied being Christian just because they were getting a lot of bad publicity and persecution? Why, of course not! It would have been like being ashamed of and denying Christ or the things they stood for!

109. WHY THEN SHOULD YOU BE ASHAMED OR DENY THAT YOU'RE A CHILD OF GOD? Even the world gives you more credit than that!—One of the news articles even said you'd never deny who you were. Even the communist party tells its members to stay above ground and fight for their rights and their beliefs in order to publicise them as long as it's possible, until their enemies make it utterly impossible for them to do so and drive them underground!

110. A FEW VERBAL ATTACKS ARE NOTHING TO REAL PERSECUTION! Wait till they close down your place, beat you up, shoot a shotgun blast through your window or raid you and round you all up in jail, or threaten your lives so that they make it virtually impossible for you to carry on! That's persecution! Then you've got an excuse for flight, or if they turn the people against you so that you can't even provision anymore! Then you've got reason to run! But a few verbal attacks in the newspaper or on TV are no excuse! Instead, God is giving you an excuse to demand the right for the truth to be heard, to tell your side of the story! Insist on it!—Or you can sue the news media! Or sue those that are lying about you! Show they can't prove their lies in court! Pray for a radical lawyer! Sock it to 'em! Show you've got guts and can fight for the Faith!

PART III---"WHAT'S IN A NAME?"

111. BUT HIDING UNDER SOME OTHER NAME IS NOT GOING TO DO IT AND FAILING TO SPEAK UP IN ANSWER TO THEIR CHARGES IS NOT STANDING UP FOR JESUS! I don't blame you much for wanting to conceal your name when you're out trying to get provisions in a town where you've had a lot of bad publicity that has turned people in general against you! But when I was praying about this name-changing business because so many have asked if they should, just because of a little bad local publicity, I got the picture of Peter denying Christ when only a little girl poked her finger at him, saying, "you're one of them!" But even his denial didn't do any good because she said, "Your speech betrayeth you!" You're not going to fool anybody for long‚ and when they find out they'll just point the finger at you for being a coward, ashamed of your name and your beliefs!

112. REMEMBER WE'VE GOTTEN A LOT MORE GOOD PUBLICITY THAN BAD and our good publicity is nationwide and worldwide and has been on a much vaster scale than these ridiculous little local attacks! But just because a few little local news media have viciously attacked us with nothing but a verbal barrage‚ you want to change your name and run, when you ought to be standing up and fighting them on their own grounds in the same news media with the truth!

113. THIS IS EXACTLY WHAT WE HAVE DONE IN OUR RECENT COUNTERATTACK AGAINST THE ENEMY by telling you all to go home and prove their lives were false! And the publicity this move has received is a direct attack on the Enemy and his lies, and now he has been put on the defensive with both this action and our legal action against him, so he'll have to try to prove his lies or suffer a very embarrassing and costly defeat!—Which will publicise and prove our truth even more! By your going home, you've proven the Parent's Committee to be liars and defeated them and their lies! They have no leg left to stand on! No matter how many backsliders they hire to lie about us in court‚ for every lying backsliders there'll be a hundred of you to prove it's not true! Amen?

114. HOWEVER, IF YOU'VE CHANGED YOUR NAME AND AREN'T EVEN CALLED "THE CHILDREN OF GOD," what was the point in sending your people home? You're not proving a thing if you're not willing to confess that you're one of us! God's Children‚ in Hebrews 12‚ were not ashamed to confess that they were strangers and Pilgrims on the earth, wherefore God was not ashamed to be called their God! Could He at the moment be ashamed of some of us for our being ashamed to be called the Children of God? Do you think the Jews under Pharaoh could have hidden their true identity just by changing their name and thereby avoided persecution? No! God even told them to paint their doors red with blood to identify themselves as the Children of God so they would not suffer the wrath of God! Who are you afraid of most?—God or man?!

115. GOD WON'T LET THEM STOP TALKING ABOUT US, EVEN IN CONTROVERSY! Every time our name is mentioned, they know what we stand for and they can't get away from it! We are the subject of arguments‚ debates, lectures, controversies, articles, sermons, TV shows, radio talk shows, and targets for the attacks of our enemies the world around! But every time they attack us and publicise us, they are proclaiming our message again‚ and God has again caused even the wrath of man to praise Him! Hallelujah! So what's in a name?—Plenty!—If you're a Child of God!

116. I CAN UNDERSTAND WHY A FEW OF YOU LITTLE SELAH COLONIES MIGHT WANT TO HIDE OUT under some other name in order to survive where you're not known anyway and there's no controversy and you've nothing to contend for! But where a battle is already raging and your identity is already revealed and virtually impossible to conceal no matter what you try to call yourselves, you might as well stand up and be counted and contend earnestly for your faith, fighting the good fight!

117. I THINK SOME OF YOU HAVE TRIED TO HIDE OR RUN AWAY TOO SOON just for fear the battle would get too hot, when you should have waited and fought it out until they made it virtually‚ physically impossible for you to continue, such as literally closing down your place, forbidding you to operate, or the police actually telling you to get out of town, or the enemy threatening your life! Then's the time to run from that kind of persecution, as Jesus said! Don't rescue yourselves prematurely! You may not have finished your mission! Fight back!

118. EVERY REGION THAT HAS RECEIVED A PERSONAL ATTACK OF LIBEL and slander in the news media by those lying parents should have immediately socked them back with a civil suit requiring them to prove it, or pay damages! Every news medium which comes out with an attack against us should be challenged to print our side of the story too or you're going to take them to court for their lies. Every Colony that's broken into should have the intruder arrested! Any visitor who attacks one of our Children physically should be charged with assault and battery! Anyone who damages our property should be made to pay for it! And any member who is forcibly kidnapped against his will by his own relatives ought to threaten them with a serious criminal charge of kidnapping if they don't let him go, and a mental warrant should be fought in court! It's time to resist the Enemy!

119. MORE ON NAME-CHANGING: We've been praying a great deal lately about this name-changing, it's advantages and disadvantages and possible effects! And my answers from the Lord have not been good. It's as though the Lord is displeased with us, ashamed of us for being ashamed of His Name, the Name that He gave us—the Children of God. We didn't choose that name for ourselves: the Lord chose it! We didn't call ourselves the Children of God—others called us that, like "the disciple were first called Christians at Antioch." Like the Early Church, God let others name us a name describing our characteristic and what we're like—the Children of God!

120. IN THE EARLY DAYS OF OUR FIRST LITTLE TEAM, we debated a great deal about what to call ourselves because people always want to call you something, and if you don't call yourself something, they will! They'll think of a name for you and it might not be too good. So when the Lord let the news media nickname us "The Children of God" and they just kept calling us that, we figured it must be the Lord, and it has stuck, Praise the Lord. I believe it was God!

121. AND I THINK IT'S A GOOD NAME, DESCRIBE EXACTLY WHAT WE ARE—nothing but children who belong to God! What a good name for a youth movement—"Children of God," like the Children's Crusade! It's also very Biblical and Scriptural‚ and His Children were often called that throughout the Bible, not just in the New Testament, but also the Old Testament! … Our Jewish flavour, from our names to our dances and our kibbutzim to our tribes have all given us a distinctly Jewish flavour…!

122. SO I BELIEVE GOD USED GREAT WISDOM IN CHOOSING THAT NAME FOR US, AND I THANK GOD WE WERE WISE ENOUGH TO ACCEPT IT! Oddly enough, God has apparently been reserving it for us all these years! I've never heard of any other organised religious group or movement called that, have you?—Nothing but the true Children of God throughout the Bible! I've herd just about every kind of a church name you could think of‚ and whole denominations have been born over arguing about their name, like the Christian Church, Disciples of Christ, and the Church of Christ, etc. You didn't belong to the right church unless it had the right name! I never heard of "Jesus' Church‚" but the Jesus People came pretty close to that one, and I think they were pretty smart in picking it—but it's rather limiting and would be offensive to some, especially Jews and other religions‚ so apparently the Lord didn't want us to be handicapped with it. After all‚ most people consider themselves Children of God—even the Children of the Devil, so it's a pretty good all 'round name!—It doesn't leave anybody out! You can all be the Children of God and give them the heavy stuff later.

123. ANYHOW, THAT'S WHAT THE LORD CALLED US! It's good and Scriptural, and now we're stuck with it and famous for it—so why change it just because a few people don't like us and are trying to smear it! Most people have heard the good things about us‚ whereas very few people have heard their lies. There are a lot of advantages in keeping the name: it's well-known, and well-known what it stands for! Frankly, I think it's not a name to be ashamed of‚ no matter what lies our enemies tell about us! Changing the name is not going to refute these lies! In changing your name you act more like you're guilty and therefore ashamed of the name!

124. I THINK IT'D BE FAR BETTER FOR YOU TO BE THANKFUL FOR THE NAME AND FOR WHAT IT STANDS AND FOR WHOM IT STANDS, and not at all ashamed of it, and your own courage, fearlessness, faith, faithfulness, and loyalty to the name and who and what it stands for will do more to refute these lies and vindicate the name and its bearers than freaking out because of some scarehead with scare statements and a few little lies of the Devil, and crawling into some hole to hide‚ and even trying to change your name! That makes me ashamed of you, because it sounds like you're ashamed of us! And the enemy will think you're ashamed of us too, and even ashamed of yourselves!

125. I HAVE IDEA THE LORD'S A LITTLE ASHAMED OF YOU, IF YOU ARE ASHAMED OF THE NAME He's given you! No wonder Jesus had so much to say about not being ashamed of Him or His Name! He even said that if you were ashamed of Him and His Name before this wicked and adulterous generation, He'd be ashamed of you before the Father in Heaven. His Name stood for something, and neither is there Salvation in any other Name! We're to pray in His Name, heal in His Name, cast out Devils in His Name, baptise in His Name, preach His Name! There's Power in His Name! Why? Because of Who He is and what He stands for, no matter how many people hate Him and curse His Name!

126. SO WHAT'S IN A NAME?—EVERYTHING! It should describe you, tell who you are, what you are, indicate your characteristics, and even what you stand for! Jesus even made loyalty to His Name a requirement of discipleship and He insisted that it be proclaimed, and literally millions have died for His Name and refusing to deny His Name, or even to deny their own name—that they were Christians! Why didn't they just change names? Couldn't they just have said: "It doesn't really matter what we call Jesus, or what we ourselves are called, just as long as we know who He is and who we love and worship and who we are! We can call Him or ourselves anything we want‚ and we'll still know who we're talking about, so that if our attackers or persecutors ask us if we believe in Jesus‚ we can say, No‚ we believe in Krishna! That'll be our new name for Jesus! We'll know who we're talking about! We'll still know we're really talking about Jesus but it'll throw our enemies off the track‚ and we'll call ourselves Hare Krishna, so that, though we'll know we're still Christians‚ our enemies won't know it! So all hail to Krishna by all us Hare Krishnas! Don't be alarmed!—We're still Christians talking about Jesus, but we don't want the world to know it!"

127. WHY DIDN'T ALL THE CHRISTIAN MARTYRS DO THIS INSTEAD OF HAVING TO DIE FOR THE MERE NAME OF JESUS‚ instead of confessing they were Christians? Why didn't they just change their names and escape? Why didn't they just say, I'll only deny with my mouth, but I'll just be lying, 'cause I'll still believe on Him in my heart? Why didn't they do this? Why did they suffer and let themselves be tortured and killed for nothing but a name? What's in a name?

128. WE'LL I'LL TELL YOU WHAT'S IN A NAME! The name "church" no longer means anything but a building! That's what it stands for today! The name "Christians" no longer means anything either! It usually means just some kind of hypocritical self–righteous church person who goes to that building on Sunday! Even the name "Jesus People" doesn't mean much anymore because of the way they've been acting lately, which certainly isn't like Jesus! It doesn't even mean much to the world, because even the world recognises what a cheap imitation and shallow fadists the Jesus People are!

129. BUT LET ME TELL YOU SOMETHING, BROTHER: THE NAME CHILDREN OF GOD MEANS SOMETHING TODAY THE WORLD OVER! The world has heard about us! They know about us, both the good and the bad—who we are and what we stand for, and they know we're not to be confused with the Jesus People, the church compromisers, the sickening little members of the System! The world knows that the Children of God are that radical, fanatical‚ hard-line, uncompromising, all-the-way, totally committed, utterly dedicated, militant, fearless, explosive, one hundred percenters, that some people swear by and others crucify! There's no mistaking who we are!

130. AND IF YOU THINK BY COMPROMISING IN CHANGING YOUR NAME OUTWARDLY IT'S NOT GOING TO CAUSE A CHANGE INWARDLY, YOU ARE MISTAKEN! I can already smell the stink of compromise in some of you who have become ashamed of the name and changed yours for fear of persecution, trying to change your name outwardly and still call yourselves Children of God inwardly! You can't do it anymore than the Early Christians could! If you really are a Child of God, but you change your outward name, sooner or later you're going to have to deny that you're a Child of God and a member of the Children of God, and you'll be lying! And one lie leads to another! Pretty soon, just like Judas, you're going to have to prove that you're not one of us by denouncing us to individuals and publicly! One lie leads to another, as my Grandmother used to say: "One lie can never stand alone! It always has to have several others to prop it up.

"Oh what a tangled web we weave,

When first we practice to deceive!"

How true!

131. FIRST YOU'LL DENY THE NAME, THEN YOU'LL DENY YOU'RE ONE OF US, THEN YOU'LL DENOUNCE US TO PROVE IT, THEN YOU'LL TRY TO PROVE IT BY YOUR SPEECH AND ACTIONS that you're not a Child of God—and you will become such a living lie that either you really will no longer be one of us, or people will see right through your denial, like the little girl did Peter's, and scornfully ridicule you for your cowardice and your lying, saying, "Your speech betrayeth you!"—And then you will have brought even greater shame upon the name! You will even be a testimony against us, proving only to the world that you are ashamed of the name‚ ashamed of us, ashamed of what we stand for, and even ashamed of yourself, and a coward on top of it, having renounced your name, us, what we stand for, and even your own stinking self and your own convictions!—All to escape a little persecution‚ a little harrassment, and a few lying accusations—just like Judas!

132. I AND THE LORD WOULD RATHER SEE YOU DIE FIRST! There are some things worse than death, amongst them cowardice‚ betrayal‚ being a traitor‚ being a Judas, being a lying hypocrite‚ being a disgrace, being a shameful bad example, a dissembler, and bringing shame and reproach on His Name‚ our name, and yourself! I'd really rather see you die first than to wind up a shameful dandy bad example! I'd rather see you die before you become a traitor! I'd rather see you die for your convictions, the things you believe in, the people you believe in, the Name you believe in, and the God you believe in than to become such a coward and a hypocrite! I'd rather see you die for something than live for nothing! I'd rather see you a dead hero than a live coward! May God have mercy on you! I am ashamed of you‚ and so is the Lord! "And some to everlasting shame and contempt!"

133. AGAIN, WE GIVE YOU AND INCH AND YOU TAKE A MILE! We tell you can call your local place, organisation, corporation, church, or bank account, anything you want to, to satisfy the draft or please the System! But you carry it so far as to even deny that you're the Children of God at all! Apparently one compromise leads to another and eventually complete denial, renunciation, and denouncement! At the rate you're going, pretty soon, you really won't be one of us!

134. WHERE'S THAT SPIRIT YOU ONCE HAD OF BEING WILLING TO SUFFER ANYTHING FOR HIS NAME'S SAKE? Where's that desire you once had for martyrdom for His Cause? Where's that loyalty and camaraderie you once had, which would have made you willing to lay down your life for your brethren? Where's that faithfulness you once had which claimed you never would deny the Faith or the Truth or your brethren! Have you lost the will to do or die?

135. YOU'RE AS BAD AS SOME FOLKS IN THE NORTHEAST WHO ARE SPREADING THE LIE THAT I AND MY FAMILY HAVE BACKSLIDDEN, GONE BACK ON THE LORD‚ LEFT THE WORK‚ AND ARE NO LONGER EVEN SERVING GOD in a foolish attempt to try to hide the Truth from the King they're working with who doesn't like us! What a testimony! How ridiculous! What a lie! What a besmirchment of our character, our Faith‚ example, and conversation! Frankly‚ I think that King is too smart and knows us too well to believe it, and knows you're lying, but he's letting you trap yourself in your lies so you'll be all the more bound to him! The Devil is going to make you pay for it‚ and the payment has already begun up there!

136. YOU'RE ALL BECOMING LIARS! Where did you get the idea you could keep on lying like this and get away with it? What does God's Word have to say about liars? How far are you going to go to lie to save your neck, to deceive people! Be sure your sins will find you out! Whatsoever a man soweth that shall be also reap! Lie to him and he'll lie to you, and neither of you will believe each other, and pretty soon you'll be wondering what the Truth is! And if he actually believes that ridiculous lie‚ think how far he may spread it, and what a terrible testimony that would be, and the little ones it may cause to stumble‚ for which you will be to blame! It would be better for you to have had a millstone hung around your neck and be dropped into the sea!

137. AND WHY DO YOU FOLKS LIE WHEN IT'S NOT EVEN NECESSARY? The truth would have served your purpose much better: "He's retired, and writing a book, hasn't been with us for a year! We don't even know where he is!" This is every word the Truth! You just don't have to tell him the whole Truth! I am retired from my former active personal leadership and teaching in person, and we're not only writing one book, but several! You're reading one of them! And I haven't been with you in person for a year! You haven't even seen me for a year and you don't even know where I am! That's the Truth! Why don't you use it? Why do you tell all those dirty lies about me that you didn't even have to tell? He would have believed the Truth! But God's not going to let him believe those lies! It would be too damaging to our life and testimony and even to his own faith in us, even if he doesn't like us! I'll tell you right now, if he's a man of God at all, he'll know you're lying, but he's smart enough to let you do it in order to play his little game and let you play yourself right into his hands! Wait and see! God have mercy on you!

138. WHEN GENERAL WILLIAM BOOTH WAS ON TRIAL FOR HERESY BY THE METHODIST CHURCH and his excommunication hung on his just shading the Truth a little on one little answer or he'd be out of the Methodist Church, out of his church, out of job, and cut completely off from former associations‚ not even knowing where to go, he hesitated only a moment before giving that answer! As he hesitated, his tiny little spitfire of a wife, Catherine, leaped to her feet clear up in the balcony, leaned far over the rail, and pointing her finger at him on the platform, screamed at the top of her voice, "William!—Don't you shilly shally!"—And the Salvation Army was born!

139. YOU GUYS WHO ARE TELLING AND LIVING THESE LIES ARE SHILLY-SHALLYING, and pretty soon you're going to get so wishy-washy you won't even know what the Truth is, or who you are, or what you stand for! For God's Sake, don't wind up a perpetual liar! You don't have to tell everything you know, and for the sake of security, you don't always have to tell the whole Truth, and sometimes, you may even have to say one thing that is true, but give someone the impression you mean something else in order to protect yourself and others from unnecessary trouble! But for God's sake and His Work's Sake, and your own sake, don't come right out with bold-faced lies that aren't even necessary and that are even going to require more lying to prop it up! God forbid!

140. ASK GOD FOR MORE WISDOM! Ask God for the right answers! Ask God to lead you what to say and to protect you and the Truth! The Lord can give you some real smart answers, like the ones He Himself used and gave His disciples, which still didn't tell His enemies what they wanted to know and still didn't let Him land in their trap! Ask the Lord what to say! He's a lot smarter than you are, and He certainly won't lead you tell those stupid, unnecessary and damaging lies! May God help us! "As deceivers, yet True!"—Not liars! There's a difference!

141. HERE WE ARE IN A MAJOR DRIVE TO DISPROVE THE LIES OF THE DEVIL ABOUT US, AND SOME OF YOU ARE WINDING UP AS MAJOR LIARS YOURSELVES, just for a little gain, or a little relief from the Devil's own lies! Maybe that's why they're lying about us! You're reaping what you've sowed! May God forgive you, and may you repent and try to undo the damage you've done! "With what measure ye mete it out, it shall be meted unto you, pressed down, shaken together, and running over!" This can be bad, as well as good! If you sow evil, you'll reap evil, but sow good and truth, and you'll reap the same! I'm beginning to understand now what's the matter with some of you and why God is letting some of these things happen to us! Some of you are getting just like the church people and guilty of the same things—like Israel—and you're going to reap the same things if you don't repent! May the Lord have mercy on you and us! You'd better do a 2Chron.7:14!

142. WHEN GOD CHANGES YOUR NAME, as He did oftentimes in the Bible in order to denote a change in you, like you change your own names when you join, this is a different story! This is trying to show something! This is trying to prove something—that you are different, and that God has changed you! But you guys who are trying to change your name from the Children of God to something else‚ what are you trying to prove? What are you trying to show us? Maybe you have changed! Maybe you're no longer what you used to be! Maybe you are different! If so‚ let's hope it's for the better, and not for the worse‚ like some people in the Bible whose names God changed to something bad because of the bad change in them! I hope that's not true of you!

143. WHY DIDN'T THE ISRAELITES CHANGE THEIR NAME WHEN THINGS GOT ROUGH UNDER PHARAOH? Would that have fooled the Egyptians?—Not a bit! A rose by another name smells just as sweet, and a skunk by any other name stinks just as bad! The Israelites could no more hide themselves under another name than you can hide a candle under a bushel or a city set on a hill. "Let your light so shine before men, that men may see your good works and glorify your Father which is in Heaven"! Unless you really hide your light, your Truth, which is our Message, method‚ and way of life, for which we are now world famous and which anybody could recognise no matter what your name—unless you really hide this light‚ you're not going to be able to hide! They're still going to know who you are, for your very speech and manner of life will betray you‚ and they'll only be ashamed of you and have contempt for you and think even less of you and even doubt your Message and you and its Truth, if you become such a liar as to try to cowardly deny it to save yourself! "He that saveth his life shall lose it‚ but that loseth his life for My Sake and the Gospel's the same shall save it!" Praise God! Hallelujah! Come die with me for Jesus and His Name!

144. WHY DIDN'T THE MORMONS TRY TO HIDE AND CHANGE THEIR NAME! They got into such a war with the government that they even had pitched battles with Federal troops! Why didn't they run and hide and change their name to avoid it?—Because they believed in what is stood for and were willing to die for it! You've got to hand it to them for guts, and God evidently blessed them for it because they're still around, have multiplied the world over, and run the Governments of about four western States! If they could be willing to die for their false doctrines and illegal practices, why can't you be willing to live and die for the Truth! They weren't ashamed of their name, and it still lives on, and so do they, in spite of terrible opposition!

145. WHY DON'T THE COMMUNISTS CHANGE THEIR NAME?—They've been known as Communists ever since I can remember, ever since the days of Lenin! I don't even think they called themselves that to begin with!—They were called Marxists‚ Bolsheviks, etc! But people called them Communists because of their beliefs in a communal society, so they've retained the name, and every time you hear it, you get the Message! They haven't tried to change it just because at first nearly the whole rest of the world hated them and were trying to kill them and fought wars against them!

146. BUT JUST BECAUSE ONE LITTLE HANDFUL OF PARENTS STARTS SCREAMING A FEW LITTLE LIES about us which we've already easily disproved and for which they themselves are over a barrel, under a heavy libel suit which could cost them plenty, and just because a few little stinking shit-sheet newspapers have been smearing us with sensationalism to sell papers because people obviously like to read about us, good bad, you scream and run for the nearest hole to hide and change your name!

147. WHAT KIND OF A SOLDIER ARE YOU WHO RUNS WHEN THE ENEMY STARTS SHOOTING! The Enemy always starts shooting when you're going over the top and attacking him, as they used to say in World War I! It's proof that you're hitting him where it hurts and accomplishing something, getting the job done! That's why he's screaming! That's why he's yelling! That's why he's lying and smearing you, trying to stop you from the good you're doing! If you stop and run away, the Enemy has accomplished exactly what he wanted to do! He said "Boo!" and you run, instead of standing up and yanking off his Halloween mask and exposing him for the liar he is! He really spooked you, scared you half to death and sent you running, which is exactly what he wanted to do to stop you from doing what you're doing, and the great good you're accomplishing! These parents don't know what they're doing, but the Devil does, and they're just willing tools of the Devil, and you let them bluff you out! They couldn't lick you, or stop you, so they just scared you out! The Lord won't let them lick you or stop you until your job is done, but for God's Sake and the job's sake don't let them simply frighten you away, even if we have to have a few martyrs as every Cause has!

148. THE JEHOVAH'S WITNESSES HAVEN'T CHANGED THEIR NAME in spite of terrific persecution and a battle royal with the establish churches! In fact, because of this in the early days‚ they did try to change their name a couple of times: once it was "Watchtower Society," and another time they were the "International Bible Students"! But that didn't fool anybody! Every time they saw two people on their porch knocking at their front door and rapping the System churches, they knew good and well who they were, no matter what they tried to call themselves or what phoney name they had on their literature! Because who else but the Jehovah's Witnesses were so faithful in witnessing! What other church went around calling on everybody in town to try to teach them to hate the System churches and beware of anti–Christ government and prepare for the Coming of Christ? And what other church besides the Jehovah's Witnesses required all of its members to witness canvass their neighbourhoods, study their Bibles and stand on the street corners waving their literature with its dangerous anti-System doctrines! They weren't fooling anybody! Everybody knew who they were no matter what they tried to call themselves‚ because there was nobody else like them! And God blessed them for it, in spite of some of their phoney doctrines, till now they're so powerful they're proud of their name and don't even try to hide it anymore! How about U?

149. SO IF YOU'RE TRUE TO OUR MESSAGE, METHOD‚ AND WAY OF LIFE, IT WON'T MATTER WHAT YOU CALL YOURSELVES, PEOPLE WILL STILL KNOW WHO YOU ARE! You won't be able to hide it anymore than you can hide your light under a bushel or a city set on hall! They're not trying to hide it in Europe! In fact, they're capitalising on it, and everybody knows who the Children of God are‚ and they raised a storm of controversy because of it, which has helped to spread their message even further. The churches and parents are already beginning to fight them because of it, because they which live godly in Christ Jesus and tell the Truth shall suffer persecution! And they're growing faster in Europe than you are in America! God is doing mighty wonders for them miraculously providing, healing, protecting, and prospering them! They're growing at the rate of a Colony a month‚ each one in a different country in spite of language barriers‚ cultural differences, governmental borders, and sometimes, seemingly insurmountable odds, because they're on fire, full of the power of God, obeying His commandments, and not ashamed of themselves or His Name or their name, or what it stands for! What's the matter with you North Americans? Are you ashamed of us and our name, and what we stand for, or are you just a plain coward, afraid of a little persecution. Maybe you're not worthy of the name God has called you—His Children! Are you ashamed to be going by it?

150. READING MO LETTERS: Well, Praise the Lord! This has been the longest one yet, and I hope you're still awake! When you get a long one like this, you probably ought to divide its reading and study into two or three periods of LT classes. This one is already pretty much divided into three major sections—the first seven pages on various items about Burlington many of which also apply to all of you! The next seven pages are generally on Security and how to Contend for the Faith. And although we had already gotten on to Name Changing before‚ the last seven pages, 15-21 are principally socking it to you on that subject.

151. IN THE FIRST SEVEN IN THIS PERSONAL VISIT WITH ALL OF YOU, I mostly harped on your major sins and weaknesses at the present, so that probably should only be read in your Leadership Meeting with all your leaders present, which means your entire staff!—Which again, I say, Big Colonies, does not mean only two or three or half dozen of the top leaders only! Leaders means all the leaders! When I used to call a Leadership Meeting at TSC, it took in nearly half the Colony, including everybody from the Director down to the lowliest tribe leader and the cook! Do we have to start making you fill in report blanks again in order to see who you're reading these Letters to and to make sure you're reading them and that you're reading them to the ones they're intended for, instead of keeping them to yourselves, just the top leaders, for fear they might expose you to your people, or do you just read certain sections of them to them, and the rest to yourself? May God judge you if you are withholding His Word from His People!—And He will!

152. THE NEXT SECTION OF SEVEN PAGES, pages 8-14, is primarily on Security and How to Contend for the Faith, so you can make that a Leadership Class for all the LTs, meaning Leadership Trainees, or student leaders, which is all the potential leaders who are not on your staff yet‚ but of course, this section or anything else addressed to LTs is also for your staff—you leaders!—In other words, both Leaders and LTs—both Leaders and potential leaders! See that you read it to them all!

153. AND THE LAST SECTION OF SEVEN PAGES, 15-21, IS ON NAME-CHANGING, and should be read to ALL, including your Babes‚ no matter how much it hurts your God-damned pride! You need it, and they all need it‚ all of us need it—so you be sure you read those last seven pages to everybody, because this is a basic principle and a major stand that we're taking against this name-changing cop-out of which so many have been guilty lately. If God wants to change your name or our name, He'll let you know, and we'll let you know! In the meantime‚ you'd better not!

154. IN FACT, I THINK YOU MAY EVEN NEED TO READ THE SECOND SEVEN PAGES ON SECURITY TO EVERYBODY, BECAUSE THEY ALL NEED IT! I don't know why not! That'll only leave your private sins of the first section for just you leaders! I don't want to embarrass you that much in front of your followers, but you need it! So in other words, read the first seven pages just to the Leaders and all the rest of this Letter to everybody in your Colony! I think they all need it! PTL!

155. THEN MAYBE AFTER YOU'VE READ THE LAST TWO SECTIONS TO EVERYBODY, YOU MAY EVEN WANT TO READ THE FIRST SECTION TO YOUR BABES TOO‚ to keep them from throwing you out for your mistakes. Maybe they might as well find out right now that we all make mistakes, including me and you, and they will too—but we're all still part of the Family! We don't throw you out for them—we just scold you, maybe spank you a little bit‚ try to correct you and keep right on loving each other and working together and fighting the Enemy together‚ and keep right on going in spite of our mistakes, from which we learn! We're still one Family, right or wrong, and I love you and hope you still love me; like the Lord, whom I love I chasten!—And I scourge every son whom I receive!—You've all had me lay it onto you sometime or another! Otherwise you wouldn't be my sons! But as a result, you've become better sons, and I'm proud of you—every one of you, in spite of your mistakes! You're all doing a tremendous job and we're going to win together! PTL!

156. EACH OF THESE SECTIONS SHOULD TAKE YOU ABOUT AN HOUR AND A HALF TO TWO HOURS, which is the usual length of my Leadership Classes. Please read all MO Letters slowly and with the expression and spirit which you have caught from them through private prayerful pre-reading before reading them publicly. This is a must—to read them in the same Spirit in which they were given! They are the gun and ammunition, but the guy using them has got to know how to shoot! Don't just rip through them like a machinegun without pausing for audience reactions. Give each heavy thought time to sink in and the Spirit time to work and your kids time to absorb it. Otherwise you're just wasting your time. Avoid interpreting! Let the Letters speak for themselves! Amen?