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Personal Life & Biblical Economics (Part 2)

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• Long, of course, as they are ruling in agreement with God's Word, in conformity. And he understood that we have a right to resist tyranny and wickedness. Well, he was kind of sharing this with his other pastor friend, and the other pastor friend just simply said in response, "Well, I believe Romans chapter 13." And by that, what he meant was he meant he believed in unlimited submission to civil government—whatever they said, however they said. Well, my friend looked at him and said, "Well, I'm glad to hear you say that you believe in Romans chapter 13."

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• He said, "While we may disagree on the interpretation of verses one through seven, verse eight is so plainly stated that I am sure that you could not possibly disagree with it or with me." So he said, "I have just two questions." He said, "Brother, is your church in debt, and are you in debt? Because the Scripture says, 'Owe no man anything.'" Well, obviously that ended the conversation. So you have to ask yourself, what does Scripture really mean when it says, "Owe no man anything"? You have to ask also, is it possible to live debt-free? Why do so many people—and I'm talking about Christian people particularly—live constantly in a state of debt and slavery?

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• Is it because we are basically ignorant, undisciplined, or just simply rebellious? So you have to ask, can this phrase, "Owe no man anything," be taken absolutely and concretely? Well, let me answer that. In one sense of the word, we are forever in debt. By that I mean this: we owe our Heavenly Father and our Lord Jesus Christ a tremendous debt, and the Bible says that we're not debtors to the flesh to live after the flesh. Certainly we are debtors to live after the Spirit and honor our Lord in everything, in every area of our life. So obviously we cannot be debt-free in that sense. Moreover, we cannot be debt-free in another sense, and that is the fact what we owe to individuals.

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• It was the Apostle Paul who said, "I am debtor to the Greek and to the barbarian, to the wise and to the unwise. So much as in me is, I am ready to preach the gospel to the Jew first and then to the Gentiles." He said, "It is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth." So in that sense of the word, we cannot be debt-free.

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• In fact, the Bible also tells us that we are to "communicate unto him that teacheth." There are so many scriptures that tell us in that sense of the word that we cannot be absolutely totally debt-free. When you look at verse 7—and I ask you to do so—in Romans 13 verse 7, the Bible says, "Render therefore to all their dues: tribute to whom tribute is due, custom to whom custom, fear to whom fear, honor to whom honor. Owe no man anything."

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• So in the context here, there's even a broader reference than simply to the financial realm. God said there are certain individuals that we owe honor, we owe fear, we owe respect, and we owe reverence. Let me show you. I want you to hold Romans chapter 13, but turn in your Bibles very quickly to 1 Peter chapter 3. I'll show you this and then I will quote another passage. Notice in 1 Peter chapter 3, beginning there with verse 5, I want you to note what the Bible says. 1 Peter chapter 3, and notice if you would, verse 5. The Word of God says it very plainly, very clearly: "For after this manner in old time, the holy women also trusted in God, adorned themselves, being in subjection unto their own husbands, even as Sarah obeyed Abraham, calling him lord, whose daughters you are as long as you do well and are not afraid with any amazement." Now, so the wives owe the husband respect and reverence—I'll quote that passage just momentarily—but look at verse 7.

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• "Likewise, you husbands, dwell with them according to knowledge, giving honor unto the wife as unto the weaker vessel, and as being heirs together of the grace of life, that your prayers be not hindered." So the Bible tells us very clearly the husband is responsible to honor the wife. And the Bible says in Ephesians 5 and verse 33, "And you wives, see that you reverence your husbands." So you owe honor and you owe respect and you owe submission, and likewise the men owe submission to the Lord Jesus Christ as well. So obviously when you look at this verse in the context, it has more involved in it than just simply in the financial realm. However, the truth of the matter is, the financial realm would be included in this, for God simply says, "Owe no man anything but to love one another." So the only thing that God says that we are not to cease owing would be love. Now, the interesting thing is this: the Bible tells us in verse 10, of course, that love is the fulfilling of the law.

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• That's why, obviously, we can never, ever get out of the debt of love. But when God says in verse 8, "Owe no man anything," the word "owe" there is *opheilete* in the Greek. Now, the interesting thing about this is when you look at the Greek term, it is the Greek term for the second person plural of the present active indicative. It is also the same exact form for the present active imperative.

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• One is a statement of fact and the other is a command. So if you interpret this word, "Owe no man anything," as an indicative, God is just simply saying you're not to be owing anyone anything but love, which would be a statement of fact. If you interpret it as an imperative, God is simply saying you're commanded to not owe anyone anything but love. I believe in the context, the imperative is that which it should be decided upon. So God is telling us that we're actually to acquit ourselves of debt in anything but love.

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• So that would include not only the financial realm, but the social realm, the civil realm, and the moral realm. Now, when you begin to look at this passage, you have to understand one of the rules of interpretation is this: you have to interpret every scripture within the analogy of faith. Scripture has to agree with scripture, as the Apostle Paul says, comparing spiritual things with spiritual. If you interpret a passage so that your interpretation contradicts another plain passage of scripture, the scripture is not wrong—your interpretation is wrong. So you have to interpret everything in light of Scripture.

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• Now, it's interesting, if you will study the Bible throughout, from Old Testament to New Testament, if you will study the Bible on the subject of debt, you will find that there are 50 specific passages that deal with debt. There are additional 20 passages that deal with it indirectly. Every one of those passages, both direct and indirect, always deals with debt in a negative framework. In other words, there are no passages that encourage debt. I'm not going to have time to teach and preach all of this, but yes, there are emergency loans in the Bible. Yes, there are short-term loans in the Bible, and God rules and has rules for every one of those, that is for sure.

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• But you remember that passage in Proverbs 22 and verse 7, where the Bible says, "...the rich ruleth over the poor, and the borrower is slave to the lender." Now, the word I said slave, it says servant. But the word servant and the word slave are identical. They're one and the same. So the borrower is the servant or the slave to the lender. So if I borrow, say, $20,000 from the bank, to be honest and to be practical, I am now the servant or the slave of that bank until I pay that loan back. I'm literally working for the bank is what it amounts to. Anytime you borrow, God says you are a servant or a slave.

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• Even in the Bible, what we call suretiship, or striking of hands, is condemned. Or, let me say this again, cosigning a note with someone. For instance, if you will turn in your Bibles to the book of Proverbs chapter 6, there's a multitude of verses. We won't have time to look at all of them. But look in Proverbs 6, if you would, beginning there with verse 1. Proverbs 6 and verse 1. Note, if you would, how God begins. Proverbs 6, verse 1.

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• He says, "My son, if thou be surety for thy friend"—that is, you've said, "I'll stand up for you. I'll take care of you. I'm going to back you up financially." "If thou hast stricken thy hand with a stranger, look what God says: 'Thou art snared with the words of thy mouth, thou art taken with the words of thy mouth. Do this now, my son, and deliver thyself when thou art come into the hand of thy friend. Go humble thyself, and make sure thy friend. Give not sleep to thine eyes, nor slumber to thine eyelids. Deliver thyself as a roe from the hand of the hunter, and as a bird from the hand of the fowler.'" God says, get out of it as quickly as you can. If you said, "I'm going to stand up for you, I will back you financially," whatever it is, God said, you better make sure of your friend. Look in Proverbs 11 and verse 15. Proverbs 11 and verse 15.

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• Again, we have it like this. Proverbs 11, verse 15: "He that is surety for a stranger shall smart for it, and he that hateth suretiship is sure." Now, God said the only way that you can really be sure is to absolutely abhor suretiship. Notice, if you would, in Proverbs chapter 17 and verse 18. Proverbs 17 and verse 18. The Bible says in this passage, "A man void of understanding striketh hands and becometh surety in the presence of his friend." Now isn't that interesting? God said if you become a surety even for your friend, it's because you're void of understanding. God says don't do it. Look, if you would, in Proverbs chapter 20 and verse 16. Proverbs 20 and verse 16. God says, "Take his garment that is surety for a stranger."

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• In other words, he's going to lose it anyhow, and take a pledge of him from a strange woman. Look in Proverbs 22 and verse 26. Proverbs 22 and verse 26. God says, "Be not thou one of them that strike hands, or of them that are sureties for debts." And if you will look in Proverbs 27 verse 13, you'll see it again. Proverbs 27 verse 13: "Take his garment that is surety for a stranger, and take a pledge of him for a strange woman." So God is saying basically don't do it.

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• Now, if you want to know what suretiship is, then you need to study Genesis 43 and Genesis 44, because you remember Judah became surety for Benjamin. They had to go back into Egypt and Jacob said you can't take Benjamin, because Joseph is not—he thought Joseph was dead—and Simeon is being held in jail. And Judah said, "Look, I'm going to take him or we're going to all starve to death. I will be surety for him."

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• I will stand for him. And you remember how Joseph's cup was found in Benjamin's sack, and Joseph then was going to keep Benjamin. And Judah came up and said, "Oh, no, please do not do that. I became surety for him. Take me. Let him go because he's the only son of an old man and you will kill him." And of course, Joseph was working everything out. But you understand suretiship then is basically when you are standing up and you're saying, "I'm going to be responsible financially for someone."

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• Now, whether we're talking about family, or if we're talking about Christian brothers, or we're talking about Christian friends, there are such things—such a thing—in the Bible as an emergency loan. There is such a thing also as giving to someone. Do you understand that? If here is a brother in need, I may give to him, or you'd have to study the lessons, or there is an emergency loan, but you cannot charge him usury, or you cannot charge him interest.

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• Now, I'm saying all that to ask you a question. Have you ever wondered why this generation is so debt-oriented? Anytime we want something, if we do not have the money, we say charge it. We'll go into debt, or we'll go borrow the money to get whatever we want. Let me give you some interesting facts. Do you realize in 1929, and before 1929, up until 1929, 95% of all homes were bought with cash. Only 5% were financed. In 1999, which has not been that long ago—15 years—95% of all homes were financed and only 5% with cash.

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• Do you realize before 1945, practically no cars were financed. If you wanted a car, you just simply paid cash. So you have to ask yourself this question: Why is it that if we have so much more money today than our grandparents had and our great-grandparents had, why is it that they were basically debt-free and we're consumed with debt, and we're in debt up to our eyeballs? I read an interesting article the other day and the article said if you have this much money extra and above, you are special. You are different. And I had to read the article just to see what the amount was. You know how much money they said if you have this much in savings you are above everyone else? Four hundred bucks. Four hundred bucks. And they also said the average credit card bill for the average individual is from eighteen to twenty thousand dollars, and a lot of those credit card companies charge twenty-one percent interest. So why is it our forebears were basically debt-free and we're in debt up to our eyeballs?

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• Well, we can blame inflation, which I covered yesterday. We can blame that. You know, I told you yesterday that when my wife and I got married, I used to give her ten bucks a week to buy groceries. You say, "How in the world could that be?" Well, you've got to remember the bread back then was like twenty-five cents a loaf. Gallon of gas was twenty-five cents. You could buy a gallon of milk for seventy-five cents. I'm just saying you have to understand there's a difference, but now—why is it that you and I today are so debt-oriented? Is it because of our ignorance? Is it because of our lack of discipline? Is it because of our rebellion? Or is it because of all of those things together? And it could be this as well: because we have ceased being a future-oriented people, and we have become a present-oriented people, in the

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• sense we want what we want, and we want it right now, and it doesn't matter. We just got to have it. We're not willing to wait. We're not willing to save. We just want what we want, and we want it right now. Consequently, what we have developed is a slave mentality. Now I want you to stop and think. The Bible does say very clearly that the borrower is servant or slave to the lender. What is the slave mentality? The slave is not interested in the future because basically he has no future. The slave is only interested in the present and all he wants is to make the present as comfortable and as convenient as possible.

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• So everything that he does is for the moment. Now, it's true that most Christians are totally ignorant of economic principles in the Bible. The Bible is indeed an economic book. It is also a governmental book. God's law and God's sovereignty extends to every area of life. There is no area of life over which the Lordship of Jesus Christ does not extend. You say, "Well, Brother Weaver, I don't want to be ignorant. I don't want to be rebellious. I don't want to be undisciplined." Well, let me tell you this: to the extent that you and I are both ignorant of God's law and do not have our lives in conformity to God's law and His sovereignty, to that extent we are ignorant and to that extent we are undisciplined and to that extent we're rebellious. The Bible says, "Stand fast in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made you free, and be not entangled again with the yoke of bondage." C. H.

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• Mackintosh said it like this in 1864: "'Owe no man anything' is a precept so plain that the wayfaring man, though a fool, need not err therein. What right have I before God and man to wear a coat or a hat not paid for? What right have I to order a ton of coal, a pound of tea, or a joint of meat if I have not the money to pay for it?"

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• It may be said, "What are we to do?" The answer is plain to an upright mind and a tender conscience: we're to do without rather than to go into debt. Do you realize when it comes to our lives and our lifestyle, there are two options that you and I have if we're trying to, quote unquote, satisfy our needs or even our wants? What are they? We can either make more money or we can learn to do without. We can either make more money or we can learn to do without.

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• And God is the one, by the way—I've got a whole series back there on biblical wealth, and it's taken from Deuteronomy chapter 8, where He said very plainly, "It is the Lord thy God that giveth thee power to get wealth." Do you realize God is sovereign even in the distribution of wealth? I know men that everything they touch basically turns to money. I know other men, basically everything they touch crumbles and falls to the dust.

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• Years ago, and Alice can tell you, we went through a number of things. We had kids, we had company all the time. I made very little preaching. And listen, there were weeks that Alice and I ate peas and drank water because we had nothing else to eat. I had a preacher friend who was one of those men. He preached, but he also was a worker. And he had a business.

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• And everything this brother did turned to money. I mean, he could make it. But let me tell you what he did. The man died poor. I had his funeral. Because although he basically made millions of dollars, he gave it all away. I've seen him go to a widow woman's house. Her hot water heater had gone out. He'd go down, buy a new hot water heater, take the old one out, install it, never charge a dime.

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• He saved us so many times, it's unbelievable. He bought us a refrigerator. He bought us a used car when we needed it. Any other young preacher he took care of. But you know what he told me one day? He said, "Brother Weaver," he said, "I've got a way that you can make some extra money." I said, "Well, how is that?" Well, he said, "We'll buy this truck, and we'll let another man run it"—because he was doing contract work—and he said, "We'll pay him so much and you get all the extra and you don't have to do anything." I said, "Well, that's wonderful." Well, guess what? We got the truck. Two weeks later, the man quit and then the truck tore up. You know what I told the Lord? I said, "Lord, let me tell you, You called me to preach. That's all I can do. If I ever get rich, I'm going to get rich preaching. If I don't, I'm going to die poor preaching because I'm going to preach. That's exactly all I'm going to do."

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• I'm going to quit. But it's God who gives you power to get wealth.

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• Now, I want you to understand something. I want you to understand you can learn to discipline yourself, and you can learn to do without. I'm going to tell you a quick story, and then I'm going to give you a quote from Charles Haddon Spurgeon, and then I'm going to try to go on some very practical things. But my wife and I have been married pretty soon to be 52 years. When we got married, I told you, I went to Thomasville, Georgia, and I started off making $65 a week.

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• And I know that you think that's not good money. Brother, it was wonderful money back then. It really was. And I told you yesterday, the motorcycle cop that had been with the city of Thomasville for 10 years was only making $60 a week. But we had so much money at $65 a week, we could get whatever we wanted to get. We wanted furniture, we'd go get it. We wanted something else, we would go get it. And, you know, young people are usually not only covetous, but stupid.

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• Now, listen to what I mean. Here's what I mean by—I'm not being ugly to the young people, but I'm talking about young married people particularly, you know, because their mentality is, "Well, Mom and Daddy have a new car. Why can't I have one? Mom and Daddy have beautiful furniture, why can't we have it? Mom and Daddy have a big house, why can't we have it?" They don't understand Mom and Daddy.

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• It took them 50 years to get those things. And so we want everything that Mom and Daddy has, but we want it now instead of waiting 50 years to get it. So what Alice and I did, like everybody else, we went out and got what we wanted to get and we charged it. Because I'd only have to pay five or ten bucks a month, I mean, you know, that's no problem. Well, you know, I woke up one day and I realized my sixty-five bucks a week, all of it was going to pay bills.

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• We didn't have any money to live on. I thought, "Well, now that was stupid, wasn't it?" Ah, I know what I want to do. I'm going to go down to the bank and I'm going to borrow the money. I'm going to get all these debts, and I'm going to put them in one little pile. I'll be making one payment to the bank, and I'll have money left over.

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• And that's exactly what I did. And I had money left over. And you know what we did? We saw something else we wanted. We got it on credit.

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• Next thing I know, we owe the bank, and we owe the other people, and we don't have any money to live on. And I look at Alice and I say, "We're not too smart." I said, "I tell you what we're going to do. We're going to tighten our belts. We're going to do without. We're going to pay off the bank. We're going to pay off these other bills. And from henceforth, if we want something, we will save until we have the cash to pay for it. And if we don't have the cash to pay for it, we'll do without."

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• And that's what we've done all these years. And you can get used to doing without a lot of things. And I got news for you, when this economy does collapse, you're going to be doing without a lot of things anyhow, so you might as well get used to it because it's not going to be there. I want you to listen to this quote by Charles Haddon Spurgeon. Here's what he said.

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• "He is both a fool and a rascal who has a quarter coming in and on the strength of it spends five dollars, which does not belong to him. Scripture says, 'Owe no man anything,' which does not mean pay your debts, but never have any to pay. My opinion is that those who break this law ought to be turned out of the Christian church." Wow. Wow. Wow. It's absolutely amazing how we are so debt-oriented today.

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• Now, I wanted to show you something and try to answer some questions based upon some of the information I gave you yesterday. And I want to begin by showing you some money. This is not mine, but it is a good example of what I was talking about yesterday. I told you that a dollar is a unit of measurement. Here is a ten Federal Reserve note. This is an old one, and here's what it says on the bottom.

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• "Will pay to the bearer on demand ten dollars." Well now, if it's going to pay on the bearer ten dollars, this is not a dollar. This is a note. This note says that it owes the bearer ten dollars. A dollar is the unit of measurement. So the ten dollars would be in silver or the ten dollars would be in gold, but it owes or will pay to the bearer on demand ten dollars. Here is another one which is a one Federal Reserve note and it says "one dollar in silver payable to the bearer on demand." So a dollar is a dollar unit of silver or a dollar unit of gold.

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• It is not a piece of paper. I talked yesterday about hyperinflation. Here is a thousand dollar note from Haiti. Listen to this: from Zimbabwe. Here is a ten trillion dollar note that would not even buy a loaf of bread. Ten trillion dollars. I have pictures of individuals with wheelbarrows with money tightly stacked with rubber bands trying to buy a loaf of bread and they could not even buy a loaf of bread with all the paper money they had stacked in a wheelbarrow. When you have a ten trillion dollar note that will not buy a loaf of bread, all this is good for is wallpaper or to blow your nose on. It's just that simple.

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• Here is the ten mark. This is a gold piece. I told you about the Deutschmark yesterday, the hyperinflation in Germany in 1923, where people were papering their walls with their money and starting fires with it because it was absolutely worthless. Well, this piece of gold and others like it replaced that. And although the paper has been long gone and it's absolutely worthless, this little gold mark is absolutely valuable.

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• and still can be exchanged. Here is a Russian gold coin, about a tenth of an ounce, with a picture of Tsar Nicholas on it, or the image of Tsar Nicholas. One of my favorite stories about Tsar Nicholas is before the gold was being prevalent in society, they had paper money as well. And there was a counterfeiter in Russia who was counterfeiting Russian paper money. And finally, he had to cease counterfeiting.

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• Not because he was caught. His counterfeit bills were almost perfect. But the reason he had to cease counterfeiting was because the paper and the ink was costing him more than the paper was worth. And so on his last issue of Russian paper money, he had the picture of Tsar Nicholas in the front, and in Russian language in small letters around Tsar Nicholas's picture—you had to use a magnifying glass, but you could read it—it said, "My money is worth more than yours."

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• Now, my favorite story concerning the German hyperinflation, and it is a true story, is about the German woman who had a wheelbarrow that was absolutely full of Deutschmarks. She was going to the bakery to buy her a loaf of bread. On the way to the bakery, there was a fight in the street, and a lot of people were gathered around watching the fight, and her curiosity got the best of her to see who was fighting, and so she went over and was kind of pushing the people aside so she could see, and when she finally saw, her curiosity was satisfied, she turned around to go back, and someone had emptied all her money in the street and stolen her wheelbarrow. The wheelbarrow was worth more than the money. So, when you read through the Bible about money, you're always going to find it's gold and silver.

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• You remember, God told Israel as they were going into the land, when you pass Moab, when you pass Esau, He said, "Don't meddle with those. I'm not going to give you one foot of their land, but you buy meat for money and you buy water for money." And you remember in 2 Kings chapter 5 and verse 26, it was Gehazi who said, "I'm going to go back and take a little something of this Syrian Naaman," because Naaman had come with ten talents of silver and ten thousand pieces of gold. And when you get to 2 Kings 5 and verse 26, Elisha says to Gehazi, "Is it a time to receive money?" So gold and silver are money in the Bible. Historically, that is true.

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• Now, let me try to spend the rest of my time answering some questions that were asked me yesterday. If I do not answer all of your questions, hopefully I will get to do some a little bit later. But I'm going to make some recommendations to you and tell you some things. First of all, I do have that series on debt and I do have the series on biblical wealth.

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• But let me begin by telling the young people this, and this is good advice for old people as well. But usually when I get young married people to counsel, I give them some economic counsel as well as other areas as well. And here's what I tell young married couples. I said, "If you will do what I'm telling you to do right now, you will not only be able to live debt-free, but you will also be able to retire, if that is in your plans, whenever you want to retire." And here's the counsel that I give them. I said, "Whatever you make in Federal Reserve notes"—that's how we get paid—"whatever you make, I don't care if it's a little or a lot. Whatever you make, the first 10% goes to the Lord."

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• By the way, I hope you understand, and I explain all this in the series on biblical wealth. There were actually three tithes in the Bible. There was the Levitical tithe, which was 10%. There was the festival tithe, or the tithe of rejoicing, which was 10%, which God allowed you to spend upon yourself. And there was the poor tithe, which was 10%, but it was only taken once every three years. So that meant if you were actually tithing biblically, you were tithing really 13% every year: 10% for the Levitical tithe, 3% for the tithe of rejoicing, and then the other 10% you've got to spend on yourself at the seven annual feasts that were in the Bible. So actually, people were tithing 23% in the Bible. Okay? And really and truly, we should have a poor tithe today. In fact, we have it at our church, we call it a benevolent tithe.

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• where we give to help the brethren. And I discuss all that and tell you the difference between a work of emergency and a work of charity as well. There's a big difference. But first of all, you should always take 10 percent and give to the Lord. Okay, secondly, you should take 10 percent and put back as an emergency fund. Do you understand that if you have a washing machine, it's eventually going to quit? If you have an automobile, it's going to break down. If you have anything mechanical, it's going to tear up. You have to have an emergency fund to fix those items. And then you take another 10% and buy silver and/or gold every month, every month without fail.

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• I don't care what the price is. I don't care if it's up or down, high or low. You consistently, constantly do it every month.

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• Now, let me tell you why. Listen carefully. If you say, "Well, I'm not going to buy silver and gold, but what I'm going to do is I'm going to take these Federal Reserve notes and I'm going to stick them in this book. And when I get enough where I can buy a whole lot at one time, I'm going to go and buy my silver and gold. But until then, all these Federal Reserve notes are in this book right here." Well, number one, you're losing money because inflation is continually stealing the value of those Federal Reserve notes. But number two, and here's the bad thing, if you want something badly enough, you will go to that book and get those Federal Reserve notes and go spend them on whatever you want. But if you've already bought silver and gold, and you've got silver and gold put up, you're going to think long and hard before you take your silver and gold and trade it in for Federal Reserve notes. Now, here's the thing: that means if you do this, you're living on 70% of what you make.

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• That's fine. Well, guess what? If the Lord blesses you, and you have more in this emergency fund than you could possibly need for the next four or five months, take some of that, put it with the 10% for gold and silver and buy it and just keep adding and keep adding and keep adding. You start doing that when you're 20 years old. When you get 40 years old, if you've done that faithfully every month, you will have more money than you can ever, ever dream of having. Because that silver and gold is always going to be worth something. It's never going to totally lose its value. Never. I don't care how low it goes, it's going to be worth something. Paper money will be worth absolutely nothing. Electronic digits will be worth absolutely nothing.

  #55 | 38:36 to 39:26 | cleaned

• So the point I'm trying to make is this: you have to do this, and you have to do it consistently.

  #56 | 39:28 to 39:34 | cleaned

• Now, let me tell you how to do this very easily. Someone asked me yesterday, "Well, where will I get my silver and gold?" Well, I would hope that you would get it from a Christian who understands. There's a fellow in our church, and he's been with me nearly 40 years, Henry Klingler, who sells as well. But there's also Franklin Sanders in West Point, Tennessee, the Money Changer. And Franklin Sanders has what he calls a MAP plan. And MAP is just short for Monthly Acquisition Plan.

  #57 | 39:35 to 40:13 | cleaned

• Now, things have changed a little bit lately. I think probably the minimum now is like 150 bucks a month. It used to be 50. But it may be 150 now. The only thing he asks is, whatever you buy, you buy it in increments of 50. If you want to go higher than 150, make it 200 or 250 or whatever. Just go in increments of 50. But what you do is he reminds you every month. Every month you tell him what you want. If you want gold, fine. If you want silver, fine. If you want a combination of both, whatever.

  #58 | 40:14 to 40:48 | cleaned

• He gets it and he sends it to you. You hold it. You keep it. It's yours. It's not stuck in a bank somewhere. It's not stuck in some paper somewhere. It's yours. It's in your hand. And you do this every month. And some of you young single men, if you're working and you're making a scad of money, you better be buying silver and gold. You better be putting it back, because although you're single now, you're going to be wanting to get married before long. I'm just saying you need to do this every month. You need to get on Franklin Sanders' mailing list or get on it electronically and just start doing that now. I, by the way, I've known Franklin for probably 40 years. He's also a Christian. He's a Calvinist. He's a preacher. So, and he's honest.

  #59 | 40:49 to 41:43 | cleaned

• I know his whole family. So I'm just saying. And Henry is as well. So that's just something for you to consider.

  #60 | 41:44 to 41:52 | cleaned

• Now, let me make some other recommendations, because someone asked yesterday, "Well, Brother Weaver, there is a collapse coming. When will it come?" And my answer is I have absolutely no idea. I can tell you what I read. And I try to read every day. I haven't since I've been here, but when I'm at home or usually when I have my computer with me, I'm reading every day. And I don't care if you read a Christian economist or a pagan economist, all of them are saying essentially the same thing. I don't care if you read from Gerald Celente or Peter Schiff or Gary North or Marc Faber or any of them. All of them are saying that basically we can expect a collapse no later than 2020. Most of them are saying by 2015. Some are even saying before this year is over. I have no earthly idea, but I'm just simply saying the Bible does tell us that "the prudent man foreseeth the evil and hideth himself, and the simple pass on and are punished."

  #61 | 41:53 to 43:03 | cleaned

• So, I would say if you've not started preparing now, you're already behind the eight ball. You needed to be preparing, not only financially, but food-wise, water-wise, tool-wise, for a long time. And so I would say that you need to get a lot of those things as quickly as you can. And you say, "Well, what if nothing ever happens?" Well, fine, you'll have what you need regardless. And if nothing ever happens, you've got a bunch of food, guess what? You can eat it. You've got a bunch of water, you can drink it. You've got a bunch of tools, you can use them. If you've got a bunch of silver and gold, you can hold on to it because it's going to just increase in value.

  #62 | 43:04 to 43:53 | cleaned

• And I hope you understand the markets. I don't care if you're talking about the Dow, the Nasdaq. I don't even care if you're talking about silver and gold right now. All the markets are manipulated. They're controlled by the elite, by the powers that be. But there's going to come a time that the powers that be do not exercise control. And when they do, silver and gold are going to go sky high. There are economists that are saying gold will go to $10,000 to $20,000 an ounce and silver to $5,000 an ounce. And I hope you understand that if it does go to that and you still have a mortgage on your home, take a gold coin or two and go pay your mortgage off. If hyperinflation happens, take that cheap, worthless money and go pay it off.

  #63 | 43:55 to 44:46 | cleaned

• That's what they issued you. Give it back to them. Let them have it. Now, books. I want to tell you about some books. If you've not read these books, I would encourage you to get them and to read them. I will tell you about them. First of all, is the book *Patriots* written by James Wesley Rawles. James Wesley Rawles is a retired military—he's military, he was military intelligence, his father was military intelligence—and James Wesley Rawles is not only a Christian, he's a Calvinist, he's a theonomist and basically a reconstructionist. He wrote the book *Patriots*. Now, let me tell you, every one of these books that he has written, with the exception of one, every one of these books that he's written would be considered a novel. I will tell you up front, I hate novels. I despise them. Only because, you know, if I'm going to take my time to read, I want to read something that is accurate, something that is real, something that is true, you know, and a novel is just something someone made up.

  #64 | 44:47 to 46:12 | cleaned

• But there's a difference between James Wesley Rawles' novels and the ordinary novel. Since James Wesley Rawles also is the owner of survivalblog.com, he takes a story and he teaches you how to prepare as you read this novel. So let me tell you, if you read about a weapon in his books, that weapon is real, it will work. If he tells you how to exchange something with weapons, it will work. If he tells you about a medical procedure, how you can do this without a doctor being around, it will work. If he tells you how to build thermite grenades to destroy a tank, believe me, it will work. He gives you all that information in his novels.

  #65 | 46:13 to 47:14 | cleaned

• He's got *Patriots*, that's the first one, I don't remember all of them. There's *Founders*, there's *Survivors*, and what was the last one, Halas, do you remember? I don't know, there's three or four after that, but *Patriots* is the very first one. You should read it and underline what was used to survive and how they did things. The second book, and by the way, the other book that he wrote that is very excellent, and someone told me they had ten of them around, I don't know who it was, but *How to Survive the End of the World as We Know It*.

  #66 | 47:16 to 47:49 | cleaned

• Who was it that had those books? Okay, Eric, Eric has them. You need to get that book and read it. Because he gives you some very useful information. I read the book a long time ago. I gave it to my wife. She read it three or four times. And it's just an excellent book. And you need to get that book and read it. Now, there's another book that I would encourage you to get and read. The title of the book is *One Second After* by William Forstchen.

  #67 | 47:49 to 48:20 | cleaned

• And I think his last name is spelled F-O-R-S-T-C-H-E-N. William Forstchen.

  #68 | 48:20 to 48:30 | cleaned

• Now, I'll tell you what the book is about. I will tell you its good points and its bad points. Okay? The book, *One Second After*, is about an EMP attack, electromagnetic attack. I hope you understand that North Korea has these weapons. China has these weapons. All the rogue countries have these weapons. And all they have to do is burst one bomb in our atmosphere, say, over Denver, Colorado, and all our electronics is gone. Our electricity is gone. Everything is gone. It doesn't even take a rogue country doing that. A solar flare can take out our electrical grid. In fact, in 2012, one narrowly missed the Earth, which would have destroyed it totally. If you will do some reading, and this is absolutely amazing, because they are admitting it, they're admitting it, do you realize the entire electrical grid in our country will be taken out if nine substations go down and one transformer factory? There are only two factories that make transformers in this country. If one of those goes down and nine substations are taken out, it'll take the entire grid down.

  #69 | 48:30 to 49:49 | cleaned

• William Forstchen in this book, and here's the bad side of the book, the only bad thing: God's name is taken in vain, I think one time. And a couple of times, Jesus Christ is said not in a praising manner, but just kind of using it as a byword. That's the bad part of the book. And I'm not going to say this is a bad part. I'm going to say this is a good part, although it's bad. If you read this book, it will show you if such an EMP attack occurs—and by the way, I hope you understand coming across our borders are not just simply the Mexicans, the Hondurans, the Salvadorians, but it's Chinese, it's Pakistanis, it's everybody. In fact, one of the five terrorists, I just read this past week, one of the five terrorists that Obama released has already snuck back across our border and is in the United States.

  #70 | 49:53 to 51:09 | cleaned

• That ought to tell you something. Now, what he does in this book is to absolutely show you how many people are going to die. How many people are going to die. If we lose the electrical grid, folks in the hospital are dying. Folks in the nursing home are dying. Folks at home on medical equipment are dying. In this book, the hero of the book has his own daughter who is a diabetic that dies because they cannot get insulin. One of the other major characters in the book is a doctor, an old doctor.

  #71 | 51:11 to 52:00 | cleaned

• And after they bury everybody that has died, they even have to take the football field and turn it into a graveyard. So many people have died. After they get all these people buried, somebody says as they're having their meeting, "Well, thank God all the dying is over." And the old doctor said, "Hang on. In three more months, we'll have it again, because that's when the disease and the starvation will set in."

  #72 | 52:01 to 52:29 | cleaned

• You will never believe until you read the book and see what all can fail in this country without electricity. So I would encourage you to read the book. I think it's a vitally important book. But like I said, you just need to be aware there's a couple of places in there that I don't necessarily recommend, but it's worth reading for the impact that it would have. I told Brother Yarbrough this morning, I just got the idea of a message as I was reading through Joshua. I said, "I don't know to whom I could preach the message, except our own people." But I said, "You know, but I just got the idea and the title of the message would be 'Get Used to It.'" Because I was reading how Joshua and the children of Israel conquered all these cities. And would you like to tell me what they did?

  #73 | 52:31 to 53:36 | cleaned

• They put to death every man, woman, and child. Thirty-one cities they conquered. Thirty-one cities they destroyed. Thirty-one kings they conquered. See, the problem is we're not used to all this dying. We're not used to death. I had it figured out—and I forget the exact number right now, but I had it figured out. Do you realize when those Israelites in the desert, when God said, "You're going to wander in the desert for forty years until every one of you men that came out of Egypt is dead"? I forget the exact number, but I think it was seventy-three a day that died. Seventy-three a day. There he goes, there he goes, there's another one, there's another one. We're not used to that.

  #74 | 53:37 to 54:37 | cleaned

• It's a book that will open your eyes. Let me tell you also about two websites. Actually, I'll end up giving you three, but I'll save one a little bit later. The first website I really think you ought to read every day is survivalblog.com. Survivalblog.com. That is the site of James Wesley Rawles. Now Rawles is not the only one that writes therein. There are a number of doctors, there's a number of policemen, detectives, common everyday people, people who are expert in certain areas. If you wanted to find out something about medical, Dr. Cynthia Koelker writes there, two or three other doctors. They even tell you how to prepare if you're diabetic, how to get by without your medicine, or how to get other things, or how to get medicine even to put back. They will even tell you how to buy antibiotics without a prescription, because I hope you know that veterinarians give your animals the same exact medicine that you take, it's just in different dosages and it's a whole lot cheaper.

  #75 | 54:39 to 56:00 | cleaned

• Fish mox, fish saline—that penicillin and amoxicillin that you give your fish, it's what you take. So I'm just simply saying, there's all kinds of excellent information. If you want to know anything about martial arts, it's there. If you want to know anything about economics, it's there. If you want to know anything about any subject, it's there. And if you scroll down on the side, you'll see everything advertised there, and you can go from—it's amazing. They may have something like, last time I looked, it was over a thousand articles just on homeschooling. So, it's an excellent blog, and it will tell you things that you need to know. There's another one, and here it is.

  #76 | 56:02 to 56:50 | cleaned

• If you've never been there, I would encourage you to read it every day. It's shtfplan.com. shtfplan.com. You will get all kind of information from that website. And once again, if you scroll down on the left, there's going to be about another fifty or sixty sites on the left that are actually just wonderful, every one of them. Like you will see on the left, Doom and Bloom. Doom and Bloom. That's a medical website. He calls himself Dr. Bones, and his wife is a whole lot prettier than he is, Nurse Amy. She's the bloom on it. And they listen.

  #77 | 56:50 to 57:43 | cleaned

• They'll teach you how to suture. They'll teach you how to cleanse wounds. They'll teach you. And it's all free. It's just there. You just have to take the time to read it, take the time to do it. So I would encourage you to go to that. There's another area that you could get to if you're really interested. I think every Christian should be to the place where he can basically take care of himself.

  #78 | 57:44 to 58:13 | cleaned

• And when I say that, I mean that medically speaking. Now, I can't do surgery on myself unless it's minor surgery, that's obvious. But I ought to be able to take care of some minor things. My wife and I, my daughter, my granddaughter, we went to Medical Corps with four days of training in Ohio. It was doctors teaching ordinary people how to do things. There's even a dentist there that taught us how to pull teeth, how to fill teeth.

  #79 | 58:14 to 58:51 | cleaned

• We learned how to set broken bones, how to make a cast, how to give shots, how to suture, all this kind of stuff. And when you got through at the end of four days, here's all this material on the back at a very good price discounted. You can buy all this material and take it home with you.

  #80 | 58:53 to 59:12 | cleaned

• Now, I'll be honest with you. Yes, I've sewed up animals, and I've sewed up people before. It's a piece of cake. All you have to do is learn how to cleanse the wound, what to do, and you know, you can do it. I sewed up one young man. He'd cut his hand. I mean, you could see down in it. I took the Betadine and I cleaned it out. I washed it out. I irrigated the wound.

  #81 | 59:15 to 59:41 | cleaned

• He said he didn't have any money to go to the emergency room, didn't have any insurance. I said, "Well, I'll sew it up if you want me to." And so I got the needle out with some lidocaine to put around it, to deaden it. He said, "What's that needle for?" I said, "Well, that's to deaden it where I can sew it." He said, "I don't like needles." I said, "I'm sorry. I'm just going to go in just in the skin, just to deaden it just enough that I..."

  #82 | 59:41 to 1:00:06 | cleaned

• "No," he said, "I'd rather not have that shot." I said, "Well, fine, stick your hand out here." He stuck his hand out there and so help me, turn what is that paper? But I put five or six stitches in his hand and he sat there and he took it. I'm just saying you can learn to do all of these things. We have a veterinarian in our church.

  #83 | 1:00:07 to 1:00:30 | cleaned

• He gives lessons on suturing. He'll show you it's easy as pie. So I'm just saying, you can do that, you can join—I forget the whole acronym—CERT, Citizens Emergency Response Team, that's what it is. This county has it. They'll teach you certain things, and they'll give you equipment. And all you have to do is say, "Yeah, I'll help if there's an emergency." Aren't you willing to do that? Sure. They'll teach you. So I'm just saying there's some things that you can learn there. Also, let me give you one other website. And I want to tell you about one other fellow. One other website. And I forget, I don't have the website, but you can type it in again: Solutions from Science. Solutions from Science. And the owner of that website is Bill Hyde. Bill Hyde, and it's from Thompson, Illinois, Solutions from Science. Bill Hyde is not only a Christian, he's a Calvinist, he's a theonomist, he promotes Rushdoony. I'm just saying he's a good man. They sell heirloom seeds, they sell all kind of things.

  #84 | 1:00:31 to 1:01:43 | cleaned

• And if you don't have heirloom seeds, if you've got hybrid seeds, you're in trouble. The heirloom seeds reproduce and you can use whatever they grow to grow more the next year. If you've got a hybrid, no. It's going to come up one time and produce and that's it. So you can get that as well.

  #85 | 1:01:43 to 1:02:03 | cleaned

• Now one other quick thing before I try to close and see if there's even one question. When you get to shtfplan.com, if you would type in on the little search engine there the name Selco. S-E-L-C-O. Selco. It will probably bring up a lot of things about Selco. Selco was an EMT in Bosnia. He went to sleep free. It happened in a night.

  #86 | 1:02:03 to 1:02:49 | cleaned

• He woke up the next morning and their entire city was surrounded by an army. They lived over a year without electricity, without running water, with snipers, with enemy soldiers. You just need to read what he did to survive. It's absolutely unbelievable. And of course, over there, it gets cold. He said the trees in the park, all of them were cut down for firewood and for cooking. Then they tore all the molding off the doors and off the house because all the trees were gone. And they had to do that just to survive, just to cook. He said you could only go out at night because of the snipers during the day.

  #87 | 1:02:51 to 1:03:36 | cleaned

• He had a wonderful thing about bartering, and a wonderful article on that subject. And he also talked about charity.

  #88 | 1:03:38 to 1:03:49 | cleaned

• Now, in this book, *The End of the World as We Know It*, James Wesley Rawles talks about charity as well. And Selco, he may not necessarily be a Christian, I don't know whether he is or not, but he lived through this for a year. And here was his advice. James Wesley Rawles says, "You know, you can have a little jar of beans or peas or something like that and two or three other things just to hand to somebody or give it to a church or give it to a community station that's handing out food."

  #89 | 1:03:50 to 1:04:24 | cleaned

• Said you can do that. But Selco went a little bit further. He says never give anybody anything. Here's what he said: if someone comes to you, he's hungry, and you're a Christian and you want to feed him, he said, you barter, you make him give you something. He said, "I don't care what it is, whether you want it or not, whether you need it or not, it's immaterial." He said, "You just don't want him to think that you have plenty. Because if he gets that idea, he can go off and bring others and come back and the next thing you know, you're in trouble." And here's what he said about bartering in the situation that he was in.

  #90 | 1:04:25 to 1:05:17 | cleaned

• He said, you had to learn to be extremely careful who you bartered with. For instance, suppose Ernie had matches, and I didn't have any matches. But suppose I had cans of beans. And so Ernie and I have been bartering, I've been getting matches from him and he's been getting cans of beans from me. And that's how he's been surviving. Well, I need some matches and I go up to Ernie.

  #91 | 1:05:18 to 1:05:48 | cleaned

• And he happens to have two boxes left. And I say, "Well, no, we've been trading a can of beans for ten boxes of matches." Well, Ernie says, "It's all I got and I want the beans. I'm sorry, you're not getting the beans unless I get ten boxes of matches." He says, that's where you need to beware, because when a man is hungry, when his family is down and out and starving, he will kill you and take the beans and go his way.

  #92 | 1:05:49 to 1:06:22 | cleaned

• What he's talking about is this: all of our neighbors that we love and we think we know, when they're hungry and their children are starving and their children are dying, guess what? They will turn on you if you have anything and they know that you have it in order to save their lives. So Selco says this: be wise as a serpent and harmless as a dove, don't let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, and don't let anybody know what you have or what you got, unless it's absolutely necessary.

  #93 | 1:06:26 to 1:07:06 | cleaned

• These are just some tips. These are just some things. And if you read these sites and read these books, I think it'll open your eyes to a lot of things that are very possible in our day and age. All right, well, our time is gone, let's have prayer. If you have questions, I'll try to answer them later. Father, in the name of Jesus Christ, we're thankful for Your love. We're thankful for Your truth.

  #94 | 1:07:08 to 1:07:35 | cleaned

• We pray that You would teach us, teach us biblical economics, teach us, Lord, how to live, how to discipline ourselves, how not to be ignorant on any subject in the Word of God. But Father, help us to bring our lives into conformity to the whole Word of God. And as we've heard this week, it's Christ for the whole man. And Father, may we be Thy children, and walk and talk as Thy children. In the name of Jesus Christ we ask and pray. Amen. Amen.

  #95 | 1:07:35 to 1:08:02 | cleaned

deepseek | deepseek-v4-pro | clean_readable_transcript | 2026-06-06T04:04:16Z