Our Country's Current Financial Crisis

I'd like to talk today about something that we're all concerned about, we're all faced with, and that's the current financial crisis facing the U.S. When we were at the feast on the Sunshine Coast, there was a Bible study given by Mr. Bradford on why God's financial system will last for a thousand years, and why man's doesn't. And I thought I would cover that today as far as something that we can profit from because we need to realize what's wrong with our financial system that we have. The Bible, when it describes this world, it describes the religious, financial, political systems as being Babylonian in nature, and that's true for all of them. Now, we tend to focus on the religion, and we don't realize that the others fall under that category. So what I'd like to do is to cover this information. We know that recently it's been mentioned about the enormous debt that we have here in the United States. The last Sabbath I was here, I mentioned in looking up on the internet that the total debt, federal, consumer, state, local, you know, in the United States is something like 55 trillion dollars.

The federal debt is 9 trillion dollars. Consumer debt is 2 trillion.

43 percent of American families spend more than they earn. That's a big problem. The average household has 8,000 dollars in credit card debt. The average card holder has 2.7 bank credit cards, 3.8 retail credit cards, 1.1 debit cards, a total of 7.6 cards per person. So that's the average person. Now some people, because I don't average that, have got a lot more than I do. So I mentioned the average household has 8,000 in credit card debt. That's up from 3,000 in the year 1990. And at an 18 percent interest rate, it would take 24 years to pay that off for 25 years and cost more than 24,000 dollars. The average interest rate on most credit cards today is 14.71. I'll give you an idea. And then the most recent Federal Reserve study shows that 43 percent of U.S. families spend more than they earn. On average, Americans spend a dollar 22 cents for every dollar they earn. So what that means is you're going in the hole. I mean, that's the picture in our country. You know, just sort of a snapshot of what the debt is. People owe money that they can't pay back. You know, that's a problem. Borrowing and debts are encouraged by lenders who make money on money that does not exist. And we'll talk about that more later. Money is lent on increasingly greater amounts to business, to governments, individuals, countries, other banks. And it seems like everybody is borrowing. It wasn't that many years ago that there wasn't such a thing as a credit card. You know, you didn't have a credit card. And so therefore, you didn't have that temptation. There was a time when banks lent money based on what they had in deposits. That means they lent one for one. For every dollar they had, they'd lend a dollar. So if the bank was worth a hundred million, they could lend a hundred million. Today, a bank can be worth a hundred million, and they can loan a billion. They don't have it. But they're loaning it because they think they'll get it back, and they'll make money on it. And so therefore, you know, they are making money. Right now, they're losing money.

So much money is lent that, you know, it has to be covered by deposits. And what it does, it gives an illusion of wealth. When you find this taking place, lending then requires regulations. And so there have been all kinds of regulations that have been set in motion in order to control what could be lent. The problem is, in the past few years, those regulations have been relaxed. And why have they been relaxed? Well, basically because of greed, for one thing. But secondarily, political pressure. Back in the 90s, it was thought by the politicians that everyone should be able to enjoy what we have come to know as the American dream. Everybody should be able to own a house. Now in order to own a house, you have to relax the requirements for borrowing. So people were lent money who could barely pay it back. They knew that they didn't have a lot of money, but we'll lend it to them, and hopefully they'll be able to pay it back. There was subprime loans. So those who got those type of loans were charged higher rates, stricter terms. Margages are then sold by the original lender to other institutions. Sometimes they're held by governments, companies. Actually, some of you may have your mortgages owned by the Chinese. It could be owned by the Russians. It could be owned by who knows what particular company. Now the reason for this is that loans are considered lucrative investments because of the high interest rates, the high returns, and there's also a high risk involved with this, as we all know. So since so many people are marginal, meaning they're already high in debt, any type of downturn in the economy, any type of downturn that's going to hit us, is going to create a snowball effect. And that's exactly what we've seen happening here in the past, a few months in the past year or two. Many of you have heard of Susie Orman. You see her on television a lot. She's written a number of books on finances.

And this is sort of a summary statement that she has made concerning what's happening today. A lot of you have built your personal financial foundation on deceits and lies.

You bought a home that you couldn't afford. You spend money like it was going out of style, and it wasn't your money to spend. When you borrow money, you leverage yourself. The United States of America leveraged itself so high that when it started to come down, the whole thing now has fallen down. Now, we're all familiar at the feast. We were over there in Australia, and the one thing that we could get was news about the bailout going on. The U.S. created a $700 billion package to cover the debts that is held by institutions, countries. Banks and funds and even countries will benefit from this money. And without it, nobody's going to lend money. So, you know, they're trying to pump money into the system. Our system today is based upon a simple principle, having money to lend. People aren't lending money, the system stops. So, you've got to pump money in there to keep it going. The government's plan has been readily described as a bailout, and really it's like an overprotective parent bailing out a delinquent child out of jail instead of letting him suffer the consequences of his actions. In psychological terms, it's called an enabler. What we're doing, we are enabling a lot of people who cannot afford it to own homes, and as a result, you know, we're going to try to help them along. Somewhere down the line, they'll probably not be able to pay for it anyway.

There is a principle in the Bible called the law of cause and effect.

Always protecting someone from the consequences of bad decision allows that person to continue to make bad decisions, to continue to go on a wrong course of action, and will eventually, in the future, lead to greater problems. There is a fundamental truth in the Bible that you reap what you sow, and eventually sin will lead to disaster, but righteousness will be rewarded. Now, the Bible says in Proverbs 22, verse 7, that the rich rules over the poor, and the borrower is servant to the lender. Now, this, I think, is a true statement, and we see it happening today.

Who is it who lends to the poor? It's not the poor, it's the rich, and they're getting richer off of whom? The poor, you know, off of those who don't have it. God did not want this to happen, and under his system, it will not happen.

The problem, basically, is greed. It's greed on both parties. It's greed on the lender, because he's wanting to make more money, make it faster. It's greed on the person who's borrowing it, because he's not willing to buy his time and wait, earn it. The problem, many times, is power, security, wealth for a few at the expense of the many. And so, it creates problems.

It creates debt, it creates borrowing, and it creates greed. And the theory is, you create debt and borrowing. In other words, by doing this, by creating debt and by creating borrowing, you have more prosperity. And this is exactly what's happened over the last few years. I mean, when people who could not afford houses were buying houses for nothing down, or you're paying very little down, or borrowing 110%, 120% off of that house, you know, there have been situations, this has happened over in Australia also, where people borrowed 110%, so all the closing costs are covered, everything is covered, and they get a free vacation to Hawaii to go along with it. So, I mean, who can turn down such a good deal? I mean, that's what happens. But in the millennium, in the future, when Jesus Christ comes back to the earth, sets his government up on the earth, that is not going to be the millennial system. That is not going to be what God will have. Let's notice Micah chapter 4 verse 4. Micah 4 verse 4. We find a principle here that everyone in the future will sit under his vine and under his fig tree, and no one shall make them afraid, for the mouth of the Lord of Host has spoken. And then verse 3, God says, he shall judge between many people, rebuke strong nations afar off, they shall beat their swords into plowshares and their spheres into pruning hooks, nation shall not lift up sword against nation, and neither shall they learn war anymore, God says. Now, the principle I read in verse 4, that everyone shall sit under his vine and under his fig tree, is that an economic principle? I say that it is. That in the millennium, everybody is going to be a landowner, and everyone is going to have to figure out how to make his land productive. He's going to own property, he's going to own land, and he's going to have to make it productive. And what you'll find in the millennium, this will be the greatest land reform since Israel settled Canaan and moved into the Promised Land. You might remember back in Numbers 33 verse 54, Numbers chapter 33 verse 54, the first great land reform, that when God brought Israel into the Promised Land, notice what he did. They didn't come in and everyone started staking out the best claim. It wasn't like the rush for land out in Oklahoma and out in that area back in the 1800s. Now, God says this, verse 54, Numbers 33, you shall divide the land by lot as an inheritance among your families. To the large, you should give a larger inheritance. To the smaller, you shall give a smaller inheritance. There, everyone, inheritance, shall be what falls to him by a lot, you shall inherit according to your tribes by your fathers. So God had them to cast lots to determine where the tribes would settle. Smaller family, when I say a small family, maybe husband and wife, one child versus a family of 10 children, one would get more property, the other would get less.

And what you find is when they came into the land, they didn't have to pay for the land, the land was given to them. They had it. It was theirs. They didn't have to pay taxes on it. They didn't have to pay for the land. God gave them the land. Now, when God starts the world tomorrow off, he will settle nations, not only Israel, but all nations will be settled in the countries where God says they should be. And he will bring us, when I say us, Manasseh, back here. Ephraim will go back to Britain, will go back to South Africa, will go back to Australia, to where the Commonwealth nations are. They will be resettled, and people will be given property. What you find is the family unit is the basis of economy, or should be the basis of economy for all nations.

In Deuteronomy chapter 14 and verse 22, we find this principle. You shall truly tithe all the increase of your grain that the field produces year by year.

So they were to tithe, but what did they tithe on? Well, they had an increase every year.

The land was productive, so a family was given the means of having increase through their own productive labor. If you were willing to work hard, you were willing to get out and work the land, you would have a crop, and it would be an increase that you could live off of, and that you might sell to others, because not everybody, you know, some people lived in the cities, not everybody lived out. In Deuteronomy 14.23, sometimes people feel that Israel had nothing but a barter system. They were just agrarian, and all they had was barter, but that's not true. Let's notice here in Deuteronomy 14 verse 23, the principle again concerning the tithe says, you shall eat before the Lord your God in a place where he chooses to make his name abide, the tithe of your grain, of your new wine, of your oil, the first born of your herds, of your flocks, that you may learn to fear the Lord your God always. This is talking about what we call the festival tithe or second tithe.

And if the journey is too long for you so that you're not able to carry the tithe or the place where the Lord your God chooses to put his name is too far from you or the Lord or when the Lord has blessed you. Notice verse 25, then you shall exchange it for money. Take the money in your hand and go to the place which the Lord your God chooses. So it was not just a barter system. There was money that was used as a medium of exchange for goods and services at that time.

Now here is where the problem enters in. When you have money and people want to borrow money, there are those who are going to want to make money off of people borrowing money, right? Where do you find all of this wealth coming from? Well, it's because of usury. Now in the Bible, God told Israel not to use usury against their own brethren.

Exodus chapter 22 verse 25. God very clearly makes this statement, Exodus chapter 22 verse 25. If you lend to any of my people who are poor among you, you shall not be like the money lenders to him.

Remember Christ came into the temple and overthrew the money changers tables. God says, you shall not be like a money lender to him. You shall not charge him interest. No interest. Period. None. Verse 26. If you ever take your neighbor's garment as a pledge, you shall return it to him before the sun goes down. For that is his only covering. It is his garment for his skin. What will he sleep in? And it will be that when he cries to me, I will hear, for I am gracious. So usury mentioned here is not just an exorbitant interest, but any amount of interest. What was taking place here? Well, taking a pledge.

If you loan money to somebody who was poor, there was a pledge that you could take from the individual showing that he owed you money. Now, if the only thing he had was his cloak, which would be his outer garment that he would have, then at night you'd have to give it back to him so he would have something to cover himself to sleep. A hundred. Now, this would encourage the person, though, to pay it back quickly. It's very tiresome every night to go back, get your cloak, come back, go to sleep every morning, bring it back, and you'll get it. So it would encourage a person to go ahead and pay it back very quickly. A lender had a right to expect a pledge which was a token of promise that the person would pay it back. So the loan, though, was without interest. In Deuteronomy 23, verse 19, we also find the same principle mentioned here. Deuteronomy 23, verse 19, you shall not charge interest to your brother.

Interest on money or food or anything that is lent out at interest. But, verse 20, to a foreigner you may charge interest. See, a non-Israelite, they could charge interest. But to your brother you shall not charge interest, that the Lord your God may bless you and all which you set your hand in the land when you are entered in to possess.

So to a brother you could not, to a foreigner you could. Now why? Well, God promised that He would bless the person who would be willing to do this, that they would be blessed. God wanted His nation to be prosperous. He wanted Israel to prosper.

You would not lend to an Israelite on interest. This ensured that there could be credit without multiplying debt. So get the principle. There would be credit, but you would not multiply the debt. The only debt would be the money that was borrowed. Now why did God forbid interest? An interest from an Israelite to another. Any form of gain made at the harmful expense of another person was forbidden by God.

The enormous sums involved in interest charge alone. Enslaves individuals. Enslaves entire nations.

And puts people into financial bondage.

Usury is the most destructive principle for the economy of any society.

And it puts a tremendous burden. Look at what the U.S. government is. How will we ever pay off the $9 trillion that we owe? If we do, it's going to be a tremendous burden. High interest rates increase the cost of production.

If a corporation has to borrow money for investments, it robs a nation of the wealth. And it encourages financial parasites. Our entire economic and social structure is built on the false principle, which God calls an abomination in His word. And yet it's something today that people just sort of accept and don't even think about.

In the book of Nehemiah, chapter 5, let's go back to the book of Nehemiah. Nehemiah chapter 5. We find a very interesting principle here.

Nehemiah 5 will begin in verse 1.

Notice what happened here.

They had come back out of captivity, the Jews had, and notice there was a great outcry here.

There was a great outcry of the people and their wives against their Jewish brethren.

For there were those who said, We, our sons, our daughters, are many. Therefore, let us get grain that we may eat and live. So they come back, they don't have anything to eat.

And there were some who said, we have mortgaged our lands, and our vineyards, and our houses that we might buy grain because of the famine.

So there was famine at that time. There were those who had cash, who had money, and they took advantage of the hard times. And they were buying up people's properties, buying up their homes, taking slaves, and taking advantage of them. We read in verse 4, there were also those who said, we have borrowed money for the king's tax on our land and vineyards. So another problem was taxation of the lands and vineyards. This was by the king of Persia at that time. God's system did not have taxes on the land. All God's system required was 10% tithe. That 10% tithe went to the administrators, went to the priests, went to the Levites at that time.

The tax that Israel paid was a tithe of the increase. Look at how difficult it becomes today.

What if you're a farmer today and you own 200 acres and you had to buy that property for, I'll just use a low figure, a thousand dollars an acre. Well, you got to go out and borrow $200,000. It would normally be a little more expensive than that. So you're making a land payment, right, for that $200,000. So you got to produce enough to make your land payment every year. You got to pay taxes on that property, and you're still paying first tithe and second tithe on your income. You know, you're paying school taxes and whatever other taxes that you have. And look at the taxes that people, you pay your federal income tax, and you go on and on and on all of the taxes that people are paying. Would it not be wonderful to live under a system where you don't have to pay for the property? The only thing you do is to pay 10% of your income. That's it. You're through. You're done. And you set aside your festival tithe. You go to the feast every year, and everything else you produce is yours. And you're able to live off of it or sell it to others.

Well, we had a problem here in verse 5. It says, Yet now our flesh is as the flesh of our brethren and our children as their children. And indeed, we are forcing our sons and our daughters to be slaves. And some of our daughters have been brought into slavery. Yet it is not in our power to redeem them, in other words, to buy them back, for other men have our lands and our vineyards. And I became very angry when I heard their outcry in these words. After serious thought, I rebuked the nobles and the rulers and said to them, Each of you is exacting usury from his brother. So I called a great assembly against them.

And I said to them, According to our ability, we redeemed our Jewish brethren who were sold to the other nations. So they took whatever funds they had and they bought those who had been sold into slavery. Now indeed, will you even sell your brethren, or should they be sold to us? Then they were silenced and found nothing to say. Then I said, What you are doing is not good. Should you not walk in the fear of our God because of the reproach of the nations, our enemies? I also with my brethren and my servants am lending them money and grain. Please let us stop this usury. Stop buying and resorting to usury. Restore now to lend even this day their lands, their vineyards, their olive groves, their houses, also a hundredth of the money and the grain and the new one and the oil that you have charged them.

And so he made them undo this. Now it's interesting, those who were judges of the land are elders back at this time. Judge cases, they sat in the gates, and you read in the Bible about the elders who sat in the gate to judge the people, were all volunteers. They became volunteers because they were prosperous enough and had sufficient income that they were freeing, had time that they could free up to contribute to the community at large. These were the elders who sat in the gates and judged the people. Now the same thing happened in the early days of the United States. Many of those who became statesmen in this country had their own holdings, had large holdings. They were able to leave their holdings in the hands of others to take care of, and they went about establishing this country and establishing this nation. Actually, in the early parts of this country, people went to war at their own expense because they were, in many cases, able to do it. Under God's system, brethren, there is no such thing as long-term debt. No long-term debt. Deuteronomy 15 shows that every seventh year was a year of release, and all debts were forgiven. Let's go back to Deuteronomy chapter 15, and we'll begin to read here in verse 1. 1. At the end of every seventh year you shall grant a release of debt. Margin says, remission of debt, and this is the form of the remission. Every creditor who has lent anything to his neighbor shall release it.

And in other words, he cancels the debt, as the margin says. He shall not require it of his neighbor or his brother because it is called the Lord's release. Of a foreigner you may require it, but you shall give up your claim to what is owed by your brother.

Okay, so you loan your brother a thousand dollars.

Seventh year comes along, he's paid you five hundred dollars back. Still owes you five hundred dollars. You forgive the loan. It's wiped clean. He no longer owes you the five hundred dollars. Now, you would think, well, in that case, I'll never lend money to anyone because I'll never get it back. Well, let's go on and read what God had to say here.

Except, verse 4, he says, when there may be no poor among you, for the Lord will greatly bless you in the land which the Lord your God gives you to possess as an inheritance. Only be careful to obey the voice of the Lord your God to observe with care all these commandments which I command you today, for the Lord your God will bless you just as he promised you and you shall lend to many nations, but you shall not borrow. What are we doing today as a nation? We're borrowing money from all of the nations. They owe us, or I should say own us, because of our debt. You shall reign over many nations, but they shall not reign over you.

If there is among you a poor man of your brethren, within any of the gates in your land which the Lord your God is giving you, and you shall not harden your heart nor shut your hand from your poor brother, but you shall open your hand wide to him and willingly lend him sufficient for his need whatever he needs. So you had to lend to him. Beware!

Remember I mentioned earlier about, well, in that case, I won't lend money. Beware, lest there be a wicked thought in your heart, saying, the seventh year the year release is at hand, and your eye be evil against your poor brother, and you give him nothing, and he cry out to the Lord against you, and become sin among you. You shall surely give to him, and your heart shall not be grieved when you give to him, because for this thing the Lord your God will bless you. See, it takes a certain amount of faith, doesn't it, to do that, to lend. Let's say it's the fifth year. You only have two years for the person to pay the debt back, and you lend. He still owes you. You forgive him when the seventh year comes around, and God says, I will bless you. So God will personally bless you as a result of that. That takes faith to be able to do that. For the poor, verse 11, will never cease from the land. Therefore I command you, saying, you shall open your hand wide to your brother, to the poor, to the needy, in your land.

Now, imagine the effect that this would have on the economy today. A person would be productive, contributing his own wealth and the wealth of the nation because he's released from his debt. But also, he remains productive and is able to pay back his debt. He has his property. He can pay his debt back. This means that people would try to be as responsible as they could and not get into debt. They would be, in fact, working to pay their debt off.

Now, there were also laws that God gave Israel. And you might remember these principles, that there were certain ones because of circumstances who required support. The elderly, the fatherless, the widow, and the poor Levite. Remember them being named in the Scripture? There was a tithe that people set aside to take care of those people. In Deuteronomy 14, verses 28 and 29, what we call the third tithe was set aside to help these people. Third and sixth year of a seven-year cycle. At the end of every third year, you shall bring out the tithe of your produce that year and store it up within your gates. And the Levite, because he has no portion or inheritance with you, the stranger, the fatherless, and the widow who are within your gates may come and eat and be satisfied that the Lord your God may bless you and all the work of your hand which you do.

So here we find that there was a third tithe to help the needy. Now, in Deuteronomy chapter 16, verse 11, notice, out of the second tithe, they also were to help the poor and those who we would consider as helpers, those who were indentured slaves at that time or servants of them. Beginning in verse 11, you shall rejoice before the Lord your God, you and your son and your daughter, your male servant and your female servant. So it's talking about the male servant, the female servant, the Levite that is within your gate, the stranger, the fatherless, the widows who are among you at the place which the Lord your God chooses to make his name abide. You shall remember that you were slaves in Egypt. In verse 14, you shall rejoice in your feast, your son, your daughter, your male servant, female, the Levite, the stranger, the fatherless, the widows who are within your gates. So you find that they were to help the needy at that time by their extra second tithe, that they would be blessed and by the surplus they would have they would be able to help those who are needy.

Now turn over to chapter 24, the book of Deuteronomy, and you'll find another principle that God gave for the needy, for the poor. You see, we don't apply these principles today.

I mean, we do in the church, but society as a whole is not. And as a result, you find we're suffering. In verse chapter 24 verse 19, When you reap your harvest in your field and forget a sheaf in the field, you shall not go back to get it. It shall be for the stranger, the fatherless, the widow, that the Lord your God may bless you in all the work of your hands. And when you beat your olive trees, you shall not go for the bowels again. It shall be for the stranger, the fatherless, and the widows. But I want you to notice, you have a tree out here, you gather all of the olives off of it, and you don't get every last one. Or an apple tree, you don't get every last apple. And you're a widow, or you're a stranger, you're a fatherless. You have to go out and pick it. It doesn't say that they had to go pick it and give it to you. It's there for the taking. So there's a certain amount of responsibility on the person who is needy that is not just a free will society. Here it is. They had to go out and pick it. And when you gather the grapes of your vineyard, you shall not glean it afterwards. It shall be for the stranger, the fatherless, and also for the widow. Now notice Leviticus 19 and verse 9 adds an additional fact about this. Leviticus 19 and verse 9, When you reap the harvest of your land, you shall not wholly reap the corners of your field. Not to go into the corners, square them off, get every last piece of grain out of the corners, you round your corners. And you leave what's in the corners of the field. Nor shall you gather the glaining of your harvest, and you shall not glean your vineyards, nor shall you gather every grape of your vineyard. You shall leave them for the poor and the stranger. I am the Lord your God. So you'll notice, unlike the U.S. government with all of its handouts, there were provisions made for the needy, for the poor, and for the elderly to be able to take care of them. But they had to go out and work also. And you know our welfare system where people have to go work is not unlike what God says here. If you want it, go work for it, and they would be given it. Now, in Deuteronomy 28, in verse 12, Deuteronomy 28, verse 12, let's notice again what God said He would do. And God will do this for any nation on earth, and will do it for all nations in the millennium.

Except all nations in the millennium will be blessed by God, and there's not going to be a great deal of need to lend to all nations. But let's apply this principle today. There was a time when this applied to the United States and Britain.

The Lord will open to you His good treasure, verse 12, the heavens to give rain to your land in its season, and to bless all the works of your hand, and you shall lend to many nations, and you shall not borrow.

And the Lord will make you the head not to tail, you shall be above only, and shall not be beneath, if you heed the commandments of the Lord your God, which I command you today, and are careful to observe them. And it wasn't until we came after the Great Depression, the New Deal, that we began to tax the people, we began to have all of these programs, and what you find today, we have reverted. We are no longer the lender, we are the borrower.

Now, there is a second great economic principle that God gives. We've covered one of them, that is the year release, when debts were forgiven, and all of the principles surrounding that. But there is a second great economic principle that God gives. It's called the Jubilee, the Jubilee Year, Leviticus 25 verse 8. Leviticus chapter 25 and verse 8.

Notice this principle. You shall count seven Sabbaths of years for yourself, seven times seven years, the time of the seventh Sabbath of years shall be to you forty-nine years. And you shall cause the trumpet of the Jubilee to sound on the tenth day of the seventh month, on the day of atonement, and you shall make the trumpet to sound throughout all the land. And you shall consecrate the fiftieth year and proclaim liberty throughout all the land to all of the inhabitants. It shall be a Jubilee for you, and each of you shall return to his possession, and each of you shall return to his family. A person's land could not be sold in perpetuity.

Every fifty years it came back to the family. So you had another start. You could start all over again, or your children could start all over again. The fiftieth year, verse 11, shall be a Jubilee to you. In it you shall neither sow nor reap what grows of its own accord, of its own accord, nor gather the grapes of your untended vines. For it's a Jubilee. Shall be holy to you. You shall eat its produce from the land. This is the year of Jubilee. Each of you shall return to his possession. If you sell anything to your neighbor, you buy from your neighbor's hand. You shall not oppress one another. According to the number of years after the Jubilee, you shall buy from your neighbor. According to the number of years of crops, he shall sell to you. According to the multitude of years, you shall increase its price, and according to the fewer number of years, you shall diminish its price. For he sells to you according to the number of years of the crops. So what you find, the land returned to the original owner, it could be redeemed, meaning bought back or paid for before the fiftieth year, if you had the money to do so. So basically what you had, you don't have land speculation here. What you have, if a man wants to sell his property, it's according to how many years to the Jubilee that you can produce a crop. If it's 10 years to the Jubilee that you can produce a crop, it's what he's willing to pay you for that 10 years. If it's 20 years, he's going to pay you more because he can produce a crop for 20 years. If it's 30 years, then he'll produce a crop for 30 years. He pays more. So if it's one year, he'll only pay you for one year. So it does away with the land speculation, as we know it. Verse 23, the land shall not be sold permanently, for the land is mine. You are strangers and sojourners with me. So God gave them the land. He allowed them to use the land. So every 50th year, you could start all over again, or your family could start all over again.

Brother, why is the bailout that the U.S. government has right now? Why is it not going to work? It may, for a short period of time, appear to, but let's notice Deuteronomy 28 and verse 29.

Deuteronomy 28 and verse 29. We'll just take a principle here. There's coming a time, God says, here in the future for our people. That you shall grope at noonday, as a blind man gropes in darkness. You shall not prosper in your ways. You shall be only oppressed and plundered continually. And no one shall save you. You shall betrothal life, but another man shall lie with her. You shall build a house, but you shall not dwell in it. You shall plant a vineyard, and shall not gather its grapes. Your ox shall be slaughtered before your eyes. You shall not eat it. Your donkey shall be violently taken away from before you. You shall not be restored to you.

Your sheep shall be taken to your enemies, and you shall have no one to rescue them. Now, basically, if you apply the principle, God is talking about our people going into slavery here. But in one sense, this is already happening. Others with cash have come in now, and they own our country. They buy our assets. They buy our properties. They buy our corporations, because we don't have the money, and we work for them.

They become a lender, and we'll be happy to do so. You know, our people today won't think anything of it, because money is flowing again. You know, once the money is flowing, banks start lending money to banks, and people start borrowing money again. The economy begins to perk up. Business continues to do better. Everybody thinks it's great without realizing the problem that we are in. What do these two laws accomplish for any nation, any people who apply them? And again, these are national laws.

These are laws that apply to a nation that a nation puts into practice. What happens is this. You do not accumulate wealth in the hands of the few. The wealth is distributed among everyone. It maintains a base of income for even the poor. It does not allow a great, impoverished class of people to develop. You may have some poor people, but as a whole, most people are going to prosper. You don't have an impoverished class. The increase of a nation through wealth distribution in a proper way. See, accumulation of wealth into the hands of a few large agricultural businesses or large corporations will not apply. Family holdings will thrive.

You'll basically have a situation like we had a hundred years ago, 60, 80 years ago in this country, where most people lived in rural areas, had a small piece of property, and could live off of that. Contrast this. Have you ever seen pictures of the agricultural business where, let's just say, cattle industry, where you have 80, 90, 100,000 cows and pens, and they hardly have room to move?

They come along and they give them a gruel or some type of food to eat in troughs. They stick their heads out and they eat out of these troughs, and they're living in the muck and the mire. You know, when you've got that many cows, nobody's going to go in there and throw out the muck and the mire that is produced, and they're living in that stuff. They're giving them drugs. They're giving them everything that they can think of, the medicines to try to keep them healthy, and then they slaughter them, and you and I buy it in the stores, and we wonder why we get sick.

As opposed to somebody who maybe has 25 acres out here, he's got a couple of cows, a goat, he's got a few chickens, he's got a few trees, apple trees, pear tree, this type of thing. He grows a garden. His wife cans, freezes. They slaughter a calf or a cow every year, put it up. Maybe they've got a fish pond out here. They fish. They grow their food organically. Isn't that a much more healthy situation than what we see today, where big businesses own farms? You know, little man can't produce today and compete, so therefore what happens?

They're driven out of business. Big companies buy them up. They had tens of thousands of acres, and so they, you know, thousands of acres of soybeans over here, thousands of acres of corn over there, ten thousands of acres of wheat over here, and it's big business.

And the principle is to grow it as fast as it will grow, produce as many crops as you can. If you can produce two crops instead of one or three instead of two, and you'll do it as fast as you can, put as much fertilizer on it, and produce crops, that's exactly what we see happening.

And consequently, we all suffer. Remember the principle we read back in Micah 4-4, that every man will sit under his vine and under his fig tree? Everyone in the future will be secure on their land by laws established by the government, and those laws cannot be changed by human rulers. We will be the rulers. We will see that those laws are applied. We have one example in the Bible. You might turn back here to 1 Kings chapter 21, in verse 2, where King Ahab was about to violate this principle. In 1 Kings chapter 21 verse 2, So Ahab spoke to Naboth, saying, Give me your vineyard, that I may have it for a vegetable garden, because it's near next to my house.

For it I will give you a vineyard better than it, or if it seems good to you, I'll give you money. Verse 3, Naboth said to Ahab, The Lord forbid that I should give the inheritance of my father to you. Now this is the land that I inherited. I can't give it to you. This is my inheritance. Well, you find that he was killed over that vineyard.

Well, this is the principle that you do not sell your vineyard or your inheritance forever.

It could not be sold forever. He could sell it to him, let him use it, and then it would come back to him. You'll find, as Deuteronomy 2717 says, cursed is everyone who removes his neighbor's landmark.

So what you find is that you couldn't go around moving landmarks and taking other people's property and belong to them. In the future, there will not be any inflation, as we know today. God's system does away with inflation. Deuteronomy chapter 25 verse 15.

Deuteronomy 25.15 says, you shall have a perfect and just weight, a perfect and just measure, that your days may be lengthened in the land which the Lord your God is giving you. And then verse 13, you shall not have in your bag differing weights, a heavy and a light. No, you were to have one weight. Couldn't say, oh yeah, let me give you a pound, and it's only 15 ounces or 12 ounces or something else. With the institution of God's system that God gave to ancient Israel, inflation simply did not exist. Abundance from the farm or factory would see corresponding increase in the volume of money and circulation, because money would be based on what was produced, increase, not just speculation. A person's wealth in the millennium and in ancient Israel was based on what he produced. We no longer are a producing nation.

And what do we make here? We are a service-oriented society. China, everything comes from China today. They're producing Mexico, you know, many other countries. There was a value to what was produced and to produce a stability in what people possessed. So what you find again, the property, the land could not be sold forever, and it was not what a seller could get for it. Today, people speculate, don't they? I buy a house today for, let's just use a figure, 100,000. I keep it 10 years. I sell it for 150,000, I hope. Somebody else buys it for 150,000. He hopes 10 years later he can sell for 200,000. Person buys it for 200,000. He hopes 20 years from now he can sell for 300,000. Same house, it was valued at 100,000. Now it's 300,000. Money keeps going up, more money in circulation, and is that house actually worth that much more? No, it's just speculation. And that's exactly what we saw happening. Was it not with oil recently? In the commodities market, speculators were going out speculating because of the tight amount of oil. They started running the prices up. They speculated and started buying it for $75 a barrel, then 90, then 100, then 140, and on up. And so it jacked the price up. Now what's happened? People can't afford to buy it? It's coming down. I mean, I was shocked. I came home from Australia. When I left, gasoline was around $385. Come back $259. You can find it in some places. Tremendous drop. Now gas is selling for $60 a barrel, and the speculators have had to back off. All that was was people thinking that here's something that's going to be needed. Let's run the price up. We'll make money. And what they were trying to do is to gouge you or take advantage of you. Then there are those who produce that. In other words, who are producing the oil. They start cutting back, hoping that they can get more money because they're producing less. And so it's all based upon greed. Have you ever realized that goods in the hands of merchants who then value the price or set the price, and as soon as it passes into your hands, its value decreases?

Car. You go out and buy an automobile. You drive it off the lot and it loses what?

$4,000 or $5,000 in value? Simply because you drove it off the lot. Now, who set the price? Well, the person who is selling it. The same holds true regarding practically all production. You find that those who sell it enrich themselves while the person who produces it gets very little. The farmer goes out here and works like a dog producing crops. He gets very little. Maybe he gets three or four dollars for a bushel of wheat. The person who buys it, takes it, manufactures it, and then sells it. The person who puts it in the store gives you a loaf of bread. Maybe he can make 50 loaves of bread out of that wheat. He sells it to you for a dollar and a half or two dollars a loaf. Who's making the money? He sets the value. He can come in and say whatever the price is going to be. The problem is the failure to fix a standard of value.

The product can be valued at anything. So whatever they think they can get for it, that's what they'll sell it for. That's the problem that we run into in our society today. But notice Leviticus 27 and verse 25. Leviticus 27, 25.

All your valuations shall be according to the shekel of the sanctuary. 20 gira to the shekel.

20 gira to the shekel. Now, God intended that Israel should adopt a standard of value.

The shekel of the sanctuary was a standard weight that was kept in the tabernacle, and this was the stabilizing factor in the economy. Now today we have standards, do we not? We know what a foot is. It's 12 inches. We know what a yard is. It's 36 inches. We know what a mile is, 5,280 feet. We know what an acre is. Some do. We know what a pound is, how much it weighs. We know how much a ton weighs. All of those are set standards. When it comes to the value of money, it's not set. In ancient Israel, it was pegged according to what the shekel in the tabernacle, or the shekel in the temple, was. 20 gira.

Everything today has standards except money. In times past, money was weighed, and the value was set by silver and gold.

What happened to us when we went off the gold and the silver standard? There was nothing backing our money up. It's just no value behind it. When you have gold and silver behind every dollar you have, you've got something in value. But when you don't, see the shekel could be weighed. You could have money back then if you had a pound of silver. It was worth so much based upon what the shekel was worth.

In the old days, because of this, they had what they called coins shaving.

People would take coins and they would shave the coin. They would shave a few shaves off of the silver. After a while, they'd have enough to make a new coin. And so, they were always doing that.

Today, we do it in a little different way. We keep changing the value of money. Inflation keeps money rising.

If we don't have enough money, the federal government just goes out and prints a little more. Now, we got more money, but it's not worth anything.

The current situation, people who wanted money wanted loans. They were given loans. Now, in the past, you had to put 10% at the least, 20% down in order to buy a house.

Well, then the regulations were changed, as I mentioned earlier. It was reduced to 5%. Then it was reduced. You didn't have to have anything.

Then they started charging veritable rates.

After a year, two years, five years, whatever the variable rate loan, the rates increased.

People were not able to pay what they had.

They gave people money who didn't earn it, didn't have the money to pay it back.

It was not backed up by any value.

They had nothing backing that money.

Sold them houses that were worth more than what they sold them for.

Look at what happened in Florida. Look at what happened in Phoenix, in New Jersey, in New York, in California. Houses. You go out in California and you can pay half a million dollars for a one-bath, two-bedroom home. You're sitting in a little lot somewhere.

You can buy that same house here for $40,000, $50,000.

You find that totally inflating the value of the house.

Under God's system, that just simply did not happen. Okay. Lending institutions can lend out money that they don't have.

One-to-one lending ratio no longer is applicable. It's based on the money they think they're going to get back that's going to come back to them.

Who benefits the rich? Who suffers the poor?

You know, those who are needy. Those who have money control it. They make money. Those who don't have money pay higher interest.

They're taken advantage of.

You read in the Bible, brethren, all kinds of scriptures where God indicts our people for taking advantage of the elderly, the whittle, the poor.

That's exactly what we find happen. The rich get richer, the poor are paying extremely high rates because they don't have the money. The rich have the money, but it's not backed up by goods or services.

Everybody suffers in the long run, you know, according to this system.

So why won't the bailout work?

Well, we're just paying, creating more money to pay off bad debts. And it's not going to solve the problem. Let's just read Amos, just one scripture. There are a number of scriptures that you could read, but Amos chapter 8, where God indicts our people. In verse 4, Amos 8, 4, Hear this, you who swallow up the needy, who make the poor the land fail, saying, When will a new moon be passed, that we may eat grain, and the Sabbath, that we may trade wheat? Making the ephod small and the shekel large. See, they change the value of the shekel, falsifying the scales by deceit, that we may buy the poor for silver and the needy for a pair of sandals, even sell the bad wheat.

And so God goes on to say that, you know, He will punish them for doing so.

So, brethren, what's wrong with paying as you go?

You got the money? You can buy it? Buy it. Well, there's nothing wrong with that. Pay for what you want and what you need when you have the money to do it.

See, we have whole generations that have grown up thinking, that when I get married, all I have to do is go out. You know, how do they start life off? Well, they buy a car, and they own a car. For the year or two, they buy a house, and they own the house. They need the stereo. They need the wide, big-screen TVs. You know, they furnish a house, and they go deep in debt.

And, well, you hear the commercials on TV. You owe it to yourself. You shouldn't be without it. And so, you know, people go into debt.

People are given means to earn by just going out and borrowing, not by productive effort. As they earn and save, then they can buy.

If you produce more, you earn more, you can buy more. It's that simple. Earn more, produce more, buy more.

The value should stay the same. The shekel is the same value. It stays the same. People become better. They adhere to true values of work through productive effort, and there are no shortcuts. You know, you stay the same.

God says in the future in Isaiah 65 that people will build houses, plant vineyards, and they will be as the days of a tree. In other words, they will live long lives. They will enjoy the work of their hands, and they will pass what they have off to their offspring.

So, brethren, in the future, people will not have the tax burdens we have today.

Look at the tax burdens today.

They will not be suffering from the inability to make and pay use repayments.

What happens when you die today? You have to pay a death tax. You have an inheritance tax. You have property taxes. It can take half of what you earn. In ancient Israel, that was not true. If it were true, stop and think.

If in ancient Israel you died, and let's just choose a figure, 10% of what you own goes to the Levite.

And then your children die. 10% of what you gave them goes to the Levite. And then your grandchildren die. And 10% of what they have goes to the Levite. After 10 generations, guess who owns everything? The Levite. Well, that's not what God said. He said the property belongs to the family.

And there was no inheritance tax on the property. It just belonged to you. You passed it on from generation to generation. So what you find, God's system includes no interest, interest, you increase from what you produce, and then you procure more because you have the money, and it's all through your own effort. Remember the parable of the talent? That God invested his goods, gave it to his family, and he expected them to go out and produce.

And you and I have to go out, we have to work at it. As Proverbs 31, 11 says, wealth gotten by vanity shall be diminished, but that gathered by labor shall increase, and that a good man leaves an inheritance for his children's children.

So the point is that for a thousand years in the future, God's system will work, people will produce, and generation after generation will produce more.

People will develop character, they will be taught right values, and they will grow up with the right character.

Actually, by the end of the millennium, people will be producing enough that they will be able to take care of the billions who come up in the Great White Throne Judgment. By the time those people come up, the earth will be so productive. People have been blessed so much, and the houses and the property and the lands will be there, that the billions who come up at that time will be able to be assimilated into society and looked after and be able to live.

God's way works, brother. Man's way does not.

So, we need to realize that God's system, as it will be instituted in the world tomorrow, will bring about a wonderful life for all people.

And all nations will adhere to that, and God will bless people.

Today, we don't find that blessing. We find that the seeds of destruction have been sown within our nation, and that we are right on the cusp of going over the cliff, and as a nation, being destroyed.

When you read in the Bible, and this is for another day, where it says in the book of Ezekiel, that when the trumpet sounds that we will not be able to go to war, if you ever stop to think, you look at our military today, we're the biggest, powerful, most powerful military force on the face of the earth. That that could also be speaking economically of us, that there will come a time when we will fall flat on our face, and we will owe everybody else, and we will have nothing that we can stand up and be able to go with.

It takes money to be able to fight a war, and if we have no money, and other nations won't loan it to us, we will be in deep trouble. So, brethren, let's be thankful for this, for the understanding of these principles, because one day you're going to have to apply these principles, and teach the nations, and the cities, and the world tomorrow how to live under God's system.