12 Keys of Discipleship
Key Nine: Ask Questions, Part 3
A Journey Without Purse or Script
A short time latter we began to accumulate a sizable mailing list with a significant number expressing interest in our work. Several even moved to Boise from various parts of the country. Most people though didn’t want to move to Boise to see us and we began to receive an increasing number of requests for us to go see them.
In particular there was a group in Phoenix that wanted us to come down, and the leader of the group told us that if we just made it down there that they would provide a place to stay and the funds to return.
After thinking about it we decided to make a trip. Our first stop was going to be the Salt Lake City, Utah, area where we had a number of people wanting to see us. Then we would swing by the Los Angeles, California, area and meet with some people there and then on to Arizona and back.
Before we left we had the harebrained idea to go without any money or credit cards. And where did we get that?
Jesus sent his apostles out without “purse or script” and told them people they taught would provide for their needs. Then in the days of Joseph Smith all the missionaries went without any funds and people provided for them despite their notorious reputation. We reasoned that if they could do it then we could do it. The fact that we had very little money at the time also made the idea appealing. We figured though that we should start with enough gas money to reach Salt Lake City, then we would depend on the people as did the apostles of old.
Our first stop on the way to Salt Lake City, Utah, was a Kentucky Fried Chicken near the Twin Falls, Idaho, area. I figured we had enough money for a few pieces of chicken, but Curtis had other ideas. He struck up a conversation with the manager who happened to be a cute looking young lady. After applying some charm he explained that we were on a mission from God (This was before the movie, “The Blues Brothers.”) and asked her to buy us lunch. To my surprise a few minutes later she brought to the table two large chicken dinners.
I congratulated him on his accomplishment and thought this may be a good sign. Maybe this living off the people was doable after all.
After we arrived at Salt Lake we started visiting several people on our mailing list. This was one area where we had a few actual Mormons on our list. The people we visited were interested in what we had to say, but aloof. They all wanted to keep one foot in the door of the church just in case the authorities were right. Getting any donations from them to help us on our way was like pulling teeth. By the end of the day we had maybe $5 and a donated book. The book was “The Keys of Enoch,” by J J Hurtak. This was supposed to be a revelation from God and we found it quite interesting.
We ended the day visiting the last person on our list, which was a young single mother. She was very sweet and sincere and our last chance to get enough money for gas to get to our next stop which was in the Las Vegas, Nevada, area. After answering some of her questions and explaining some teachings we told her of our situation and asked her if she could donate enough to fill up our tank. She said that she was in a bad way financially but would give us a couple dollars. We crossed our fingers and hoped we had enough gas money to get to our next stop.
She was gracious enough to feed us, but didn’t have a spare bedroom and offered to let us sleep on the floor of her small place. We accepted and took off to Las Vegas the next day.
We arrived at the next prospect’s place on fumes. We went out of our way to see this guy as he seemed to have much above average intelligence and seemed to be a true seeker.
We had a good visit with him and really liked him and wished he would move to Boise, Idaho, but he had pretty strong roots in the area. He gave us enough gas money to get to Los Angeles, California, and we spent a couple days there visiting with people on the list. One night we stayed with a kindly old couple and the next we didn’t have any place to stay, so we slept in a park.
Again we found getting donations of any kind was like pulling teeth but we thought we had enough gas money to get to Phoenix, Arizona. Once we got there we figured that the rest of the journey was a cinch for the leader had promised us enough money to take care of our travel expenses.
Again we arrived at our destination, but just barely as our tank was again near empty.
The group leader treated us amicably and told us the group had read some of the writings and were anxious to hear us address them. That evening around 15 people showed up and we talked to them mostly about the gathering principle. We found that most of the group felt that some type of apocalypse was coming soon, and most of them were not very group minded. Most just wanted to get some land in the wilderness and fend for himself when the expected collapse came. We met quite a few people of this mentality, as time passed, and came to call them “survivalists.”
Still they treated us well and we had a good visit with everyone till late in the evening. After everyone left we reminded the group leader of his promise to cover our travel expenses and told him we needed it then for we wanted to take off for home in the morning.
He looked a little startled and replied that he knew the group could come up with the money, but we should have hit them up for it while they were at the meeting.
We were beside ourselves and explained that we assumed that he was just going to give us the money and get it from the members himself.
“No,” he said. “That was not the plan.”
But he certainly gave us the impression that was the plan so we asked him if he could just give us enough money for gas and hit up the members themselves. He them explained that he was hard up at the moment and could maybe spare about five bucks (US dollars).
What were we supposed to do then, we asked for, we seemed to be stranded there. He then told us he would give us the address of some of the group who attended who lived nearby and we could visit them and ask for their assistance.
We didn’t want to do this at all but we had no choice so we took the names and the next day visited members from his list. Each visit was awkward and most didn’t have much money but by the end of the day we finally had enough money for gas to get home. As soon as we had enough money we took off and, outside of stopping at service stations, we drove straight home.
We felt ourselves fortunate to have survived the trip and be home in one piece. We concluded that going without purse or script wasn’t like it was in the old days. One difference was that the early apostles never had to worry about running out of gas.
“What can you say about a society that says that God is dead and Elvis is alive?” — Irv Kupcinet
June 1, 2009
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