Thank God that Bible-Truths has no paid workers. That is so much more blessed.
Having said that, if there is a cost for purchases of books or material, we should charge for that and not offer it free to those who can pay. Those who cannot pay, should be offered free.
I seen people say that they offer all their material free and then they place a offering link at the place where they can order freely. Very subtle, but what does that mean and does that not force people to give?
Any thoughts on this.
Gerry, Ray mentioned the "offering link" topic in one of his audio's. Apparently, there was a time when BT did have a link on the main page where people could give to the ministry via PayPal. If I recall correctly, Ray said that they would get less than $100 per month on average. He told Dennis to get rid of the link altogether - if people wanted to give to the ministry, they would have to seek it out on their own. Apparently, people started to give much more after that.
The problem with an offering link with a disclaimer saying, "if you can afford it, click here and make a donation, if not, we'll send it to you free" is:
(1) A lot of ministries do this, but those same ministries don't typically already offer the material on their site for free - The LOF series is already available for free, albeit not in book form.
(2) It can come across as some kind of ploy and I think many people are suspicious of the hidden motives of the many charlatans out there (and rightly so).
(3) When you say "if there is a cost for purchases of books or materials we should charge for that and not offer it free to those who can pay. Those who cannot pay, should be offered free. " --- Those who can pay, can simply go to Lulu and order it. All those who cannot pay, can simply send a PM to Addison and he'll pick up the tab.
Seriously, though, I think it would be up to us individually to pay for the book for those who can't afford it. I think the fact that everything is free at BT and there are no "give here" links, no matter how subtle or what the intentions are, exemplifies everything meant by "freely you received, freely give".