Herbert W Armstrong

RADIO CHURCH OF GOD
WORLD HEADQUARTERS
PASADENA, CALIFORNIA

HERBERT W. ARMSTRONG
PRESIDENT and PASTOR

Broadcasting The WORLD TOMORROW
Publishers of The PLAIN TRUTH

June 20, 1958

Dear Brethren of the Church of God:

   Again, GREETINGS, in Jesus' name!

   Here is BIG NEWS for all members of God's true Church! The construction engineers are now on the building site, and the actual work on the huge new Tabernacle is under way! The contract for the building of the big new Tabernacle near Gladewater, Texas, has been signed. Beyond any doubt it is the biggest contract entered into by God's Church in 100 years—perhaps for all time.

   I was not able to send the construction company in Nebraska the full amount of down payment they demanded. They finally agreed to divide that payment, letting us pay half of it now and the other half a month from now. This extension is giving us enough time to raise the full amount, so we could go ahead and have the Tabernacle for this coming fall festival.

   They required that I sign the contract personally, as well as signing it as president of the Radio Church of God. That is, I was required to sign it twice—once as president and pastor of the Church, and once personally, making me, personally, liable for the payment of the entire amount, $328,500.

   Brethren and fellow-laborers, I have to look to YOU to stand back of me that this next month's equally heavy payment may be met—and then EVERY payment thereafter until the entire $328,500 is paid, about 13 or 14 months from now. That means we have to meet a tremendous $56,000 payment in a few weeks. We do have already part of that on hand. BY FAITH I have to TRUST GOD to make it possible for YOU brethren to send in the balance of it—and then $12,000 each month until the Festival of Tabernacles, beginning September 28th. During that great festival, in the two offerings God has prescribed, we must raise a $30,000 special payment—and then $18,000 every month until it is paid out.

   BUT THIS IS NOT ALL! We have to alter the present tabernacle building which we have outgrown into a dining hall. That means new plumbing, new equipment, altering part or the building. It will cost a few thousand dollars. We also have to build at least one new sanitary building for those who will camp on the grounds—we ought to build two new ones—and they cost $8,000 to $10,000 each. We have to put in a new wide side-walk between the new tabernacle and the dining hall. All these ADDITIONAL expenses we must meet as we go along, during the next two months, IN ADDITION to these heavy Behlen payments.

   BY GOD'S GRACE and help—with willing sacrifice on our part— WE CAN, AND MUST meet this heavy obligation. IT'S NOW ONLY ABOUT THREE MONTHS UNTIL FEAST OF TABERNACLES TIME! Keep your largest possible special offerings coming—as often as possible—BESIDE regular offerings and tithes. We are surely looking forward to this Festival as the GREATEST since the days of the Apostles! KEEP PRAYING! And PRAY for Garner Ted Armstrong's major-scale EVANGELISTIC CAMPAIGN starting July 13th in SPRINGFIELD, MISSOURI! Because we were unable to obtain a hall large enough in Pittsburgh, the campaign there has had to be postponed until NEXT summer.

   Instead. my son and co-pastor on The WORLD TOMORROW, Garner Ted Armstrong, is going to Springfield, Missouri. There he has obtained the best auditorium in Springfield, the JEWELL THEATRE, in downtown Springfield, seating over 1,000. An ABC Network television and radio show originates in this theatre, coast to coast, every Saturday night. Ted and his evangelistic team will have it every other night, for a six weeks big-scale campaign. We are now on Springfield's 5,000-watt NBC station, KGBX, every week- day morning at 6:15, and a later, better time on Sundays (to be announced). Also TWICE a week on TELEVISION, over KYTV, the NBC Network TV station there, TWICE a week, Saturday night at 10:30 and Sunday afternoon at 2:30, up until the campaign. We are using big third-of-a-full-page newspaper ads, and twenty billboards on all major highways into Springfield are going up.

   People in Springfield are going to KNOW about this big campaign! NEVER has the true CHURCH OF GOD attempted an evangelistic campaign on this scale in the last hundred years! A full evangelistic team is accompanying Ted to Springfield. Mr. Al Portune is going along as song leader and soloist. Tony Hammer and Ronald Kelly as ushers and deacons. Mrs. Lucy Martin, head of the Ambassador College Music department, is going as pianist, assisted on a second piano by Mrs. Garner Ted Armstrong. Before the campaign is over, evangelist Raymond C. Cole will join the team and establish our new local church there.

   But with all this big-scale preparation, the entire success of the campaign depends on YOUR PRAYERS! I ask every one of you to GET ON YOUR KNEES, and PRAY YOUR HEART OUT in earnest intercession to God for a BIG HARVEST OF PRECIOUS LIVES FOR HIS KINGDOM. Ted is now encamped by a lake in Arkansas where he is FASTING and praying for God's intervention and POWER and blessing in this campaign. I ask you to JOIN HIM in this earnest and believing intercession.

   And REMEMBER! —keep your biggest possible special offerings coming in for the new TABERNACLE! God bless you! And THANK YOU!

With much love, in Jesus' name,
Herbert W. Armstrong