Proclaim to the World the GOOD NEWS OF THE WORLD TOMORROW
BOX 111, Pasadena, California
Publishing: The PLAIN TRUTH a Magazine of UNDERSTANDING
February 24, 1954
Dear Co-Workers for Christ:
I can't hold back the truth from you any longer. I have to tell you we have reached the breaking point — the extreme LIMIT — in this tight squeeze holding on to the powerful net-work broadcast!
Unless God now performs a MIRACLE thru you co-workers, we cannot carry on another week! I shall have to cancel the net-work, and either close down Ambassador College or take the daily and every night programs off the air.
No longer is the situation just desperate — we have passed the desperate stage! We now face a quick, sudden DEATH of most of the work of God!
In Jesus' name, I have to tell you it is just that serious! Our business office has put squarely up to me the hardest decision I ever faced in all my life — they tell me I have to shut down all these expenses immediately! But I can't do it until I send you co-workers this one more letter. Even now I have not lost faith!
Here are the hard cold facts! Since the first of the year we have been receiving enough money to pay expenses only ONE WEEK in each month. The other 3 1/3 weeks of the month we have been falling short an average of $650 per day seven days a week — that's $4,550.00 per week less than we have to pay out to carry this mighty WORLD-WIDE GOSPEL CRUSADE. The business office — our business manager, our auditor and attorney, tell me bluntly that we cannot continue to run behind at the rate of $15,000 per month. They demand that I drop the net-work broadcast, and either stop the daily broadcasts or close down Ambassador College AT ONCE!
Co-Workers! Brethren in Christ! IS ALMIGHTY GOD STILL ON HIS THRONE? Is God still able to keep His promise to supply all our need, according to His riches in glory by Christ Jesus? God has said in His Word that He will not stop the work He has begun! Let me tell you right now, my dear Co-Workers and brethren, I believe God means what He says! Though our faith be tried to the breaking point — as it now is — YET WILL I TRUST HIM!
Co-Workers, my fighting clothes are on! I'm no quitter! All physical FACTS and evidences, which can be plainly SEEN, say we have to QUIT. But I have an evidence which is NOT seen — FAITH IN GOD! Years ago I lost all self-confidence, but God replaced it with a more SURE faith! — the FAITH OF JESUS CHRIST! I know I am His servant! I know CHRIST lives in me! I know that this is HIS WORK, which HE has begun thru us, and which He promises that He will not stop. I know you are God's co-workers with me in HIS work! I know GOD has PROMISED to supply every need — He has said no man can shut the door He has opened! But I also know God works THRU those of us whom He has called as HIS human instrumentalities, and WE must now unitedly RESPOND, and PRAY, and SACRIFICE!
I say to you, we shall not quit! Here are MORE facts! Listen carefully. We have now been on the great ABC net-work, Coast to Coast, four months. Mail from new listeners has doubled, and redoubled! The listening audience is growing rapidly — now around TWO MILLION — in areas we were NOT REACHING BEFORE — where they cannot hear the great Mexican stations, in the North Atlantic and north-central states, where 55% of the nation's population lives! Already scores of new co-workers are beginning to join you older co-workers in the regular support of God's great work. But there are not enough of them, yet, and the amounts they send in now are still small, of course. The true Message of Christ is still NEW to them. Not many of you came to really SEE the Truth, and put your hearts into it, and became co-workers with us, until you had listened longer than just 18 broadcasts. But hundreds of thousands are now becoming really INTERESTED! They are listening! New thousands start listening EVERY WEEK.
My beloved co-workers, LISTEN! If we fail in OUR PART right now — if we allow this net-work to drop — hundreds of thousands of precious souls will lose interest, TURN AWAY FROM THE TRUTH — back into the world of sin — hundreds of thousands may be doomed to loss of salvation — just because we could not HOLD ON a few more months, — just because we failed to LIFT UP OUR VOICES IN UNITED, BELIEVING PRAYER as never before, and to be willing to make financial sacrifices for the most important work on earth!
But, if we can spur on to greater and CONTINUOUS effort, — ALL FOUR WEEKS of every month — if we can just tide over a few more months, NEW co-workers are joining us week by week, and in three more months, our years of experience indicate, the NEW co-workers will be paying at least HALF the net-work expense, and in eight or ten more months they will MORE than pay for it, and be helping us pay for sending God's message into foreign lands all around the earth! God's work is now WORLD-WIDE!
Of course Satan hates this work. He will stir himself to great zeal just now to spread over our co-workers a spirit of indifference. HE KNOWS that when this Gospel of the KINGDOM has gone to all nations, then HIS END shall come! We need to pray that God will send the great archangels Michael and Gabriel to withstand Satan in this crisis hour! Yes, it's truly the BATTLE OF THE AGES!
Letters are continuing to roll in from all over the British Isles and Europe. The broadcast is now going out over all FOUR super-power 100,000-watt transmitters off Radio Ceylon, covering India, the middle east, central Africa, southern Asia and the East Indies. The program is now going across the iron curtain into all China over Chiang Kai-Shek's powerful station, Voice of Free China from Formosa! This is the greatest work on earth — becoming the most powerful VOICE on earth, proclaiming GOD'S MESSAGE just as Jesus Christ taught it!
Can we quit now, after going along FOUR MONTHS, when in just another three months new co-workers will ease our burden, and in six to nine more months we will be PAST this tight squeeze? Co-Workers, even if you have to LOAN a large sum you don't feel free to give to God's work, I feel we must accept ANYTHING rather than quit now — when in just a few months we shall be THRU this tight squeeze!
I say to you in Christ's name, we can, we MUST, — WE WILL! Please go immediately now to a place of prayer. Let us unitedly lift up our voices in a BELIEVING petition to God — let EACH of us do MORE than ever before — and besides, try to send even an EXTRA couple of dollars at least a couple times a month, besides our tithes and larger offerings. EVERY DOLLAR COUNTS BIG NOW. I know some of you have already done all you could — GOD BLESS YOU! But even you who have, can PRAY as never before that God will stir others who have sent in nothing, or who can send more. NEVER did we need large sums so desperately. Never did every single dollar mean so much.
Dear Co-Workers, there's nothing more I can say. Now I'm going to quit writing, and go and PRAY! — and in Jesus' name I ask you to join me in prayer and in continuous sacrifice these next few months. God bless you!