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done. So I moved up to this smaller room in order to get enough
seclusion to write and get my work done, and my former office is
now used by Garner Ted Armstrong. All of our other executives and
department managers have offices, and office desks, and secretaries
and stenographers. I have none, for there is no place to put a
secretary.
More than ten years ago, our architect made preliminary
plans for an executive office for me. But it was part of a new
wing on our administration building and we couldn't build it then,
because funds were not available. They have never been available
since. Then about two and a half years ago, the architect
completed plans for a much-needed new wing on Ambassador Hall to
provide additional class rooms. We have published pictures of
this. It included an office for me. But we did not have funds on
hand sufficient to build such an addition--and have not had since.
So that office never materialized.
Next, with the need of an office for myself growing
desperate a year and a half ago, the architect completed plans for
a remodeling job that would expand my present work-room and give me
an office--and provide a suitable one also for Garner Ted
Armstrong, adjoining mine, with a mutually-shared reception room
and space for a secretary or two we could share between us. This
would put us both just a few steps from the radio studio--which is
rather important. The plans were approved by the city building
commissioner's office, and building permit was taken out. But
then, we simply did not have the funds on hand for this remodeling
job. I wrote all our members, and urged you to keep up, or
increase your special offerings for the property and building fund.
But, instead, these offerings slacked off. SO WE NEVER STARTED
THIS ALTERATION JOB--and I still do not have an office.
Now, dear Brethren, LISTEN! We simply cannot delay some
of this building program longer! This IS the Church of God--this
IS the very WORK OF GOD, being done by HIS CHURCH! God's work
CANNOT stop growing. I am unwilling to simply grab it by the neck,
and STRANGLE IT TO DEATH--which I would be doing if I allowed it to
STOP growing, because we can't somehow induce YOU BRETHREN to do
anywhere near as much for the building and property fund as you did
do three years ago.
There IS a way we can provide for this NECESSARY
BUILDING. We can't finance it by making a big loan, payable in
somewhere between 8 and 20 years. But there is a way we CAN
finance it. Over three years ago we were paying out $18,000 per
month to pay for the new 7,000-seat Tabernacle near Gladewater,
Texas. You Brethren DID SEND THAT IN THEN, as special offerings,
over and above regular offerings for the Gospel, and tithes. THERE
WERE LESS THAN HALF AS MANY OF YOU, THEN!
Today there are MORE than TWICE AS MANY OF US. Today I
KNOW WE CAN RISE TO MEET THIS IMPERATIVE NEED! If we don't, it is
not because God has not made us able--IT WILL BE ONLY BECAUSE OUR
HEARTS ARE NO LONGER IN HIS WORK!
As God's minister, whom He uses in the over-all direction