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RADIO CHURCH OF GOD
Box 111
PASADENA, CALIFORNIA
January, 1955
Dear Brethren:
GREETINGS, in Jesus' name: I have to sidetrack everything else
for the moment, and write this brief letter submitting a serious
and most URGENT problem to all the membership of God's Church.
Mrs. Armstrong and I stopped off at the tabernacle near
Gladewater, Texas, for the Sabbath service on our recent return
trip from Chicago and St. Louis. Arriving at the tabernacle, I
found the two rooms at the rear of the main auditorium---that is
the registration office and Mr. Hoeh's room---with a door-way cut
between the two rooms, and both rooms jam-packed with men huddled
in like sardines, trying to keep warm with the little heaters in
those rooms. Then, across the auditorium floor, in the two rooms
to the south of the platform in front, with a door-way cut between
those two rooms also, were the women packed in and huddled
together.
It was a cold day. There are a lot of cold days in that part of
Texas at this time of year. It was impossible to hold a meeting
with the men and women in separate rooms, separated by the entire
auditorium floor. It was altogether too cold, with a damp cold
draft sweeping through the main auditorium, to hold the service
there. Finally we moved all the chairs outdoors, on the sunny side
of the building, and held the service out there. I stood and
preached in my overcoat. About 125 brethren were there for the
service, and they sat and shivered, in a little semi-warm sunshine,
but also in a cold breeze. I had a sore throat, and trying to
preach under those conditions gave me a severe cold, made my throat
much more sore, and brought on a temperature. We were forced to
lay over one whole day in Midland, Texas, where I had to go to bed.
After driving two more short days with the fever and sore throat,
arriving in Phoenix, I was forced to finally telephone home and
have our son Dick fly to Phoenix and drive us home from there. I am
not over it yet, still hoarse and unable to be on the air---forced
to keep repeating year-old programs.
There are now 40 children in our school in the tabernacle at
Gladewater. They are having to endure those impossible conditions
in that cold, chilly and unfinished tabernacle five days a week.
About a hundred or more brethren meet there for the service every
Sabbath.
Brethren, we cannot allow that condition to continue. Raymond
Cole, now pastor at Gladewater, and with considerable help from
Raymond McNair, who was there for some three weeks, went everywhere
around Gladewater trying to rent some other building or hall or
church, which would be warm---but it was impossible.
We have not been able to put any more money into the tabernacle
to finish it up. lt is completely open at the sides and the rear.
But SOMETHING MUST BE DONE IMMEDIATELY! If you could only see the