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Personal from...
Forty-sixth anniversary message from Peking ( Beijingj, China,
by the founder and editor in chief
1
AM WRITING
this 46th anniversary "Personal" from
our apartment where Mrs. Armstrong and l are being
housed by the government in the guest "State
House," in Peking [Beijing], China.
l t is indeed a gratifying experience to write this
" Personal" for the 46th anniversary number at a time
when I have been privileged to be the first church leader
from the Western world of Christianity to be invited to
confer with government leaders, and to speak here as the
guest of the government. You will read my personal
report of our visit here starting on page 2.
lt
was approximately 53 years ago that the idea of
publishing a monthly magazine to be called
The Plain
Truth
was born in my mind.
J
know now that God
inspired it.
At the time l was continuing in study and research for
God's
TRUTH,
following an initial intensive almost night–
and-day study to prove whether evolution is the true
means by which mankind appeared on the earth - to
prove also, wbether God actually exists!
I had disproved the evolutionary theory after careful
study through the works of Darwin, Haeckel, Huxley
and other defenders of the hypothesis.
1
had
PROVEO,
and been able to prove to professed atheists, the
existence and reality of the living Goo. Further, I had
proved conclusively the veracity and divine inspiration of
the Holy Bible as God's Word and message to mankind.
1
had been forced to give up nearly all Christian
teachings 1 had absorbed from attendance at Sunday
school and church from infancy until age 18, when 1 lost
interest in religion. Much more, at age 34 my whole life
had been changed by this intensive study. My life from
that point was given over to Jesus Christ, " If He could
use it", for I had learned that He had bought and paid
for it with His life's blood. He has used it in changing
thousands of lives. 1 had become excitedly intrigued by
the new
TRUTHS
1 was finding revea led in the Bible.
1 was experienced in writing both advertising copy and
magazine articles. Early in 1927 I began writing in
article form sorne of these truths I was discovering in the
Bible.
1t
was only natural that God led me then to
February 1980
conceive of publishing a new magazine making
PLAIN
these marvelous
TRUTHS
revealed in the Bible. I wanted
to get across to a biblically illiterate public an
UNDERSTANDING
of God's Word!
1 felt then- and I know now- that God was leading
me in this. My reading audience would be the general
public-not those who considered themselves Bible
students.
But
how
would
1
publish it? 1 had no money-in fact
my family was actually going hungry-my advertising
income had been cut to $75 per month from one client
only. And
how
would I gain subscribers? One thing
1
settled then and there. Since it would carry God's
TRUTH,
it could not be sold. God's Word says, " Buy the
truth, and sell it not." Yet it must never be given except
on request.
Undaunted by apparent impossibilities, 1 nevertheless
took the first step. I employed a professional letter artist
to design a front cover, with the name
"The Plain
Truth."
and under it,
"a magazine of understanding."
That was as far as 1 could go.
J
had to trust God to open
the way to carry it on from there.
I am reminded of the experience of the children of
Israel migrating out of Egyptian slavery, under Moses.
They got as far as the Red Sea, and there tbey were
blocked. Before them was the sea, but no bridge and no
boats. Behind them Pharaoh's army was advancing to
drive them back. They bad to rely on Goo to provide a
way of crossing. And God did!
And so God provided the way to start the new
magazine,
The Plain Truth- but
He made me wait
seven years before He did!
But I knew then, as
J
do today, that the reading
general public is not mucb interested in the tbings of
God. Perhaps most families have a Bible somewhere in
the home, since the Bible is the world's No. 1 seller. But
the chances were good that it would be covered with
dust. The job of my envisioned new magazine would be
to induce them to blow the dust off their Bibles and
read them!
Most of my years in maga-
(Continued on page 38)