April 18, 1960
Dear Co-Workers with Christ:
We are encountering some very rough going at this point in the great and all-important work of God.
Christ never intended our Mission for Him to be easy. Like a voyage by ship at sea, we might
encounter some very stormy weather. God allows these obstacles to test our faith, develop patience,
stiffen character.
I thank you, dear Co-Workers, from the very bottom of my heart for the fine and generous response of
many of you--so far--to my last letter. BUT we cannot work out of this situation immediately
--and now a new obstacle has been thrown in our path.
For one thing, persecution is setting in against proclaiming Christ's Gospel with such power every
night in Australia. Right now we are in a desperate struggle to stay on. Jesus Christ opened
this powerful door for us in Australia a little more than six months ago. I do not believe He will
allow MEN to close it--UNLESS He considers that AUSTRALIA HAS ALREADY HAD HIS GOSPEL DECLARED AS
A WITNESS, as far as He requires it! I need your DILIGENT, EARNEST, BELIEVING PRAYERS! If we lift up
our voices TOGETHER, urgently, with real concern, God will hear us and answer!
And another serious situation has developed right here on our headquarters college campus.
So far we have purchased only about two-thirds of the ground we must have to complete our college
campus. As it is now, there are lots, or strips of property we have not yet acquired, IN BETWEEN
portions of our campus. Recently a certain real estate broker has been trying to buy two or three such
blocks of ground, right in the midst of our campus, for a client who wishes to build a FACTORY on this
ground. Now, once a factory is built, jutting into the midst of our campus, we could probably never buy
this ground at any price--and the entire lovely college campus would be ruined.
About two months ago one of these properties went on the market. We had to buy it, or see the factory
go up. Backing up to this property is a half-block dead-end street off of Terrace Drive, the very center
axis street in the midst of our grounds. We already owned all the property on both sides of this short
dead-end street except one 50-foot lot. It is necessary for us to acquire this and get permission from
the city to CLOSE this short street, in order to have room to build our new dining hall.
Already our students are jammed into first floor Mayfair, as our outgrown dining hall. Our cooks have to
cook food for 250 students three times a day in a kitchen designed and built for a family of three or
four. Even so, we have planned to keep squeezing into this overcrowded space another year or more until
we can build the new dining hall--but even if we delay building the new hall, WE MUST BUILD IT in a year
or two, or have no room to feed our students.
We signed up the owner of this lot and paid the deposit. He signed the real-estate broker's agreement.
But before our broker got him into the escrow office to sign the escrow papers, his wife was taken to
the hospital with an illness, and until now these papers have not been signed. Now the broker
representing this factory has offered them one-third MORE than our price--and for CASH. Also he demands
an entrance through this dead-end street, so we could never close it. It would completely ruin our
college campus.
This is only one example. We have our own Real Estate department, headed by a licensed and thoroughly
experienced leading broker. He advises me that the situation is now such that we must MOVE FAST, and tie
up several additional parcels of ground--mostly in a district of 50-foot lots, with one or two old
houses on each-- with OPTIONS, in order to prevent having to purchase many of them outright for CASH at
a greatly inflated and exorbitant figure. We must get to these owners before the opposition broker does.
To help do this we can, if there is no other recourse, borrow a certain amount of a bank or loan
company, by mortgaging some of our property which is paid out, or almost paid out. But such loans
cost us heavy fees for appraisals, for making the loans, and then a high rate of interest
beside--probably 6.6% or 7%.
Co-Workers, if you will really take this emergency to heart and help us, I hope we can avoid having to
make such loans--and we cannot borrow enough by this method to handle the situation, even if we do!
I have to ask you three things.
1) All of you to try to send in still more, even at sacrifice, IMMEDIATELY, beside the most liberal
offerings you possibly can during May and June, and after. I think many of us can squeeze things to send
in a little more--as much more as possible.
2) Several of you, who are in position to do so, to loan to this work the largest sums you can. Several
of our Co-Workers have a good sum of money, which you may be unable to GIVE, because you are forced to
use the income or interest from it to live on. It might be in the form of bonds, or stocks, or cash, or
other investments. In a few instances in the past, we have found a way by which this capital may be put
to work, being used in GOD'S WORK, and by which also we pay you at whatever regular intervals you
specify, a sum equal to, or larger than the income you receive at present. Although God's Word does not
allow God's people to take interest or usury from one another, or from His work, (although it does allow
us to take interest from a bank or unconverted person), yet God has shown us ways that are right in His
sight and according to Scripture by which such people may receive an equal or larger income, with safety
and dependable security, while such capital amounts are being PUT TO WORK, helping build God's Work, and
get HIS GOSPEL MESSAGE TO THE MILLIONS AROUND THE WORLD!
I will be glad to answer any questions, supply any information required, to any of you who may be
willing to transfer investments you may have, so that the capital sums may be PUT TO WORK in GOD'S
WORK. To save time, you might call immediately, long distance. We are simply having to make a slightly
larger than normal expansion, right now, in one or two directions, and we need this additional
help at this point. At the same time I have taken steps to
retrench wherever possible, without harm to the future of the work, making many cuts in operation
expenditures.
3) I ask every one of you to TAKE THIS TO HEART, and TO GOD, ON YOUR KNEES, IN REAL EARNEST PRAYER.
We are merely instruments GOD IS USING--and using effectively.
Some TEN MILLION people now hear the gospel every week by radio.
Another SEVEN MILLION or more every month by magazines or powerful literature in print.
This great work is WORLD WIDE.
Let's get behind this great work--the most important thing in our lives--as never before!
Let's sacrifice, and PRAY! God will see us through. THANK YOU, dear Co-Workers, I know you will!
Sincerely and URGENTLY, in Jesus' name,
Herbert W. Armstrong
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