PERSONAL PLANS FOR 1971

During the coming year I would be pleased to enhance my personal ministry for the Lord by getting out among the people more. While my teaching and editorial duties confine me somewhat, I am resolved, with the Lord’s leading, to do something special in terms of visitation for 1971.

Every other weekend during the year I will be available to visit among the brethren, especially with those that I have come to know through this journal, many of whom I love having never seen. Oftentimes some reader invites me to his home and city, and up to now I have responded only with the hope that such a pleasure might someday be possible. I am asking God for the strength and the resources to do more along this line for 1971. So I am planning something specific, and if you think you would be interested in sharing in this the following points will be applicable to you.

1. It is my preference that these visitations be “mini-meetings” in some-one’s home or in some quiet community room. The host of the affair will not obligate himself to get a large crowd, but rather a modest gathering of 12 or 18 people, more or less. There need be no public announcement. Quiet invitations by telephone or card to those interested in the things we are seeking through this journal will be adequate.

2. The meetings will simply be Christian togetherness, giving me an opportunity to meet people I now know only as readers and subscribers. They will be structured only to the extent that I will have something to say, after which the circle of concerned ones will be free to question me and to share in the ideas introduced. We will study and pray together, be together, and encourage one another.

3. The Lord providing, I will go anywhere in the continental United States for these week-end meetings in homes, and at my own expense. The last point is important, for I am resolved that no one should be out one dollar for this ministry. I will also make it a rule to stay at a nearby motel, for we do not want these plans to inconvenience anyone. Exceptions will be only when it is clear that I might be of more service to someone by staying with them.

4. The gatherings can sometimes start on a Thursday night (especially in places far from Denton, Texas) and always by Friday night, and I will be available all day Saturday in anyway the host chooses to use me: visiting the sick and shut-ins, further meetings, or extended conversations with people who want to visit or who have special problems that I might be able to help. If I stay over Sunday, I will attend the assembly with my host, if appropriate, wherever that is, and return home sometime that day in order to get to work Monday morning.

5. I would strongly urge that the meetings be open to all our Restoration folk especially, but to any concerned soul. My host does not have to be someone I know. To the contrary, I want this ministry to reach into the lives of those, in many instances, that I have never met. Neither do you have to agree with me or be particularly sympathetic. Nor does it matter one whit what wing of our brotherhood or part of Christendom you may belong to. If you think I would be a helpful resource person, if you would like for me to share with you in Christ, then invite me. The Lord willing, I’ll come, anywhere at my own expense, on a first come, first serve basis.

6. These visitations are intended strictly for peace and goodwill. We are not up to anything nor are we after anybody. If there is any probability that such an effort will be mis-interpreted and thus do harm, we will wait until such time when there will be no such likelihood.

Each visit, of course, will have its own uniqueness, and details can be resolved by correspondence. Write me if you want me to put you on my schedule for some weekend in 1971.—the Editor