Chad Metheny is a friend of Larry Lovett (local). Larry asked Tommy Key (local) if he would go with him and see if he would listen to a Gospel presentation. He agreed and they sat on the back porch of his house while Tommy presented the Gospel to him. Chad had never been baptized and he saw the need for obedience to the Gospel, so he came to the building to do so.
On Wednesday night Janey Wolverton, a new Christian, brought her sister, Barbara (Barby) Roberts, to hear Larry’s sermon. During the sermon she was listening intently and it was obvious she was learning. George and Betty Vinson (cadre) talked to her after the sermon and offered to present the Gospel to her. She couldn’t stay because it was getting late and she and Janey had to go see about their children, so George asked if she could come eat with them and then he would present the Gospel to her then. She came and listened to the presentation and told them she learned during the sermon that she wasn’t saved. When they got to the last verse she said, “Why are you waiting. Well, why am I waiting?” Betty said, “I don’t know. Everything is ready and we can go do that right now.” She had to go home and see about her daughter and came back about 8:30 that night and obeyed the Gospel.
The team of John Rowe (cadre), Michelle Sebastian (cadre), and David Eversdyk knocked on Ramon Ibarra’s door. Ramon came to the door and wanted them to come back and talk to his wife, Sandra Ibarra. When they went back to talk to Sandra she was not there but her cousin, Diana Carron, was there. They presented the Gospel to Diana and she was not ready to obey it. A little later Ramon’s wife, Sandra, came back and had her mother, Esther Torres, there. Esther spoke very little English so as John presented the Gospel to Sandra, Sandra would translate it to Esther. At the last verse Sandra and Esther were speaking in Spanish and Esther wanted to obey first. She told Sandra, “I want to be baptized. You need to be baptized too.” Sandra said, “Yes, you are right; okay let’s do it.” They then went to the building and obeyed the Gospel. As they were eating supper they got a call from Diana, the cousin of Sandra, with whom they had shared the Gospel. She wanted to obey and came to the building and was baptized to put on Christ.
The team of Joe Ferguson (cadre), David Gantt (cadre), and Linda Cox (local) knocked on the door of Jim and D’Ann Farley, Jr. Jim had accepted Christ about 25 years ago. About 20 years after that he met D’Ann, who had not accepted Christ. She then accepted Christ and then two or three months later they were baptized as an outward show of their acceptance of Christ. The team presented the Gospel to them, however they did not make a decision so the team left the materials with them. That was a week ago last Thursday. After almost a week D’Ann came to the Wednesday evening sermon and was very moved by what she heard and understood what was being said. She was in tears and very upset about what she had learned. Joe Ferguson and his wife, Darla, took her aside and went over the Gospel again and answered many of her questions. She was still weeping and still had some confusion about what she had heard. Joe told her to go home and talk to Jim and if they made a decision to obey the Gospel to call him. They did not call but came for lunch the next day, which was Thursday. After lunch Joe took them back to a study room and went over more questions and they began to see that they needed to obey the Gospel. They then accepted that fact and went to the water to obey the Gospel.
The Gospel was presented to Shelby Morrow by the team of Anthony Melakian (cadre), Barbara Moncus (local), and James Johnson (cadre). She realized that she needed to obey so they brought her to the building to do that.
The Cardinas family attended the Gospel meeting several nights. They live in a small town close to Lampasas and attend the Lord’s church there. Their son, Lane Cardinas, listened to the sermons and wanted to obey the Gospel. They went to the church they normally attended on Wednesday evening and Lane was baptized there to obey the Gospel.
On Tuesday Shri-Lahn Newman (cadre) went to the home of Karla Racca, who had listened to the Gospel presentation on Monday. Shri-Lahn wanted to give Karla some information on the World Bible School materials. Karla wasn’t home so her mother, Gayle M. Racca, came to the door. Shri-Lahn talked to her a little while. Then on Wednesday Karla obeyed the Gospel and was worried about her mother. Shri-Lahn then set up a time with Karla to go back and talk to her mother, Gayle. All morning Gayle was complaining to Karla about someone coming over. She kept saying things like, “What does she want? Why does anybody need to talk to me? What’s she going to talk to me about?” Finally Carla told her, “Mama, that’s just the devil talking to you.” As soon as Shri-Lahn walked in, along with John Sebastian (cadre) and Brian Alexander (local), Gayle recognized Shri-Lahn from Tuesday and allowed her to present the Gospel. At the end of the presentation she saw what she needed to do so they came to the building and she obeyed.
The team of George and Betty Vinson (cadre) and Cameron and Michael Cox (locals) knocked on the door of Steven Corey Carroll. George asked him how he and the Lord were doing and Corey indicated they were not doing well. He then agreed to hear George’s salvation story. At the end he told George that he needed to do this and was ready. He though it would be a day or two before he could be baptized, but George said, “No, we can do this right now, right over there.” He pointed to the church building and said, “We can practically walk to it.” After his obedience to the Gospel, Corey told them that he “just happened” to take this day off. Otherwise they would not have found him home because he works all the time. This is just another example of how we often see the Lord working in the lives of people.
On Thursday the team of Michael Moore (cadre), Jean Terry (cadre), and Jeremiah Daniels (local) knocked on a door. Brenda Arthur opened it and Mickael began his introduction. He started telling her his salvation story, but she then invited them in. Angie Lee, Brenda’s daughter, was sitting on the couch. Mickael started over and after he finished they had no question as to if they would obey the Gospel or not. The question was when they could come to the building and obey. They said they could come early Friday morning and they did. Brenda told Mickael that as she was lying in bed the night before and read the presentation from the Bible over again and she knew that was what she needed to do.