Several years ago the Church in Irving decided before the Lord to distribute BFA door hangers to every home in Irving. Maps were elaborated, teams of saints came together and in a few months every home had received a BFA door hanger. Apartments were excluded because of city ordinances.
In one of those homes, the home owner saved the door hanger and forgot about it. Some time later, the 21 year old grandson of the home owner came to visit her in Irving from Pittsburg. The grandmother had saved the door hanger that was placed there by the church in Irving. The young brother had been meeting with Doug and Todd Busch in a restaurant each morning in Pittsburg to have Bible study. He
did not own a Bible, so when he visited his grandmother in Irving, she got him the free recovery version Bible from BFA that came from the door hanger.
Later after receiving the Bible, the young brother returned one morning in Pittsburg to the restaurant where the brothers were still meeting to study the Bible. At that time he showed them his recovery Bible. They read the footnotes to some of the verses that they were having a hard time understanding.
In their words, “Immediately we were enlightened and felt like this was the correct interpretation of these verses.”
In the past they had purchased several Bible commentaries to try and help them understand the Bible, but none could ever satisfy them that it was the truth.
The brothers in that Bible study were so impressed with this little Bible and its footnotes. They called LSM to find out how to get more of these recovery version Bibles for their denomination but LSM got them in touch with Tom Smith from BFA. Then BFA got in touch with David Vinson in Irving. He contacted them and came to their Baptist denomination with a few brothers from Irving several days
later.
After a couple of months and a few visits from the brothers in Irving and some problems with their pastor and members of the congregation, they decided to leave the denomination and meet together in a home (June 2006). There were 7 adults who left the denomination at that time. Later 2 of the adults
did not see the oneness of the Church and went back to a denomination.
There was an older sister (Linda Powell) who came out of the denomination. When she received her copy, she could not put it down and spent the whole night until the next morning devouring the Word!
She went to the summer training that year (2006) with David Vinson and his family. There she met a sister and in their conversation she was asked where she was from. She said Pittsburg, Texas and the other sister said, “Oh, we have been praying for the church in Pittsburg!” The Pittsburg sister was stunned because the other sister was from mainland China. In one brief moment she saw the Body of
Christ, not in doctrine but in Reality. Linda Powell moved to Jacksonville, N.C around 2008 to live with her daughter. Linda now meets in a denomination there with her daughter. The saints in Pittsburg still contact her to fellowship and believe that she sees a lot in the Lord’s recovery.
5 saints, Todd and his wife Wendy, Doug and his wife Dwaina, and Linda, started to meet with the church in Tyler in August of 2006. Tyler is about an hour’s drive from Pittsburg. They drove to Tyler on the Lord’s Day for 2 years and had home meetings in Pittsburg during the week. Also they felt really shepherded during this time from so many different saints, some from Waco, some from Austin, some
from Arlington and of course many from Irving.
In August of 2008 they took the ground in Pittsburg in a most wonderful event, filled with Joy in the Holy Spirit. Now they have meeting with them about 25 saints. Attached is a picture of that first table meeting in Pittsburg, August 18, 2008. The place was the Shiloh Lutheran Retreat Facility on Bob Sandlin
Lake near Pittsburg. There were 19 localities represented with about 180 saints attending.
Traffic between the churches in the Dallas Metroplex and Pittsburg has continued to this day. Many of the churches in Texas, following the examples of the churches in the UK, have begun clustering.
Pittsburg clusters with Texarkana, Tyler and Shreveport. Those meetings are always living, full of the Lord’s presence and full of His rich anointing. Often the saints from the Metroplex join those monthly clustering times, to reach out with the gospel of the Kingdom, to care for the young people and to just enjoy the unsearchable riches of Christ.
Praise the Lord for the door hanger!
His Word will not return to Him empty, but will accomplish what He delights in, and it will prosper in the matter to which He has sent it. Isa. 55:11.
