By Connie W. Adams
Help Needed in Bergen, Norway
After 21 years of work in Norway, Tom and Shirley Bunting will be coming back to the States at the end of this year. They have worked long, hard, and faithfully. While progress has been slow, progress has been made. Shirley’s health has not been good the last few years. Tom still plans to return each year for brief periods of work. He is appealing for someone to replace him in the work. If you are mature in the faith and are ready for a great challenge, please write to:
Thomas Bunting
Adolf Bergvei 52-D
5030 Landaus
Norway
Terrell Bunting along with his wife, Karen, and their three children plan to continue in the work in Bergen where they have already spent several years. They have adapted to the language and culture well. Terrell has worked tirelessly in writing and printing tracts, Bible correspondence courses (they use several), and other materials for use in the work. For the last few months they have been in the States for a much needed break while Terrell has preached by appointments, in meetings, and has made numerous reports on the work in Norway. One of the elders at Cahaba Heights in Birmingham, Alabama has provided a home for them during this time. They are anxious to get back to their home and work in Norway in the summer. Terrell has learned recently that he is losing $1800 a month support. That is really bad news. The cost of living is very high in Norway (it is one of the most expensive countries in which we have traveled) and it is absolutely necessary for that to be replaced. With Tom and Shirley coming home, it is all the more urgent that Terrell and Karen be provided what they need to carry on the work. They plan to spend their lives there in the Lord’s work. They have already made a great difference.
The last time we were there I came away feeling better about the work than at any time since it all began in 1957. How about helping to spread the word around and support a good man in a needy place. Who else do you know that brethren could support in the work there with years of experience already in the field, who is fluent in the language and at ease in the culture? If you can help, or know of those who can help, please write or call:
Terrell Bunting c/o Clark Maxson
3433 Country Brook Lane Birmingham, AL 35243 (205) 967-4588
Elsie Shull — A Modern Dorcas
Elsie Shull passed away one month short of her 90th birthday. She was Bobby’s mother, my mother-in-law. She left us on January 17 while we were somewhere over west Africa trying to get back from work in South Africa. Her life was long and faithfully lived in service to the Lord and many other people. Since her death many have told us of kind deeds she did for them, even to the last week of her life. She was at Bible study on Wednesday night before her death on Saturday night. She had planned to visit folks in a nursing home on Thursday and had to be dissuaded be- cause she was not feeling well. She continually baked and cooked for the sick and needy. She wrote countless notes to encourage the sick, the discouraged, and the weak. She taught classes for children for many years. She took young couples out to eat just to encourage them. Visiting the sick and those in nursing homes was a regular practice.
At the funeral service at which her son Jerry spoke, along with Harold Byers and Greg Littmer, I spoke about her as a friend to preachers. In looking for some phone numbers for people we needed to call, I looked through her little alphabetized address book and was struck by how many preachers she had listed. There were 36 in five countries. She sent help time and again to worthy men and sometimes to their widows who were left in need. The church at Expressway misses her. So do a host of friends and family members. Bobby and I miss her terribly. She is at rest from her labors and her works follow her.
A Real Preacher
If children can’t keep you humble, nobody can. Since last August, when Phillip Mullins moved to California, the church at Manslick Road has been without a full-time preacher until March 1 when Frank and Sandy Himmel came to work with us. Between August and March, Richard Peterson and I did the preaching. I mainly filled in while home between meetings. In one of the children’s classes a little boy wrote a note to Frank and Sandy to welcome them to Manslick Road. He said, “Richard and Connie did OK, but we are ready for a real preacher.” We are glad to have that “real preacher” among us. In the meantime, Richard and I will just forge ahead and do the best we can.
A Letter from Taiwan
A Filipino sister who is working in Taiwan wrote me asking for back issues of Truth Magazine. She has tried in vain to find a faithful congregation where she lives. Her father in the Philippines had sent her some back issues of Searching the Scriptures and Guardian of Truth. Someone had sent him a gift subscription to these but that had stopped in 1991. She had been reading and rereading these old is- sues and looking up Scripture references to help her in her study. Those of us who write never know into whose hands our work will fall and the amount of good it may do. It also is sobering to think that what we write may be used years later by a lonely Christian far from home and away from brethren, as a means of spiritual help. I sent her some more recent back issues of the paper.
A Growing Set of Commentaries
There are now seven volumes completed in the New Testament Commentaries published by Guardian of Truth Foundation. The Gospel of John by Dan King is now at the printer and The Book of Romans by Clinton Hamilton is now in the second reading before going to the printer. They are all in matching binding and not only make a handsome set, but are substantive works which will long endure as useful tools for the Bible student. Are you adding these to your library as they become available? Call toll free 1-800- 428-0121 to order your copy.