My Descending from Gov. - D. A. Sharpe
My Descending from Gov. - D. A. Sharpe
My Descending from Gov. - D. A. Sharpe
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Register Report for William Bradford<br />
Generation 9<br />
sought to find His meaning and directions for our lives. It was then that our participation<br />
and interest in the inner-city ministry of Canal Street Presbyterian Church drew us to the<br />
conviction that we should buy a home and move into that neighborhood. It was a five year<br />
experience, which included my leaving my work at IBM after a couple of years living there,<br />
and thus began my career in Christian ministry. We purchased the home with another<br />
couple, Dr. Joseph A.and Charlotte Snead. Sharing home ownership is a very interesting<br />
experience. One that often was challenging, but which we remember fondly. We have<br />
kept in touch with the Snead's over the years, their living most of their lives since then in<br />
West Virginia, though they did live a while in Georgia.<br />
<strong>My</strong> relationship with IBM continued for a while, as their office wanted to reach out to an<br />
inner city neighborhood such as where we were working. It was a blessing that my former<br />
employer wanted to involve themselves in the new work to which I had felt called.<br />
==<br />
We assumed this was a temporary work in Christian ministry, and thatwe would return to<br />
regular secular work in a few short years. That was wrong! That temporary tenure in<br />
Christian work lasted through 37years and in three different Christian ministries before my<br />
2004retirement.<br />
This was a crime-ridden area with five bars within a block our ourhouse, and there were five<br />
instances of gun fire or gun fights in our immediate block in the five years of our residence.<br />
After a while, we became known as residents there who sought to for the benefit of the<br />
neighborhood, and acceptance by the neighbors enable our Christian witness to grow. We<br />
learned much through the experiences God led us and allowed us to have. Our church,<br />
Canal Street Presbyterian,called onto its staff the Rev. Mr. William (Bill) J. Brown, part<br />
ofwhose duties were to work in the neighborhood there we were. Finally,through Bill's<br />
vision, the ministry became Trinity ChristianCommunity.<br />
We did learn that the thing in life that mattered most was to be inGod's will. If we would be<br />
in His will, we would have nothing to fear and that appropriate provision and protection<br />
would always be made for us. And, we do affirm that. We also had the Biblical principal<br />
oftithing confirmed in our experience. We had begun to give 10% of our income to God in<br />
his causes and even more before coming down to that neighborhood. But living there in<br />
poverty and changing work to the Christian ministry meant living on an economic shoestring.<br />
Even so,we always pulled out our 10% of everything to give to God's Kingdom, no matter<br />
how little we had. It never failed! We always were enabled to live on the remainder. It just<br />
works out that way in God's kingdom.<br />
By age 30, I had served in the Presbyterian Church as a Deacon, Elder, Clerk of Session,<br />
was moderator of a major standing committee of New Orleans Presbytery, and was a<br />
member of its Presbytery's Council. Shortly, I was elected an alternate to the 1972 General<br />
Assembly of the Presbyterian Church, U.S. I coordinated the publicity office for<br />
communications for the successful General Assembly Moderatorial elections of Dr. L. Nelson<br />
Bell in 1972 and of Mr. Jule Spach in 1976 for the Presbyterian Church, US (the Southern<br />
Presbyterian Church). They both had served missionary careers for the PCUS.<br />
In 1972, new work was begun for a decade as Managing Editor of THE OPEN LETTER, the<br />
publication of the Covenant Fellowship of Presbyterians (CFP), living in St. Louis, Missouri.<br />
There, I served as a Deacon, Elder and Clerk of Session at the 2,500 member<br />
CentralPresbyterian Church in the suburb of Clayton, moderating several committees and<br />
actively represented the Session at Presbytery.<br />
<strong>My</strong> work with CFP took, me to ten annual General Assemblies in our Presbyterian<br />
denomination as a press representative. I have been apart of many behind-the-scenes<br />
workings that go into developing the mission of our church as expressed through the<br />
General Assembly. I attended most of the meetings of the Mission Board of the PCUS<br />
<strong>from</strong>1973 through 1979 as a press representative. In so doing, I became acquainted with<br />
many of the leadership people of the denomination in those years.<br />
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