Christian History Magazine Features: Guest Editor, David Neff; Author, Grant Wacker and Fellow Historians Who Chronicle the Life of the World’s Best Known Evangelist for Christ  

Christian History Institute (CHI), a quarterly magazine series, published a special edition of Christian History – issue #111, titled: “Billy Graham – Apostle of changed lives and second chances,” originally released in 2014. Christian History magazine continues to publish informative and entertaining history, now alongside its companion website, christianhistorymagazine.org.

In this issue, #111, Christian History magazine’s guest editorial consultant, Grant Wacker, a Duke Divinity School professor and author of America’s Pastor: Billy Graham and the Shaping of a Nation, leads a team of distinguished historians and writers who tell the epic story of Mr. Graham’s life and career, a unique contribution to the character and spirit of the evangelical church, the nation and the world. The issue’s 10 articles, rare archive photos and intimate writing style documents the life and family of Billy Graham, who has personally shared the salvation message of Jesus Christ with more people than any other individual in history.

Guest editor, David Neff, former editor of Christianity Today, has assembled the talents and expertise of several leading historians and writers, to capture the essence of the life and times of America’s most prominent religious figure, Billy Graham and the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association ministry (BGEA). Outstanding among many central themes associated with Mr. Graham in the issue, and lasting throughout his career, is his core preaching message focused on belief in Jesus and the believer’s life, lived in faith and holiness.

In addition to Graham’s primary message of salvation in Christ, the issue’s contributors have identified and examined many of Graham’s famous milestones and associations that have helped to shape the Graham legacy. These themes include:

• The 1949 Los Angles tent revival, that garnered the attention of the newspaper magnate, William Randolph Hearst, who urged his editor to pay attention to Graham
• Graham’s use of television and radio that positioned him in the living rooms of millions of Americans, where he introduced the values of evangelical Protestantism
• His commitment to world evangelism that took him throughout Europe, the Far East and Africa as an ambassador of Christ
• His interest and gift as a confidant to presidents, prime ministers and statesmen that made him a cultural influence in over 150 countries, 49 of which hosted his mass meetings that reached, in the aggregate, billions of listeners and millions of believers
• Graham’s marriage to Ruth Bell which inspired men, women and families to a deepened personal faith life and encouraged future family and relationship ministries
• His intellectual engagement with education leaders and students that spawned seminaries, colleges and universities, helping shape a worldwide evangelical movement and revival
• His pioneering vision for racial integration that inspired the American civil rights movement – in 1953, he shockingly removed ropes that separated his audience by color – and in association with Howard Jones, a full-time BGEA associate
• Graham’s uncompromising stand for ethics and morality, setting strict rules for his own behavior and that of ministry associates, which helped prevent moral scandal and compromise that destroyed many other ministry leaders and organizations

“No man has had more personal, one-on-one, impact for faith in Jesus Christ than Mr. Graham,” said Michael Austin, a Christian commentator and spokesperson for Christian History magazine. “He and his family are a living testimony to the faithfulness of the Biblical message he so clearly delivered from the start of his ministry. Billy Graham’s impact for good in this world is incalculable.”

Bishop Harry Jackson, Bishop T.D. Jakes, James Robison

From the April 27, 2015 Press Release.

On the eve of the second national meeting of The Reconciled Church (TRC) – a historic multi-racial, multi-denominational and apolitical gathering of church leaders in Orlando, a growing response to Ferguson, Staten Island, Cleveland, North Charleston, and now Baltimore – TRC founders Bishop Harry Jackson, Bishop T.D. Jakes, and James Robinson have this statement:

“What news cameras were to Civil Rights, cell phone cameras and real-time recordings are to this generation. They help ordinary Americans see the madness. Our hearts bleed for the suffering families, and not just for them. We grieve for every person who encounters injustice and brutality with no camera to show the underbelly of anger that turns standard situations into a travesty of ‘protection.’ And though we can’t give all Americans a recording device, we can give the voiceless a voice.

“Now from Ferguson, North Charleston, Baltimore and the lengthening roll call of wounded cities, we cry for justice – the lasting justice of changed minds and hearts. Black, brown and white, solutions lie not in reaction but in unified action.”

– TRC Founders Bishop Harry Jackson, Bishop T.D. Jakes, and James Robison The Reconciled Church: Healing the Racial Divide is a multiracial, multi-denominational, non-partisan expression of the Church uniting in response to current social unrest.

Bishop Harry R. Jackson organized The Reconciled Church inaugural conference. He is senior pastor of Hope Christian Church in the Washington, D.C., area.

Bishop T.D. Jakes is senior pastor of The Potter’s House, a New York Times best-selling author, leader and speaker. He hosted The Reconciled Church’s inaugural event.

James Robison, evangelist, teacher, missionary, author and television host, founded and heads Life Outreach International.

The second national meeting of The Reconciled Church is occurring on April 29, 2015 in Orlando, Florida at the Orange County Convention Center, as part of T. D. Jakes’ International Pastors and Leadership Conference 2015, April 29 – May 2. Watch it live: http://www.tdjakes.org/echurch/pastorsandleaders

Rob Wilkerson resonates with a recent article.

Robin Williams as Mr. Keating in Dead Poets Society

Jeffrey Overstreet, “How I Got Dead Poets Society Wrong: And how a great professor changed my mind” ChristianityTodayOnline (September 16, 2014).

Overstreet’s article brought back memories. A lot of them, to be honest. To some degree, the feelings the movie evoked returned to me like I saw it yesterday.

First, there were the memories of how I felt as a high school graduate, the same year the movie was released. I remember identifying intensely with Keating, a mentor every kid wished was his dad. I remembered thinking how much of Neil was in me, both the joyous freedom to be me, mixed with the insanity of conformity to cultural norms and standards.

Second, there were memories of how I felt about rules and standards. Growing up on the legalistic side of Christianity, I could understand the concerns of Neil’s father and Keating’s administration. Rebellion is built into every fiber and DNA strand of every human being. This was probably true of me when I watched it. The movie was like a pinball inside my soul, thrashing around, ringing bells, sounding noises, while smacked by the paddles of my legalistic upbringing and the taste of free grace.

Third, there are memories of my parenting. I’m a father to four awesome kids. Too often I’ve parented like Neil’s father. At least, that’s what I fear. More often I’ve wanted to parent like Keating, loosening the ropes, the guides of culture (including Christian culture) from the fragile sapling of grace I saw growing inside my children. Overstreet said it best. “Looking back at authority figures who have inspired my respect, and at those who have been driven by ego and a desire to control, I’ve come to suspect that anyone who seeks to instill character in another person by force will produce an equal and opposite reaction.”

There is a root found in both men in this movie. It is fear. Plain and simple. Neil’s father was fearful that his son wouldn’t fit into his tiny little world, that his son would find a type of happiness that he had talked himself out of years earlier. He was fearful of freedom, so he couldn’t let his son enjoy it. Then there’s Keating. Overstreet believes that “Mr. Keating models a healthy balance of freedom and responsibility. He descends into that world of order, accepting the form of a servant, and makes all things new. He shows them what the imagination, taking the shape of love, makes possible.” Perhaps. Probably. But undoubtedly obvious in Keating, as well as in his real life character, was this tinge of immaturity.