A Prophet with Honor: The Billy Graham Story

By William Martin

A Prophet with Honor is the biography Billy Graham himself invited and appreciated for its sympathetic but frank approach. Carefully documented, eminently fair, and gracefully written, it raises and answers key questions about Graham's character, contributions, and influence on the world religious scene. In this engaging and comprehensive book, William Martin gives readers a better understanding of the most successful evangelist in modern history, and the movement he led for over fifty years. 

A Prophet with Honor makes a vital contribution to the Billy Graham legacy and allows us to understand why his words, actions, and personality endeared him to popes and preachers, kings and presidents, and millions of Christians in virtually every nation and culture around the world. 

Martin draws on

• extensive conversations with Graham himself
• nearly two hundred interviews
• previously untouched resources, including documents from six presidential libraries and the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association archives
• personal observation of Graham's crusades and conferences in the United States and Europe
• decades of research on evangelical Christianity 

Martin pays particular attention to Graham's controversial relationships with Presidents Lyndon Johnson and Richard Nixon. He also describes how Graham's lifelong determination "to do something great for God" led him to organize international conferences that spearheaded the worldwide spread of the liberating message of Jesus, and prompted him to help strengthen religious freedom in the Soviet bloc and China. 

Tracing Graham's life and ministry from his rural and religious roots in North Carolina to his place as the elder statesman of American evangelicalism, examining both his triumphs and his tribulations, Martin shows the multidimensional character of the man who has become one of the most admired persons in the world.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Open Road Integrated Media
• Release date: Feb 21, 2018
• ISBN: 9780310353324

William Martin

WILLIAM MARTIN is the New York Times bestselling author of over a dozen novels, an award-winning PBS documentary on the life of George Washington, and a cult-classic horror film, too. In novels like Back Bay, City of Dreams, The Lost Constitution, The Lincoln Letter, and Bound for Gold, he has told stories of the great and the anonymous of American history, and he's taken readers from the deck of the Mayflower to 9/11. His work has earned him many accolades and honors, including the 2005 New England Book Award, the 2015 Samuel Eliot Morison Award, and the 2019 Robert B. Parker Award. He and his wife live near Boston, where he serves on the boards of several cultural and historical institutions, and he has three grown children.

Book preview

Also by William Martin

These Were God’s People, 1966

Christians in Conflict, 1972

My Prostate and Me, 1994

With God on Our Side, 2005

ZONDERVAN

A Prophet with Honor

Copyright © 1991, 2018 by William C. Martin

Requests for information should be addressed to:

Zondervan, 3900 Sparks Dr. SE, Grand Rapids, Michigan 49546

ISBN 978-0-310-35330-0 (hardcover)

ISBN 978-0-310-35392-8 (international trade paper edition)

ISBN 978-0-310-35333-1 (audio)

ISBN 978-0-310-35332-4 (ebook)

Epub Edition January 2018 9780310353324

Any Internet addresses (websites, blogs, etc.) and telephone numbers in this book are offered as a resource. They are not intended in any way to be or imply an endorsement by Zondervan, nor does Zondervan vouch for the content of these sites and numbers for the life of the book.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means — electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or any other — except for brief quotations in printed reviews, without the prior permission of the publisher.

Cover design: Matthew P. Van Kirk

Cover image: © Bettmann / Corbis

Back cover images: Russ Busby

Interior design: Michelle Espinoza

First printing January 2018 / Printed in the United States of America

Information about External Hyperlinks in this eBook

Please note that footnotes in this ebook may contain hyperlinks to external websites as part of bibliographic citations. These hyperlinks have not been activated by the publisher, who cannot verify the accuracy of these links beyond the date of publication.

To Patricia

Contents

Preface to This Edition

Preface and Acknowledgments

Part 1: Genesis

  1.    Mr. Graham Goes to Washington

  2.    A Great Cloud of Witnesses

Part 2: America’s Sensational Young Evangelist (1918 – 1949)

  3.    Billy Frank

  4.    The Boy Preacher

  5.    Ruth

  6.    Geared to the Times, Anchored to the Rock

  7.    The Canvas Cathedral

Part 3: From Vict’ry Unto Vict’ry (1950 – 1960)

  8.    Evangelism Incorporated

  9.    Principalities and Powers

10.    Trust and Obey

11.    Harringay

12.    Fields White Unto Harvest

13.    New Evangelicals, Old Fundamentalists

14.    God in the Garden

15.    Reaping the Whirlwind

16.    Unto the Uttermost Parts of the Earth

Part 4: The Kingdoms of the World and Their Glory (1960 – 1974)

17.    Election and Free Will

18.    The Kennedy Years

19.    Billy and Lyndon

20.    Second Comings

21.    Dreams and Wars

22.    Nixon Revived

23.    The Power and the Glory

24.    Billy, You Stay Out of Politics

25.    A Ministry of Reconciliation

26.    Vietnam and Watergate

Part 5: Keeping the Faith (1974 – 1990)

27.    Lausanne

28.    Higher Ground

29.    A Crack in the Curtain

30.    The Preacher and the Bear

31.    Tribulation and Triumph

32.    Amsterdam

33.    The Constituted Means

34.    Decently and in Order

35.    The Bible [Still] Says

36.    What Manner of Man?

37.    To the Ends of the Earth

Part 6: Finishing the Course (The Final Years)

38.    The Work of an Evangelist

39.    Guard What Has Been Entrusted to You

40.    Having Faithful Children

41.    The Last Days

Notes

Index

Photos

Preface to This Edition

Life is unpredictable. As explained in the preface to the original edition of this book, an unexpected invitation from Billy Graham in 1985 led to five years of near total immersion in the life of the famed evangelist and the people who held up his arms during more than five decades of public ministry. And then, with the completion of the research and publication of the book, immersion dwindled to a sprinkling. I continued to receive Decision and monthly letters and press releases and exchanged the occasional letter or telephone call with Billy Graham. I wrote articles for magazines and newspapers and talked to dozens (perhaps hundreds) of reporters whenever Billy Graham was scheduled to hold a crusade in their cities or suffered an illness and as he passed the torch, in stages, to his son Franklin. But personal contact with people who had filled my life was largely absent—and missed. Then, to my delight, Zondervan—now, like my original publisher William Morrow, under the HarperCollins tent—asked me to bring the 1991 edition up to date. For the most part, I happily relied on many of the same people who had been so helpful to me in preparing the first edition. Particularly helpful were John Akers, David Bruce, Russ Busby, Roger Flessing, Rick Marshall, Tex Reardon, Larry Ross, Maury Scobee, Norman Sanders, Tedd Smith, Stephanie Wills, and various staff members at the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association and the DeMoss Group, which handles much of the public relations activities of BGEA and Samaritan’s Purse. I also cherished the opportunity to have a good visit with each of the Graham progeny: GiGi, Anne, Franklin, Ruth (formerly Bunny) and Ned. Their valuable contributions to the new chapters will be quite clear to readers. I also deeply appreciate the wise professional counsel and encouragement I received from Zondervan, particularly from Stan Gundry and Jim Ruark, who shepherded this edition to completion.

As with the first edition, I have tried to tell the story of Billy Graham as accurately as I am able. I do not doubt that additional information about Mr. Graham will surface from time to time after the publication of this book. I suspect, with good reason, that some of the Graham offspring will publish memoirs that will add to our understanding of their father and mother. If I am granted sufficient additional years, I may participate in some widening and deepening of the story. But whatever the future, I feel enormous gratitude for the opportunity I have been given and satisfaction that the work already published has been well received. I trust that this expanded version will also make a contribution to understanding the life and work of a truly remarkable man and the movement he led for much of the twentieth century.

WILLIAM MARTIN

March 2018

Preface and Acknowledgments

I can scarcely remember a time when revivals and revivalists did not fascinate me. As a small boy in Devine, Texas, in the late 1940s, I relished having the visiting evangelist over to our house for dinner during the annual gospel meeting. When the Baptists held a revival down the street, I often dropped in for a sermon or two, and numerous times I stood at the edge of a Pentecostal tent wondering what might be going on inside the minds and bodies of folk being whipped into a holy-rolling frenzy by the sweating, shouting, shirt-sleeved man striding back and forth on the flimsy little stage.

I didn’t hold any revivals myself until I was fourteen, but they were authentic for their time and place—held in the open air, illuminated by yellow bulbs, with the crowd seated on wooden-slatted church pews and singing from tattered softback songbooks. Not all of my outings were a success. One dismal, week-long revival seldom brought more than a dozen people out to sit in the oppressive August heat, and it was hard to be confident I had the full attention even of that faithful remnant, since the bare, unfrosted floodlight directly over my head not only drew hundreds of night bugs but, with the intense glow of its high wattage, fairly baked my crew-cut scalp and forced my auditors to look off to one side to avoid permanent damage to their stricken eyes.

Still, I was a pretty good speaker, and my sermons were of sufficient quality to have merited previous publication—one of my favorites featured a stinging attack on the Bolsheviks—and when kindly church ladies said, I’d sure love to hear you preach twenty years from now, I never doubted they would have the chance. As it happens, I don’t preach much anymore—haven’t for over twenty years—but I am still intrigued by those who do and are really good at it. Thus, when the opportunity came to chronicle and assess the life and ministry of the world’s best-known and, arguably, most successful preacher, I saw it immediately as the remarkable pleasure and privilege it has turned out to be. Some explanation of how this happened and what followed seems in order.

Throughout the 1970s, after joining the sociology department at Rice University in Houston, I wrote a series of magazine articles about popular religion, my primary academic specialty. Several of these appeared in Texas Monthly. In 1978 William Broyles, Jr., then editor of that excellent magazine, asked me to consider writing a profile of Billy Graham, whose Texas connections were numerous and strong. I already knew a fair amount about Graham and had even spent several days interviewing members of his staff and meeting briefly with him during a crusade in Jackson, Mississippi, so the assignment was a relatively easy one. The article, which appeared in the March 1978 issue of Texas Monthly, was generally favorable toward the evangelist, but it was by no means a puff piece, and because I had liked and been treated graciously by every member of Graham’s staff whom I met, I had some apprehensions about how it would be received. When the time comes to write, I have no conscious hesitation about trying to say exactly what I believe and feel about people and organizations I have studied, but I do not enjoy hurting people’s feelings, and because I consider it of paramount importance to be fair in what I write, I like to be perceived as fair. On occasion, I have written things that ruptured or forever precluded the possibility of friendship. I will doubtless do so again. I can live with that, but it brings me scant satisfaction. I do not write as a means of venting repressed anger. When Graham and his chief lieutenant, T. W. Wilson, both wrote notes expressing appreciation for the article, and particularly for its fairness, I was pleased. Still, I knew enough about the evangelist’s legendary graciousness toward the press not to imagine that the article had actually made any lasting impression on him. And I expected that my study of Billy Graham had ended.

Three years later Graham held a crusade in the football stadium at Rice University. I urged my students to attend and attended several services myself but made no attempt to make contact with Graham or any of the staff members I had met several years earlier. I was quite surprised, therefore, to receive a letter from him several weeks after the crusade stating that one of the biggest disappointments of his stay in Houston was not getting to see me and expressing a hope that we might be able to sit down together for lunch sometime. I responded, letting him know that I felt sure I could work him into my schedule, but, quite frankly, I assumed that his staff had prepared a list of people he might meet while in Houston, and that he was dispatching brief courtesy notes to those he had missed lest someone be unnecessarily offended.

Thus, despite these expressions of appreciation for my acumen and literary style, I was somewhat astonished when in November 1985 I received a letter from Mr. Graham in which he asked if I would be interested in writing a book concerning my life, ministry, and any niche in history our work may have. Several scholars and journalists had approached him about such a book, he said, but he had decided not to offer his cooperation to anyone else until checking with me about my interest and availability. As it happened, I was due for a sabbatical the following academic year and had not yet fully decided on a primary project. To be sure, I was interested, but I was also uncertain as to what Graham would expect of me and whether I would feel comfortable under conditions he might set. I let him know that I continued to think well of him but would feel obliged to tell the story as accurately as I could, whatever that might entail. A few weeks later, we met for several hours in a New York hotel room. I thought it possible he might ask me to produce an in-house, authorized account of his ministry, one guaranteed to view him favorably. I would have regretted turning down the chance to look at him and his organization carefully, but I was prepared to do so if those were the conditions. I also wondered, though I considered it less likely, if he might expect me to pledge some portion of whatever income I derived from the book to the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association. To my pleasant but perplexed surprise, we talked about our children and our wives, about what directions his ministry had taken lately and where he thought it might go in the future, and about why it would be simpler just to order sandwiches from room service than to go into a restaurant where people would almost certainly interrupt our conversation. Finally, when I knew we had to start talking about the ostensible reason for our visit, he asked, Well, do you want to do the book? I told him of course I did but would need to find out what the conditions might be. He said, There are no conditions. It’s your book. I don’t even have to read it. I want you to be critical. There are some things that need criticizing. He asked if I had an agent. I told him I did, and he correctly suggested that I should find a publisher. We don’t want any part of the income from the book, he said, but you’ll have a lot of expenses. How do you think that ought to be handled? He indicated that friends of his organization could provide expense money if that were necessary, but he clearly had reservations, even about an arms-length arrangement. I told him I thought it would be best if I took care of my own expenses. He readily agreed. That’s great, he said. If we gave you money, I think you would know there were no strings attached, but others might not believe it, and I don’t want anyone to think this is a ‘kept’ book. He then gave me the names, addresses, and telephone numbers of people who held the keys to various treasure-houses of information, assured me he would tell them I’d be in touch, and invited me to attend his upcoming crusade in Washington, D.C. Shortly afterward, he gave me a letter to present to publishers confirming his willingness to cooperate with me and assuring them that neither he nor any person associated with him reserved any right of approval or editorial control over anything I might write.

Mr. Graham proved true to his word. Over the next five years—two or three longer than either of us had imagined at the outset—I enjoyed cooperation of the sort that scholars and journalists dream about but seldom experience. Long interviews with Graham himself had to be scheduled during down times between crusades and major conferences, but he was always generous with his time on those occasions, spending most of several days with me at his home or office in Montreat, North Carolina, over three years, and making himself available for long telephone conversations on other occasions. In addition, he sent word up and down the line of his organization that his friends and colleagues should feel free to speak openly with me, which more than a hundred did. At the several crusades I attended (Washington, D.C.; Paris; Denver, Colorado; and Columbia, South Carolina), at the mammoth International Conference for Itinerant Evangelists, held in Amsterdam in 1986 (See Chapter 32), and at a Team and Staff Conference at the Homestead in 1987, I was given the opportunity to visit with scores of key personnel and access to any aspect of the operation I had sense enough to inquire about. On rare occasion Graham chose not to respond to a question, usually indicating that he had pledged not to discuss the topic (for example, private conversations with presidents or other world leaders), that he preferred not to discuss the topic while other parties to an incident were still alive, or that he did not wish to cause undue pain to some person. In most cases, he was willing to answer the same or a similar question a year or two later. The few instances in which I felt he was less than fully forthcoming are noted in the text. This same generally open atmosphere prevailed at Billy Graham Evangelistic Association (BGEA) offices in Minneapolis, London, and Montreat, where I received warm and extremely helpful assistance virtually every time I requested it. Also of inestimable value was the assistance I received from Dr. Lois Ferm, who serves as BGEA’s liaison with the Billy Graham Center Archives at Wheaton College. Certain materials in the archives, particularly oral histories, were donated with the understanding that they would be sealed until a certain date. Others were available only with express permission from Dr. Ferm. The wish of donors was always correctly observed, of course, but in no case was I ever denied permission to examine any archival file over which BGEA held sole control. Dr. Ferm expressed her conviction that early acquisitions by the archives had been placed under unnecessary restrictions; later additions have seldom been subject to such stringent regulations. As the person who conducted virtually all the oral-history interviews, Dr. Ferm assured me that those still closed to inspection held no dark secrets. Given my experience with several dozen such interviews whose time limitations ran out during the course of my research, I have no reason to doubt her word. Finally, various personnel at Walter Bennett Communications, BGEA’s media representative and public relations agency, as well as people holding similar positions within BGEA itself, have repeatedly furnished me with books, magazines, videotapes, transcripts, photocopies, and incidental bits of information that have proved invaluable in my research.

As agreed in my early discussions with Billy Graham, I attempted to pay virtually all of the considerable expenses involved in preparing this book. On two occasions, when BGEA’s large-scale dealings with its travel agent made it sensible and economical for the organization to furnish me with tickets for last-minute flights to major conferences, I accepted the tickets and soon afterward made contributions to the association in excess of what I believe the actual costs to have been. On numerous occasions I was able to take advantage of special hotel rates negotiated by BGEA on behalf of its members. And though I always offered to pick up the check, some members of the Graham team paid for various meals during my visits to crusades or BGEA offices. In similar fashion, I have tried to make contributions to BGEA or Samaritan’s Purse (an Evangelical social service organization headed by Graham’s eldest son, Franklin) in excess of any financial expense directly incurred by BGEA on my behalf.

To imagine, however, that writing a few checks cancels any debt I might owe to Billy Graham and his organization would be legalistic and naive. I would not try, or even begin to know how, to pay for the favors, assistance, goodwill, and gracious treatment I have received from numerous individuals, only some of whom are named below. They knew, of course, that I would write about Mr. Graham and his organization and that treating me kindly and well would enhance the likelihood that I would speak of them favorably. But I want to believe and do believe that they treated me kindly and well because they tend to be, as a group, remarkably kind and well-meaning people. As I have written this book, I have constantly examined what I have said in an effort to make sure that I was neither shading the truth in Graham’s or his associates’ favor out of gratitude for their helpfulness, nor taking an inappropriately negative slant as a way of emphasizing that I had not been taken in by slick manipulation. Admittedly, I enjoyed writing about their strengths more than about their weaknesses. But since Billy Graham and his associates, like all humankind, have weaknesses, I determined not to gloss these over. I have tried to be scrupulously fair, not only because I do not wish the taint of unfairness to mar the most notable scholarly enterprise in which I have engaged to date but also because I regard fairness as a cardinal virtue. I do not imagine, of course, that my judgment is flawless. I am certain it is not. But the account and the assessments I have rendered here have been given with great care.

My debts, as I have indicated, are many and substantial. I owe early and long appreciation to Dr. Kenneth Chafin, former pastor of Houston’s South Main Baptist Church and former dean of the Billy Graham School of Evangelism. At our first meeting in 1974, when I was interviewing him about a different subject, Dr. Chafin half-seriously suggested that I consider writing a biography of Billy Graham. A year later, he invited me to spend several days at a crusade in Jackson, Mississippi. That visit led to the Texas Monthly article, which led to the invitation to write this book. I haven’t talked to Ken Chafin much since he moved to Louisville, Kentucky, but I haven’t forgotten him.

T. W. Wilson, Graham’s personal assistant and traveling companion, repeatedly went to extra lengths to help coordinate my visits with Graham, to provide entree to interviewees and access to materials, and to supply me with various other kinds of information. It was easy to understand why Billy Graham has come to rely upon him so heavily and to relish his company.

Cliff Barrows, even while recovering from a life-threatening illness, spent several days reviewing films of Graham’s early ministry and sharing observations and insights gleaned during an adult lifetime spent at Billy Graham’s side as his music director and vice-chairman of BGEA.

George Wilson and John Corts, former and present chief of operations of BGEA, gave me broad access to the association’s facilities and staff, and graciously met any need I expressed.

Sterling Huston, director of North American Crusades, saw to it that I got every piece of information I requested about Graham’s crusade operations and enabled me to get a worm’s-eye view of crusades in progress.

Maurice Rowlandson, director of BGEA’s London office, shared his extensive knowledge of Graham’s ministry in Great Britain, arranged interviews with key church leaders in England, and, with his wife, Marilyn, offered gracious personal hospitality and other kind assistance on several occasions.

Dr. Alexander S. Haraszti was a meticulously inventoried storehouse of detailed information about Graham’s visits to the Soviet bloc countries. Dr. John Akers and Edward E. Plowman supplemented his accounts with their own observations and insights. Both these men also offered candid and astute reflections on other aspects of Graham’s organization and ministry.

Bob Williams gave hours of his time, even when swamped with responsibility, to help me gain a better understanding of the International Conference for Itinerant Evangelists and the saturation evangelism effort known as Mission World.

Russ Busby, BGEA’s photographer, recorded hundreds of scenes that enabled me to picture exactly how an event looked, recommended several photos for use in this book, and furnished a stack of verbal snapshots that no camera could capture.

I am indebted, of course, to every person I interviewed. I hope each of them, including those not mentioned in the footnotes, will accept as sufficient my blanket expression of gratitude. Some, however, stand out for their willingness to engage in repeated conversations, for their assistance in providing access to other people, and for myriad other thoughtful deeds. I think especially of Dr. Akbar Abdul-Haqq, Gerald Beavan, Ralph Bell, Bill Brown, Dr. David Bruce, Blair Carlson, Elwyn Cutler, J. D. Douglas, Fred Durston, Allan Emery, Jr., Colleen Townsend Evans, Dr. Robert Evans, Roger Flessing, Leighton Ford, Ernest Gibson, Melvin Graham, Roy Gustafson, Henry Holley, Mike Hooser, Dr. Arthur P. Johnston, Howard Jones, Johnny Lenning, Dr. Robert L. Maddox, Dr. Victor Nelson, Roger Palms, Dr. Tom Phillips, Texas E. Reardon, Charles Riggs, Tedd Smith, Walter Smyth, Charles Templeton, Dr. Calvin Thielman, Bill Weldon, Dr. John Wesley White, Ralph Williams, and Grady Wilson.

My research efforts were wonderfully extended by a competent corps of co-workers. None was more valuable than my prize daughter, Dale Martin Thomas, who worked at my side for two summers and made further valuable contributions by writing her senior thesis at Yale on the conflict between Billy Graham and the Fundamentalists, and whose research for that project is reflected in Chapter 13. She also enlisted her friend and classmate, Jim Ford, who provided me with information about Graham’s visits to Yale in 1957 and 1982. Alongside her in importance is Jane Washburn Robinson, whose enterprising, painstakingly thorough, and expertly organized and documented research provided the basis for the chapters on the relationship between Graham and Richard Nixon. Though she was able to assist me for only one summer, and most of that via computer modem, Christiane Pratsch also proved to be as able a second set of hands, eyes, and mind as one could hope for. And during the final push to get all the footnotes correct, Shay Gregory displayed remarkable diligence, ingenuity and cheerfulness as she hunted down every straggler who lacked a proper name or identifying mark.

The bulk of my archival research was done at the Billy Graham Center at Wheaton College. The extensive and well-ordered collection at the center’s archives is a priceless resource for students not only of Billy Graham’s ministry but also of other facets of Evangelical Christianity. Archives Director Robert Shuster and his associates, Lannae Graham, Frances Brocker, Paul Ericksen, and Jan Nasgowitz could not have been more helpful or gracious during the several weeks I spent in their midst. I received similar assistance from the center’s library director, Feme Weimer, and her co-worker, Judy Franzke. As already noted, my work at the archives was greatly facilitated by the good offices of Dr. Lois Ferm, who was at pains to see to it that I had access to every piece of material that was legally possible for me to see. She was also helpful in suggesting places to look. In addition, my candid conversations with her and her husband, Dr. Robert Ferm, associated with Billy Graham for over forty years, provided many valuable insights.

One of the most valuable sources of assistance was the staff of Walter Bennett Communications, which has long handled public relations and media operations for the Graham ministry. Fred and Ted Dienert gave me open access to backstage operations of the television productions. Larry Ross repeatedly shared his time and insights into Billy Graham’s phenomenal success in gaining the confidence of the world’s media. And Noel Wilkerson Lee, again and again and again, found and sent videotapes, transcripts, press releases, and whatever other materials I requested, all in good time and good humor.

Sarah Clemmer of the Charlotte Observer also smoothed my way to effective research in that newspaper’s extensive files on Graham.

As with virtually any historical project, I have depended upon the work of those who have plowed the ground before me. Earlier biographies, particularly those by John Pollock, William McLoughlin, Marshall Frady, and Patricia Daniels Cornwell, have been helpful for their insights and for guiding me to materials I might otherwise have found less easily or missed altogether. In addition, I have benefited from the work of numerous journalists who have written books and thousands of articles about Billy Graham. I have given credit for every known debt in the footnotes, but I take this opportunity to pay additional thanks to them all.

From the beginning, secretaries have played crucial roles. Billy Graham and his colleagues are blessed—I have no more hesitation to use the word than they—with a phalanx of extraordinarily able and unfailingly helpful assistants. Stephanie Wills served as lifeline to Billy Graham himself, relaying queries accurately, dispatching all sorts of materials immediately, and giving information and advice that was invariably on target and often delivered with a wry sense of humor. Cathy Wood, secretary to Sterling Huston, not only provided me with abundant assistance at and regarding crusades and other aspects of the ministry but repeatedly did so in the midst of hectic workdays that lasted at least fifteen hours. During the several weeks I spent in Amsterdam in 1986, Susan Cherian, Bob Williams’s secretary, offered similar help with equal good cheer. Belma Reimers was especially helpful in arranging my meetings with Cliff Barrows and Johnny Lenning. Ruth Graham’s secretary, Maury Scobee, helped me several times with appointments and travel arrangements and proved to be a delightful friend as well. I had only limited personal contact with Mary Becker in BGEA’s Minneapolis office, but I was regularly grateful to her for faithfully sending me a full set of newly updated statistics every few weeks during the entire five years. And George Wilson’s longtime assistant, Esther LaDow, managed to find copies of almost any obscure publication or document I felt I needed. In addition, and absolutely without exception, numerous other secretaries at various levels within BGEA, in both the Montreat and Minneapolis offices, rendered friendly and competent assistance whenever they had opportunity. I am deeply grateful.

On the home front, my several computers, whose value has been incalculable, made it unnecessary for me to rely heavily on the official skills of university secretaries in the actual research and preparation of the manuscript. Still, the friendship, forbearance, load-lifting good humor, and able assistance on other fronts consistently furnished by Kathy Koch, Crystalyn Williams, Nancy Dahlberg, and Rita Loucks during years of single-minded pursuit of a goal and absentminded loss (usually temporary) of essential items have been a source of comfort.

I can scarcely imagine how I could have written this book had I not been able to spend eighteen months in practical isolation in comfortable dwellings graciously made available to me by thoughtful and generous people. Loise H. Wessendorff’s picturesque and peaceful retreat center, Wellspring, not only provided much-needed solitude during the early stages of the writing but rekindled a deep affection for the Texas Hill Country. The roar of the ocean at Lamar and Penny Vieau’s Seabean helped drown my inner moanings during the wintriest period of the entire project. The delightful nineteenth-century farmhouse at Pecan Mill, from whose windows I could watch champion cutting horses grazing in the fields, gave me a marvelous place to work and, just as important, enabled me to renew my ties with my cousins, Mike, Jerry, and Bill McLennan. And the magnificent view of the mountains from the window of the study in Steven and Sandra Rudy’s charming cottage in Crested Butte, Colorado, made it easy to get through the final revisions and copyediting. I expect to write my next book at a place called Canaan, not far from Wellspring. All these will be welcome there.

My several visits to Wheaton were made immeasurably more pleasant by Bill, Donna, Bruce, and Vicky Bond, who welcomed a stranger into their home and made him feel a part of their family. And my sojourn in Paris, a delightful assignment in itself, was enhanced by the hospitality and companionship of Spencer and Marlene Hays and Herve Odermatt.

For more than twenty years, I have enjoyed an unusual degree of support and encouragement from my colleagues on the faculty and in the administration of Rice University. With scarcely a murmur of discontent, my dear friends in the Department of Sociology—Chandler Davidson, Chad Gordon, Stephen Klineberg, Elizabeth Long, and Angela Valenzuela—my two deans, Joseph Cooper and James Pomerantz, and George Rupp, president of Rice University, agreed to my taking a two-and-a-half-year leave to work on this book. I do not take such an environment for granted.

The folks at William Morrow showed great confidence in this book, making it possible for me both to take time away from my teaching and to afford the research I needed to perform. I commend them for their generosity, thank them for their patience, and hope their judgment will be vindicated. I am also grateful to their counterparts at other publishing houses, particularly at Macmillan/Free Press and Houghton Mifflin/Ticknor and Fields, who helped convince them that a book about Billy Graham would have wide appeal.

Many people at a publishing house are involved in the production of a book, but none more intimately than the editor. My editor, Maria Guarnaschelli, is a remarkable woman. When we first met, I was overwhelmed by her enthusiasm for the book. In the intervening years, I have been repeatedly overwhelmed by her capacity to demonstrate a range and intensity of emotion that exceed my own to a noticeable degree. Maria not only possesses superb technical skills as an editor; she also has two other gifts that make her a valuable collaborator: the ability to teach and the ability to learn, gifts that enabled me to find and to write the book I wanted to write. Two freelance editors also gave good assistance. After reading the first version of the manuscript, Joy Parker furnished thirty pages of thoughtful analysis and encouragement that proved extremely helpful, and Ellen Joseph helped pare that first version to a more manageable size. And finally, copy editor Michael Goodman patiently checked facts, spotted typographical errors and inconsistencies, and brought the manuscript into line with William Morrow’s stylistic conventions.

Gerry McCauley has been my literary agent for twenty years. We have been friends throughout that period, but never have I valued the friendship so highly as during these past five years. From his wise and effective assistance in helping arrange for the original contract, through regular telephone calls to calm my fears and assure me that all books were difficult and that many authors actually finish them, to reading and commenting on various drafts of the manuscript itself, he demonstrated a care and concern that went far beyond a mere professional relationship. And now, perhaps, we can talk about baseball without being distracted.

My wife, Patricia, has been her dependably wonderful self throughout this long process. When it became clear that the only way to get the book written was to retreat from the city, she bore my long absences with un complaining grace, brightened my weekends with her warm and cheerful presence, gave and resisted giving criticism in just the proper proportion, and appeared never to doubt that I could and would eventually finish. My sons, Rex and Jeff, their wives, Mary and Suzanne, and my son-in-law, Rupert Thomas, were less directly involved, but they supported me with their encouragement and love, as did my longtime friends David Berg, John Boles, Sidney and Mary Lee Burrus, Allen Matusow, and Richard and Michael Parten.

I understand that I am a fortunate man.

WILLIAM MARTIN

Part 1

Genesis

1

Mr. Graham Goes to Washington

Billy Graham arrived at precisely the right moment. Some who jammed the interview room at the National Press Club looked as if they might be first-assignment reporters for their church’s weekly newsletter, but most had the countenance and equipment of men and women accustomed to confronting the familiar figures who provide grist for the evening news and the morning editions in the nation’s capital. Still, even those well-seasoned veterans seemed to acknowledge the sheer physical presence radiated by the world’s most famous preacher, a man who is by almost any measure the most successful evangelist in Christian history.

As Graham and his small retinue took their places at a table, it was hard not to be surprised that despite his six-foot-three-inch height, his shoulders are rather narrow, his chest thin, and his legs, outlined when he crosses them in a loose-jointed way, almost skinny; only the large expressive hands seem suited to a titan. But crowning this spindly frame is that most distinctive of heads, with the profile for which God created granite, the perpetual glowing tan, the flowing hair, the towering forehead, the square jaw, the eagle’s brow and eyes, and the warm smile that has melted hearts, tamed opposition, and subdued skeptics on six continents.

After a press-club welcome and warm praise from the cochairs of the 1986 Greater Washington Crusade, Billy Graham took center stage. With a manner that suggested he still marveled that a simple country preacher found favor with famous and powerful people, he recalled how legendary House Speaker Sam Rayburn arranged for him to use the Capitol steps for the closing service of his 1952 crusade, mentioned that Ben Bradlee asked what the Washington Post could do to help the present effort (I told him that all we want is the first headline every day for eight days), revealed that he had discussed the crusade at private dinners with President and Mrs. Reagan, Vice-President and Mrs. Bush, and Secretary of State George Shultz and at meetings with Defense Secretary Caspar Weinberger and other cabinet members. He told of an international conference his organization would host that summer at a cost of more than 20 million dollars and revealed an ambitious plan to use satellite technology to preach the gospel simultaneously to virtually the entire world. Then, after lamenting the return of the Elmer Gantry image among television preachers, Billy spoke of his anguish over continuing racism, his concern for the hungry and homeless, and his determination to do what he could to foster bilateral nuclear disarmament and world peace.

When he opened the floor for questioning, noting ahead of time that he would sort of beat around the bush on purely political issues, Graham displayed a well-honed skill at fielding and finessing what turned out to be a quite routine set of inquiries. Forty minutes later, as the reporters packed up their gear, Graham’s lifetime friend and primary gatekeeper T. W. Wilson, drew public relations specialist Larry Ross into a corridor for a quick assessment. They agreed the conference had been a bit of a letdown. Graham had prepared for a tough session and got nothing to hit but softballs. None of it would win much airtime or newspaper space. They also registered disappointment over a Washington Post article that appeared that morning. That guy spent two hours with Billy, but it didn’t reflect it. They had higher hopes for a New York Times story because the reporter was a Christian. "Give the Times, USA Today, and the other big papers all the time they need, Wilson said. Try to spare Billy from the others. We need to move out of here as soon as possible and get over to CNN."

Two days before the crusade would begin, Graham met with his team for a serve-yourself continental breakfast in a conference room at the Key Bridge Marriott Hotel in Alexandria. All but he and two or three of his closest aides stayed at the Marriott; to protect himself from a potentially endless parade of supplicants, Graham nearly always maintains separate quarters, taking most meals in his room. Typically, he stays in a comfortable suite in a good hotel, but lest the press find out and create an unfavorable impression, he seldom accepts the ultraluxurious suites pressed on him by admiring hoteliers. The precrusade team breakfast is one of the few occasions when most staff members will see him, except on the crusade platform. In public Graham wears well-tailored suits that give him the look of a statesman or an investment banker. Here, among his friends, some of whom have worked with him for forty years, he sported his favorite informal outfit: moccasin-style gum-soled shoes, nondescript gray trousers, and an off-the-rack bright blue blazer. His hair, as usual, needed trimming and would have benefited either from a new application of Grecian Formula 16 (a concession to television rather than vanity) or simple recognition that longevity is one of his greatest assets, of which a mane of gray would be a fitting symbol. Most of the men on his staff appeared to have chosen their clothes for utility rather than style. Several sported toupees; only one had bothered to try for a match with the texture and color of his own hair. They make up one of the most efficient and effective event-producing organizations in America; they remind one of the Lions Club in Dothan, Alabama. The women, mostly wives and secretaries, cut a similar figure: neat but unflashy, competent but ever friendly, well able to take care of themselves but accustomed by ethos and experience to attend to the needs of others. As a group, these pleasant, unassuming, thoroughly dedicated men and women represent the elite of Evangelical Christianity and the middle of the middle class.

Graham opened the meeting with a few words about the importance of the crusade, then relinquished the chair to Sterling Huston, director of North American Crusades for the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association (BGEA). A trim, diplomatic man who favors precise speech and is ever at pains to shine the best possible light on the evangelist and the association, Huston urged the team to regard its interaction with the Marriott staff as a kind of ministry, taking care to display a consistently courteous and friendly attitude and inviting them to the crusade services. On a practical note, he reminded them that the hotel restaurant’s cold breakfast buffet would provide as much as they wanted to eat, with plenty of cereal and fresh fruit at about half the cost of the hot buffet.

There followed a series of brisk reports, most packed with statistics, in which various team members summed up the preparation and current status of the aspects of the crusade under their direction. Washington crusade director Elwyn Cutler, one of several BGEA staffers who move to cities a year or two in advance to oversee the development of committees and other crusade preparations, declared how amazing it had been just to stand back and see how the Lord worked, in ways beyond human understanding, to bring to the front the leadership He wanted for this crusade. To illustrate his point, various team members told how sixteen major committees, all carefully integrated and headed by black and white cochairs, had organized 8,000 volunteers into an elaborate network of prayer, Bible study, and work groups. Workers had issued over 500,000 personal invitations and distributed 400,000 packets of promotional material to homes in the Greater Washington area. Thousands of small prayer groups had met regularly for months, and thousands more who belonged to national prayer chains had implored God to smile on this effort. Nearly 4,000 people had been taught how to counsel those who would come forward at the crusade services, and another thousand would lead nurture groups for new converts after the crusade ended. The Billy Graham School of Evangelism, an intensive training program held in conjunction with every Graham crusade, would enroll 1,750 pastors from 79 denominations and all 50 states in a five-day program designed to help them become more effective evangelists in their home communities. In similar fashion, other team members reported on special efforts to minister to blacks, young people, college students, military personnel, political leaders, and prisoners, and on the Love-in-Action program that collects food for disbursement to the crusade city’s hungry and homeless.

As a capstone to this triumphalist litany, United States Senate chaplain Richard Halverson spoke almost worshipfully of Graham’s visits on Capitol Hill. When Billy Graham comes to the Capitol, he said, suddenly, the Senate and Congress are unimportant. To me, it’s a miracle. Wherever Billy is, there is the gospel of Christ. Everybody knows what he stands for, so he says it without a word. Just yesterday, after he opened the Senate with prayer, it was almost impossible to get away. Pages wanted to get his autograph. Senators kept coming off the floor to talk with him. It was just absolutely exciting. Here is a man who personifies the gospel of Christ, the love of God in Christ. Wherever he goes, all over the world, it’s not like they are receiving just him; it’s like they are receiving Christ. I wish that were true of more of us.

Such a potent witness apparently has its downside. Graham observed that the Devil is also at work, citing as proof the afflictions that had befallen three of the men who had stood at his side in virtually every crusade since the 1940s. His longtime song leader, Cliff Barrows, crusade pianist Tedd Smith, and Associate Evangelist Grady Wilson, a high school friend who had been present when Graham preached his first sermon in 1936, were all ailing. I’m sure this is an attack of Satan, Graham said. We’ve had a number of things happen that have no other explanation to me, and we need to build a wall of prayer. At his direction, the people at each table began to pray, softly lifting petitions for the matters that burdened their hearts. As the room filled with the earnest sounds of heaven-directed entreaties, Billy Graham prayed especially for those who think they are not interested in religion but are, for those who laugh at cocktail hours but are not happy. Others prayed for the hotel staff, for team members out visiting prisons, and for those trying to solve parking problems around the downtown convention center. When enough time had passed to ensure that most key needs had been covered, Chaplain Halverson brought the meeting to a close by asking everyone in the room to touch Billy Graham or someone who was touching him. Then, as they linked in an unbroken chain of support, Halverson offered a fervent prayer commending the evangelist to the Almighty as Mr. Gospel, the incarnation of the teachings of Jesus Christ.

An old black prophet shuffling along inside a word-jammed sandwich board tried to convince the thousands who streamed past him into the convention center that Billy Graham was an aide-de-camp to the Antichrist, but they did not buy it. To them, as to Chaplain Halverson, he was the living symbol of Evangelical Christianity, the man who had preached Christ to hundreds of millions of people throughout the world and now brought his message to the capital of what many still regarded as the Redeemer Nation, the nation with the soul of a church.

Inside, some grabbed Cokes or hot dogs at concession stands. Others lingered at tables set up in the center’s cavernous lobbies, browsing over devotional guides, souvenir picture books, how-to manuals on personal evangelism, and rapidly shrinking stacks of volumes by and about Graham and sundry relatives and associates. For the most part, the assembling multitude was solidly middle- and working-class: clean, neat, and conforming to standards of dress and decorum they felt best reflected their self-image as the good, decent people who affirm and embody the core values of American society. A well-schooled usher corps funneled folks into the stands or to special areas for the deaf or for those who spoke one of the eight foreign languages into which the service was being translated.

In the cramped quarters of a TV-production truck parked at a loading dock off the main hall, a small crew checked monitors and controls as they prepared to transform a live service into a television program that would be seen by millions a few weeks later. Meanwhile, in one of the center’s many conference rooms, Elwyn Cutler gave instructions and seating assignments to the ministers and other professional churchmen whose contribution to the crusade would be honored by a spot on the platform, a tangible symbol of importance to massage their egos, impress their parishioners, and consequently boost attendance. In another room, comfortably furnished with sofas and chairs and stocked with an abundance of soft drinks and snacks, Billy Graham spent the last few minutes before the service visiting with former District of Columbia mayor Walter Washington, Mayor Marion S. Barry, Jr., and Vice-President George Bush.

When the appointed moment approached, T. W. Wilson unobtrusively indicated it was time for this inner circle to join Elwyn Cutler’s larger group in its procession to the platform. Inside the arena the choir fell silent and attention shifted to the stage, where the organ, piano, and synthesizer sounded the first notes of Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring. Moments later, as Graham and his party mounted the rear steps and came into view, 25,000 people rose in sustained ovation.

Because it was the opening service, introductions ran somewhat longer than usual, but they provided a good view of the thin line between Church and State and of Billy Graham’s position as an icon not just of American Christianity but of America itself. Mayor Washington, noting that he had raised the first dollar to build the magnificent convention center, announced that Billy Graham came to Washington, like Queen Esther in the Bible, for such a time as this. Mayor Barry, observing that it was he who brought the ninety-eight-million-dollar facility to completion, praised Graham’s stand against apartheid in South Africa and racism in America, then assumed the evangelist’s support of the mayor’s own programs regarding drugs, unemployment, the rehabilitation of prisoners, and sex education for young people. To close, Barry wrapped his own career in the mantle of God’s providence, noting that his rise from a sharecropper’s shack in Mississippi to the leadership of this great city and a spot on the platform with Billy Graham proved that the Lord moves in mysterious ways, his wonders to perform. George Bush provided the final cachet. We welcome to America’s city, he said, America’s pastor, Dr. Billy Graham. He affirmed his own belief in the separation of Church and State but insisted the nation would be strong only so long as its faith is strong, and he thanked Graham for his role in reawakening the faith of citizens in "this one nation, under God, the last, best hope of man on earth."

Other preliminaries included a stirring religiopatriotic song and a low-key collection. Then, just before Graham spoke, America’s beloved singer of sacred songs, George Beverly Shea, a gentle bear of a man who became the first member of Graham’s team in 1944, stepped to the microphone, anchored himself to the pulpit with both hands, and sang, In times like these we need the Bible. . . . This rock is Jesus . . . Yes, He’s the one. At seventy-seven, Shea sounded twenty years younger, his deep rich voice rolling out over the auditorium and settling on the audience like a down comforter.

With no further fanfare—at most services, Graham receives no introduction whatever—America’s Pastor began to speak. He commended local officials for giving the greatest cooperation we have ever received in any crusade we have ever held, announced that on Tuesday night he would talk about The Richest and Sexiest Man Who Ever Lived, and urged everyone to make a special attempt to fill RFK Stadium for the final service the following Sunday. Then, apparently because he feels a preacher ought to tell a few jokes to show he is a regular fellow, he related a couple of the small handful of stories he has been repeating for decades. Neither was a four-star anecdote, but the crowd laughed generously, as crowds often do when famous noncomedians tell jokes.

The sermon, when he finally got to it, was a classic piece of Graham homiletics. Its theme was Christ and its five subheadings were the Creative Christ, the Compassionate Christ, the Crucified Christ, the Conquering Christ, and the Coming Christ. As in virtually all his sermons, he recited a laundry list of problems: poverty, drugs, broken hearts, emptiness, guilt, loneliness, spiritual blindness, and fear. He knew these were problems and that secular remedies were bound to fail because one of the greatest biochemists in the world and rocket scientist Wernher von Braun and Harvard president Derek Bok had told him so. He had other evidence as well: "a Roman Catholic priest studying for a Ph.D. in Chicago . . . Simon LeBon of the rock group Duran Duran . . . a girl in Japan . . . the managing partner of one of Washington’s most prestigious law firms . . . a new movie out . . . a recent Gallup poll . . . a magazine cover story . . . a taxicab driver on Donahue . . . a letter that came to me last month. . . . And most important of all, the Bible says. . . ."

To no one’s surprise, Graham proclaimed, with monumental conviction and certainty, that the sole and sufficient answer to these problems is Jesus Christ. In the early years of his ministry, he spoke with such volume and driving rapidity that journalists dubbed him God’s Machine Gun. He can still generate considerable intensity when the topic and occasion demand it, but his style has become almost conversational, and the conversation has a tendency to ramble despite his increasing use of full manuscripts. Nonetheless, many of the familiar gestures—the clenched fist, the pointing finger, the ambidextrous slashes, the two-pistol punctuation, the hands drawn down to the Bible like twin lightning bolts—are still there and still riveting in their effect.

The sermon moved inexorably to its goal: the invitation—to accept Christ for the first time, to receive assurance that one’s prior acceptance and salvation are still under warranty, or to acknowledge a backslid condition and to rededicate oneself to walking a straighter and narrower path. Life is uncertain, he said. God does not give us the date of our death. And then, the words that bring virtually every sermon of his to an end: I’m going to ask you to get up out of your seat and come and stand here in front of the platform, and say by your coming, ‘Tonight, I want Christ in my heart.’ As he suddenly fell silent, his head bowed in prayer, chin resting on right fist, elbow cradled in left hand, the convention center swelled with the simple melody and words of the quintessential invitation hymn:

Just as I am, without one plea,

But that Thy blood was shed for me,

And that Thou bidd’st me come to Thee,

O Lamb of God, I come, I come.

And from every section of the auditorium, they came, they came. Serious of mien but devoid of tears or other overt signs of emotion, more than a thousand souls answered Billy Graham’s call to be washed in the blood of the Lamb.

The response pleased the crew in the television truck:

Pan around and pull, [Camera] Three. Let them walk through. We want movement. Stand by, One. . . . Give me the shot with the aisles. A little further right. That’s nice.

Would you look at that! They’re still coming.

The program would not air for several weeks, but Graham stepped back into the pulpit to say, To you watching on television, at home, in a hotel room, in a college dormitory, wherever you are, call that telephone number you see on the screen. Then, to the inquirers who had streamed into a large open space immediately in front of the platform, he said:

You have not come to Billy Graham. I have no special powers. I’m just another human being like you. I’m just the messenger. The message comes from God. You have asked for his forgiveness. I want to tell you on the authority of Scripture that he will give you that forgiveness. Not because you deserve it, but because Christ died for you. And he rose again, and he’s alive, and he’s willing to come into your heart now by the Holy Spirit and give you a new power, a new strength, a new joy, and a new peace.

He then led them through the sinner’s prayer:

O God, . . . I am a sinner. . . . I’m sorry for my sins. . . . I’m willing to turn from my sins. . . . I receive Christ as my savior. . . . I confess him as Lord. . . . From this moment on. . . . I want to follow him . . . and serve him . . . in the fellowship of his church. . . . In Christ’s name, Amen.

This ostensibly life-changing transaction so simply accomplished, he urged them to read the Bible every day, to pray regularly, and to witness for Christ by inviting others to become Christians and by manifesting a loving and helpful spirit, particularly across racial lines. Finally, he encouraged them to affiliate with a church and worship regularly, not just stay home and watch TV preachers: "Many are far better than I’ll ever be, but Christians need to worship together." With that, Graham left the platform and his associates took control, making sure all inquirers were matched with counselors who would help them clarify and confirm their decisions. As the last remaining strays found shepherds, the area began to hum with quiet conversation and prayer. Counselors helped their charges fill out decision cards and gave them a booklet entitled The Living Christ, a copy of the Gospel according to John, a brief Bible correspondence course, and suggestions for further study. The cards would reveal that few inquirers were confirmed pagans. Most already had some connection to a church or had come to the crusade as the guest of a church member.

Within minutes, runners rushed the decision cards to rooms where a Co-Labor Corps of over two hundred volunteers waited to feed them into an elaborate follow-up procedure designed to link them to cooperating pastors and channel them into local congregations. The head of this operation, Dr. Robert L. Maddox, who had served as Jimmy Carter’s liaison to the religious community before becoming executive director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, admitted that the crusade could not be expected to reshape Greater Washington. Billy will go home next week and the city will swallow him up and the effects will be gone. But as a matter of fact, in the lives of individuals, it may be absolutely pivotal. I have seen that happen. It won’t rock Washington, D.C., for the Lord, but it might make some congressman struggling with key legislation think a little bit differently. Last night, I watched two or three guys that I know who grew up out here in Virginia and were as segregationist as they could be. They were working right alongside black people without any regard to color at all. When this is over, white churches will still do their thing and black churches will do theirs, and there is not going to be any great crossing of that line. But there will be greater understanding. It could have some impact.

Back on the sidewalk outside the convention center, the old prophet had retired for the night, but a squad of grim-faced young men in slacks and white shirts and severe long-haired women in ankle-length homemade dresses passed out cheaply printed pamphlets that condemned Graham for his apostate theology, coming down especially hard on his faulty understanding of the purpose and proper mode of baptism. Most people declined their publications and tried to ignore them, but one Graham supporter vociferously responded to their challenge. While they argued, a policeman who had asked a departing counselor for an inquirer’s packet and had, after a brief conversation, trusted Christ, held up his hand to stop traffic for one of the last groups to leave the building. He was singing a gospel song.

2

A Great Cloud of Witnesses

The path Billy Graham trod to triumph in the nation’s capital in 1986 stretched backward across 350 years through gigantic stadiums and two-pole tents, brush arbors and open fields, ornate auditoriums and simple meetinghouses, to the waters of Massachusetts Bay, where the leader of four hundred brave and devout souls prepared them for their errand into the wilderness not by reading a manifesto but by preaching a sermon. From the day John Winthrop proclaimed to the passengers of the Arbella that God Almighty had dispatched them to New England to establish a city upon a hill for all mankind to behold and emulate, Americans have been moved and molded by men and women who assayed to speak for God. Over the centuries, the vectors and vagaries of history have eroded their influence and power, so that no contemporary clergyman enjoys the submissive respect routinely accorded to ministers in the early years of the New England Way, but no one who has paid attention in recent years can doubt that the Word and those who

Reviews for A Prophet with Honor

[cartledge777 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A thorough, objective biography of a great man.