No Need to Puff Graham in LA This Week

Billy Graham is preaching a crusade in Los Angeles this week, 55 years after the tent revival there that was “puffed” by William Randolph Hearst’s papers and launched the remarkable international Christian ministry of the world’s most famous Protestant. A NY Times article yesterday recounts the straightforward Gospel message that his been the staple of the 86-year-old evangelist.



Mainstream reporters seem amazed that preachers like Graham focus mostly on issues of personal faith, probably because their only exposure to evangelicals has been when the faith community takes on politically charged issues such as abortion and same-sex marriage.



The Times writes of Graham: “Much of his message seemed focused on personal responsibility. ‘You kill and covet but you cannot get what you want. You quarrel and fight; you do not have because you do not ask God. When you ask, you do not receive because you ask with wrong motives. Sin has affected our minds. We go to church. We pray. We're good people. We're moral people. But He looks at us through His own righteousness and He sees the defects in all of us. Sin.’"



Graham’s whole message is geared to generating decisions among his listeners to receive Jesus Christ as Savior. (President Bush credits Dr. Graham for leading him to Christ.) The evangelist is old and bent. The issues swirling around the world are different. But Gospel message he preaches is indistinguishable from 55 years ago.

--James Jewell