The night I met Billy Graham

When I heard the news this morning that Dr. Billy Graham had died, my thoughts turned immediately to October 12, 2001. Dr. Graham was conducting an outreach event at Bulldog Stadium in Fresno, California. Terrorists had attacked America just a month earlier.

I was part of a delegation from the Dallas-Ft. Worth area sent to invite him to preach in our area. Our group was ushered into the stadium’s locker room where Dr. Graham was resting. His broken foot was in a walking cast and propped on the coffee table before him. He was sipping a glass of water and looking over his sermon notes.

Each of us took turns shaking his hand. When my turn came, he looked deeply into my eyes and, I felt, into my soul. I have never seen such purity in a person before. A sense of holiness settled over me as we spoke. I truly felt myself to be closer to God as I sat with him.

It was my responsibility to explain to him the reason for our visit and present a book containing more than seven hundred letters of invitation. After I made our request, he asked me why I felt we needed him to come. I understood his question to be related to the spiritual needs of our area, so I spent a few minutes describing the lostness of our cities and our great need for spiritual awakening.

Dr. Graham listened politely. Then he explained his question: He understood why we would need a spiritual revival, but why did I feel he was the person to help? At his advanced age, with his infirmities, how could he be of help to us?

Here was a man who had preached in person to more than eighty million people and led more than three million to Christ through his sermons and public invitations. He was commonly considered the greatest evangelist after the apostle Paul. And yet he was genuinely uncertain he had the capacities to do what we were asking him to do.

Dr. Graham took several weeks to pray and reflect before accepting our invitation. The Metroplex Mission with Billy Graham in October 2002 was one…