BILLY GRAHAM TRIES TO DUCK RESPONSIBILITY
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July 2, 2005 |
Billy Graham drew a record crowd to the second night of his New York Crusade by announcing that Bill and Hillary Clinton would be on the program. The Clintons both gave words of "testimony" before Dr. Graham preached.
Now Graham is trying to avoid taking responsibility. In a July 1 news release, he said, "I didn't endorse Hillary Clinton." But it sure sounded like he did when he said "Mrs. Clinton might make a good President..." He would have a stronger case that this wasn't an endorsement if he hadn't gone on to say that Hillary should "run the country." Everyone knows exactly what that means.
Billy Graham has been a public figure since 1949. No politician has been in the spotlight that long. In those 56 years he has become a literal media wizard. He doesn't say things without planning his words very carefully ahead of time. I have been listening to him for over fifty years. Everything he says is prepared and scripted well in advance. He is certainly no "doddering old fool." His mind is as sharp as a tack. You can be sure that his words about the Clintons were planned in great detail, and that even Franklin Graham's "explanation," given after the event, was written in advance.
My question is this - why were the Clintons invited to be on the program at all? They hold the same extremely liberal views as Senator Edward Kennedy. Why should these far-left politicians appear at a Billy Graham Crusade, be honored and allowed to speak? At the very least it seems that Graham has deliberately slapped his most fervent conservative supporters in the face - by the very presence of these people on his program. I believe that Graham owes the nation a strong public apology for giving his platform to those sleazy politicians. Many good people will be deceived by Graham's action, and I don't understand why he said that Bill Clinton "should be an evangelist because he has all the gifts, and he could leave his wife to run the country." What exactly are the "gifts" that Mr. Clinton possesses that make Graham think he ought to be an evangelist? What does Graham mean when he says that Mrs. Clinton ought to "run the country"? Dr. Graham should never have allowed these unscrupulous people to speak at his crusade, masquerading as born again Christians. Have we come to the place of accepting everything Graham says and does without question?
No, I for one don't swallow Billy Graham's explanation, or his son Franklin's either. After 56 years as a national figure Graham knows better than to have these people participate in his crusade in any way.
So, Billy Graham thinks that Bill Clinton should become an evangelist - and Hillary should "run the country." This is Graham's latest monkey trick. He does these things to please the media and his ever softening new-evangelical base. In the early 1980's, on a trip to the Soviet Union, he said there was no religious persecution under Communism. On a Larry King program a few years ago he said that people could be saved through other world religions without belief in Christ. This was repeated on Robert Schuller's television program. Now Graham tells us that Bill Clinton should enter the field of evangelism and Hillary should "run the country." Many people will be deceived by Graham's statement.
But the worst part of Billy Graham's evangelism is his "decisionism." Decisionist evangelism, since the time of Charles G. Finney, has brought hundreds of thousands of unsaved people into the churches. Decisionist evangelism is responsible for the apostasy in the Congregational denomination, the Methodist denomination, the Presbyterian denomination, and the various Baptist groups. Click here to read Dr. John S. Waldrip's article, "How I Was Confronted with Decisionism," and my sermons, "Natural Men Do Not Want the Gospel," "We Are Against Decisionism - In Both its Main Forms," and "Superficial Decisionism and True Revival Contrasted." To understand how Finney's beliefs and methods ruined evangelism, subsequently followed by all evangelists, order a copy of my carefully documented book, "Today's Apostasy: How Decisionism is Destroying our Churches," by phoning (818)352-0452 (the above column is based on two articles taken from Newsmax, 6/26/05 and 7/1/05).
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