The Ministry of Billy Graham

by ****Cody Morgan   |     |   ,
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While attending college at Florida Bible Institute (now Trinity College of Florida) in the late 1930s, Billy Graham preaches at local churches.
Rev. Dr. John Minder (left), dean of Florida Bible Institute and the minister who performed the marriage ceremony of Billy and Ruth Graham, and Pastor Cecil Underwood (right), who ordained Billy Graham as a Baptist minister in 1939, both play influential roles in Graham’s days of early ministry.
After graduating from Wheaton College in 1943, Billy Graham accepts a pastorate at Village Baptist Church in Western Springs, Illinois, 20 miles outside of Chicago. The church’s average weekly attendance doubled by the fourth month of his tenure there.
Billy Graham begins his public ministry with the Youth for Christ organization in 1945.
At age 29, Billy Graham becomes president of Northwestern Schools in Minneapolis, Minnesota—the youngest college president in the United States at that time. His childhood friend T. W. Wilson (left) joins him as vice president. The two continued their work together when Wilson became Graham’s executive assistant and an associate evangelist with the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association in 1956.
Crowds gather outside the "canvas cathedral" at the 1949 Billy Graham Crusade in Los Angeles where some 350,000 people hear Graham preach.
Billy Graham's 1949 Crusade in Los Angeles is extended to eight weeks due to overwhelming crowds.
Between Sept. 25 and Nov. 20 of 1949, some 350,000 people gather under a huge tent—often called a "canvas cathedral"—in Los Angeles to hear Billy Graham preach.
This photo, published in the Sept. 21, 1949, issue of "Life" magazine, documents Billy Graham's Los Angeles Crusade, where overflowing crowds gathered for eight weeks straight.
The "Hour of Decision" weekly radio program is first broadcast live from the Atlanta Crusade on Nov. 5, 1950. It aired around the world for more than 60 years.
On Sept. 17, 1950, the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association is incorporated as a way to handle correspondence, funds, receipts and administration. For years after, Graham continued to be uncomfortable having his name so visible, believing "It is God’s organization, not mine, and if we ever lose sight of that fact, God will withdraw his blessing from our work."
From October 1946 to March 1947, Billy Graham and Cliff Barrows (center right) hold 360 meetings in 27 cities and towns across war-torn Great Britain. Their respective wives, Ruth Graham (center left) and Billie Barrows (far right), joined them for part of the trip.
In 1953, more than a year before the Supreme Court decision banning racial discrimination, Billy Graham holds a Crusade in Chattanooga, Tennessee, without segregated seating areas. "Jesus was a man," Graham later said. "He was not a white man. He was not a black man….Christianity is not a white man's religion."
During the 1954 Crusade in North London, Billy Graham preaches to overflow crowds at the 1,200-seat Harringay Arena for nearly three months.
Billy Graham pioneers the use of TV specials in the 1950s, when Cliff Barrows and George Beverly Shea join him in producing a 30-minute program using the KTTV studios in Los Angeles (now KABC).
More than 2 million people hear Billy Graham in person at Madison Square Garden (May 15 – Aug. 31), Yankee Stadium (July 20) and in Times Square (Sept. 1), during the 16-week New York City Crusade in 1957—Graham’s longest Crusade.
On June 1, 1957, ABC broadcasts the first of 14 live, primetime, hour-long Billy Graham telecasts from Madison Square Garden. The network estimated the weekly viewership at 7 million people.
During a lunch-hour meeting in the financial district of Manhattan on July 10, 1957, Billy Graham preaches from the steps of Federal Hall to a crowd of professionals standing shoulder-to-shoulder on Wall Street.
While in New York for his 1957 Crusade, Billy Graham speaks with gang leaders in Spanish-speaking Harlem. The meeting was coordinated by Jim Vaus, former associate of crime boss Mickey Cohen, who began a ministry to reach New York gang members after putting his faith in Christ at Graham’s Los Angeles Crusade in 1949.
From February to May 1959, the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association holds meetings across Australia and New Zealand, with more than 3.3 million people attending in person.
Over the course of three weeks, 750,000 people attend the 1962 Chicago Crusade, filling McCormick Place Arena to capacity each night. The final rally, held in Soldier Field, drew 100,000 people.
In July 1967, Billy Graham preaches in a Communist country for the first time. More than 7,000 people stood in a steady rain for two meetings in a field in Zagred, Yugoslavia—the first open-air evangelistic meetings in Eastern Europe since World War II.
During a lunch stop at the Westside Deli in Cleveland after a 1972 Crusade, Billy Graham calls the owner's mother to say "hello."
In 1972, Billy Graham visits bombed-out homes in Belfast, Northern Ireland.
Some 80,000 students from all 50 states and 75 other countries gather for the Explo ’72 in Dallas’ Cotton Bowl. Billy Graham closed the Jesus music festival, sponsored by Campus Crusade for Christ (now Cru), with an evangelistic message.
A strong advocate for race relations, Billy Graham declines 20 years' worth of invitations to preach in South Africa, waiting until he can be assured the audience will be integrated. Graham finally preaches in Durban, to an integrated crowd, in 1973; it is the first fully integrated public meeting ever to occur in South Africa.
In March 1973, 60,000 people gather at Wanderers Stadium for a Billy Graham Crusade in Johannesburg, South Africa. At the time, it was the largest multiracial gathering ever held in the country.
On June 3, 1973, 1.1 million people gather in Yoido Plaza in Seoul, South Korea—the largest single-day audience of all Billy Graham’s Crusades.
In October 1974, 225,000 people fill Maracanã Stadium for the closing meeting of a five-day Crusade in Rio de Janeiro. In addition to the record-breaking crowd, up to 50 million people saw the service on TV, carried on all networks across Brazil by order of the president.
Billy Graham answers questions from a group of young people in Brussels during Eurofest ’75, an intensive evangelism training conference that draws tens of thousands of young people from across Europe.
The World Emergency Fund, established in 1973, allows the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association to provide humanitarian aid to places suffering from natural disasters, such as the 7.5-magnitude earthquake that hit Guatemala in 1976. (The organization sent 12 planeloads of food and medical supplies to the country.) Billy and Ruth Graham visited the devastated village of San Martín-Jilotepeque, where 21 percent of the population was killed and 98 percent of homes destroyed.
Billy Graham visits Uhuru Park, in Nairobi, Kenya, in 1976.
In December 1977, Billy Graham is holding evangelistic meetings in India when Andhra Pradesh is hit by a tidal wave that kills 100,000 people and destroyed 200,000 homes. The Billy Graham Evangelistic Association provided more than $200,000 to help rebuild 285 homes and a church building in one of the communities.
Standing in front of the “Wall of Death” at Auschwitz concentration camp in Poland in 1978, Billy Graham calls “upon Christians everywhere to work and pray for peace.” Graham and his wife, Ruth, laid a wreath of red and white carnations at the place where firing squads executed some 20,000 during World War II.
At the time of the 1978 Metro Toronto Crusade, though only seven percent of Toronto’s population attend church, thousands pack into Toronto’s indoor arena at Maple Leaf Gardens. The meetings were larger than any previous events held there.
Throughout his years of ministry, Billy Graham addressed students at dozens of colleges, seminaries and universities—like these students at the John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University, in 1982.
Billy Graham chats with young people in an Amsterdam park in 1983. Nearby, the first international conference for itinerant evangelists was being held at the RIA Center, where some 4,000 evangelists from 133 nations gathered for plenary sessions and workshops intended to equip and train them in Bible study and evangelism efforts.
Despite torrential rain that flooded surrounding roads, 73,500 people jam into London’s Wembley Stadium for the final night of Mission ’89. Three of these July 1989 meetings were televised in 30 African countries with audiences for each program ranging from 22 million to 30 million.
Cliff Barrows, Billy Graham and George Beverly Shea (l to r) sing "This Little Light of Mine" at a 1984 Crusade in Sunderland, England. Barrows, Graham and Shea had worked together in ministry since the 1940s.
While in Romania in 1985, Billy Graham—accompanied by son Franklin—preaches at Orthodox and Reformed cathedrals; at Roman Catholic, Baptist and Pentecostal churches; at a Jewish synagogue; and at an Orthodox monastery. Some stops on the seven-city trip were marked by crowds in excess of 100,000.
In 1986, 10,000 participants from 174 nations and territories gather in Amsterdam for the International Conference for Itinerant Evangelists. The Billy Graham Evangelistic Association held its first such conference three years earlier and a third conference in 2000, all focused on training and encouraging evangelists from around the world.
Two hundred and fifty thousand people gather in New York’s Central Park in 1991, becoming the largest one-day audience at a U.S. Billy Graham Crusade.
In 1992 Billy Graham meets with North Korean President Kim Il Sung and becomes the first foreign-born evangelist to preach in the communist nation of North Korea (the Democratic Republic of Korea).
More than 155,000 people attend the three-day event held in Moscow’s Olympic Stadium in October 1992. On the final afternoon, 50,000 filled the 35,000-seat auditorium and another 20,000 watched outside the stadium, despite the frigid temperatures.
In May 1993, Billy and Ruth Graham dedicate the 1,200-acre Billy Graham Training Center at The Cove in Asheville, North Carolina. The Grahams wanted to provide a place where people could leave the demands of their daily lives and come to study God’s Word. Today guests attend in-depth seminars, personal spiritual retreats, concerts and many other inspirational events throughout the year.
Billy Graham delivers a message at the April 23, 1995, memorial service for the Oklahoma City bombing.
In 1996, Billy Graham holds a Crusade in his hometown of Charlotte, North Carolina. More than 336,100 people attend.
During the summer of 2000, the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association holds its third conference for itinerant evangelists, Amsterdam 2000, focusing on new methods of evangelism for the 21st century. More than 10,000 participants from 209 countries and territories gather for 900 plenary and teaching seminars, with simultaneous interpretation offered in 28 languages. Previous conferences were held in Amsterdam in 1983 and 1986.
Following the 9/11 terrorist attacks, President George W. Bush declares Sept. 14, 2001, a National Day of Prayer and Remembrance, and asks Billy Graham to deliver the message at a special service at the National Cathedral in Washington, D.C.
In response to 9/11, a Billy Graham Prayer Center opens near ground zero. The next year, the Billy Graham Rapid Response Team is developed to deploy chaplains specifically trained to offer hope in the wake of man-made and natural disasters, including hurricanes, tornadoes, floods, fires, shootings and areas of civil unrest.
Some 200,000 people attend Billy Graham’s four-day Crusade in Cincinnati in 2002.
At 86 years old, Billy Graham conducts his final Crusade in New York’s Flushing Meadows Corona Park, June 24-26, 2005. More than 230,000 people attend during the three days.
At 86 years old, Billy Graham conducts his final Crusade in New York City's Flushing Meadows Corona Park, June 24-26, 2005. More than 230,000 people attend during the three days.
At 86 years old, Billy Graham conducts his final Crusade in New York City's Flushing Meadows Corona Park, June 24-26, 2005. More than 230,000 people attend during the three days.
Billy Graham joins his son Franklin’s 2006 Celebration of Hope at New Orleans Arena six months after Hurricane Katrina devastates the Gulf Coast. More than 30,000 people gathered over two nights to hear Billy and Franklin Graham remind them that even in hurricanes or any other storm you may face in life, there is hope.
In July 2006, Billy Graham (far right) participates in the Metro Maryland Franklin Graham Festival in Baltimore, along with (left to right) George Beverly Shea, Cliff Barrows and his son Franklin.
Presidents George H.W. Bush, Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter join Billy and Franklin Graham after a tour of the Billy Graham Library, which opens to the public in June 2007.
Billy Graham is joined by former Presidents George H.W. Bush, Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton at the Billy Graham Library dedication ceremony on May 31, 2007.
During the week of his 95th birthday, Nov. 7, 2013, Graham delivers a new message via more than 480 television stations. The video was the culmination of the "My Hope America" project, the largest outreach conducted in North America by the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association.
During the week of his 95th birthday, Nov. 7, 2013, Graham delivers his final message via more than 480 television stations. The video was the culmination of the My Hope America project, the largest outreach conducted in North America by the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association. More than 26,000 churches participated in the project, which resulted in thousands of individuals opening their homes to watch the program.
Billy Graham, accompanied by his grandson Edward, enters his 95th birthday celebration on Nov. 7, 2013, after being introduced by his son Franklin. That same week, Billy Graham delivered a new message in a film called “The Cross.” It aired on more than 480 television stations, and more than 26,000 churches participated in his "My Hope America" project.

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