What does one do
when one sees falsehood that leads others astray? Falsehood that creates false
impressions? How long does a person watch and not say anything?
Often people are
led astray because they just don’t know the truth. They trust the person speaking
to them, they trust what the person says, and based on that trust they follow.
When the leader, pastor, or teacher comes from an institution, or a family,
that has a reputation for trustworthiness it is all the more understandable
that people uncritically accept what they are told.
I have written
previously of the grave danger of Christian leaders and churches identifying
themselves with political parties and agendas. Proximity to power, including
political and economic power, is seductive, and nations and political powers
are all too willing to use religion, including Christianity, to achieve their goals.
We see this dynamic in the ancient Kingdom of Judah, where false priests and false
prophets aligned themselves with ungodly kings and their administrations. They
arrogantly thought that since the people of Israel were initially chosen by God
that they could sin and deceive and commit idolatry with impunity. Many of us
seem to believe the same thing and act the same way.
Billy Graham, as
wonderfully as God used him, learned this lesson in a hard and embarrassing way.
Billy Graham was given the grace of God to acknowledge his mistakes, and to ask
forgiveness for wrongs he had done. While Mr. Graham was used by God to minster
in a healthy way to some presidents, he was seduced by others – most notably by
Richard Nixon. This was painfully revealed in the White House Nixon tapes, but
Billy Graham also realized this to some degree before the release of the tapes.
Below are
excepts from two articles regarding Mr. Graham’s realization of his mistakes and
advice he had to give in light of them. One is from The Southern Baptist
Theological Seminary, and the other is from Dartmouth; I have also provided
links to the full articles.
Billy Graham
learned from his mistakes, and from his sin (for a sad element of this was
sinful, but I’ll not touch on that) – and Mr. Graham wanted others to
learn from him so that we would not repeat it.
Yet, Billy’s son
Franklin, has not only aggressively aligned himself with a president and that
president’s agenda, he has attacked the opposing candidate and political party.
But even worse, he has encouraged others to do the same in the name of Christ.
On September 26
Franklin Graham led a prayer march in Washington, D.C. The morning of the march
he appeared on television attacking the Democratic Party, saying that the
Democrats were the reason for the division in our nation. A week or so ago Franklin
Graham, via the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association, sent an email calling
for today, October 25, to be a day of prayer for the “healing” of our nation –
the email had a link to a fuller explanation of this call for healing, and it consisted
of a series of attacks on Democratic positions and endorsement of Republican positions.
This is hardly a sincere desire for healing – it is a desire for political
victory.
At no time have
I seen Franklin Graham discuss the lessons his father learned as noted above.
Why is that? In the Graham email regarding October 25, there is a quote from
Billy dated 1952 regarding being informed voters, why no discussion of being
manipulated and seduced by political power? What about full and honest disclosure
about what his father really learned and thought?
What a shame
that the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association, which was once an organization
of integrity, has become a political tool. And quite honestly, what a shame
that the man, Franklin Graham, who founded Samaritan’s Purse, a wonderful organization,
should allow himself to go so far afield as to call the Gospel witness of both
Samaritan’s Purse and the BGEA into question.
We can only hope
and pray that Franklin will come to realize what Billy learned.
From the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary Article:
BILLY GRAHAM
APOLOGIZED. When thinking about Billy Graham, the word “apology” doesn’t
typically come to mind. Graham was not only a public figure; he was also
extremely articulate and careful with his words. However, one cannot enjoy the
length and degree of limelight that Graham did without a few blunders along the
way. True to his seemingly incorruptible, moral character, the man once called
“America’s Pope” was not above acknowledging his few public mistakes.
Unfortunately, they almost always involved partisan politics. “There is no
American I admire more than Richard Nixon,” Graham once said while introducing
the candidate’s two daughters to a crusade audience in Portland, Oregon.
Graham’s well-publicized relationship with Nixon forced him to eventually admit
his overly rose-colored view of the corrupt figure years later. After defending
Nixon’s character relentlessly and even dismissing the Watergate findings,
Graham eventually demonstrated a profound change of heart about his involvement
with American political life. He later repented, “in my earlier days. . . I
tended to identify the Kingdom of God with the American way of life. I don’t
think like that now.” Just a few weeks before Nixon’s resignation, Graham
warned a group of evangelists “not to identify the Gospel with any one
political program of culture.” He admitted, “this has been my own danger.”
Billy Graham’s faith was authentic, on and off the crusade stage.
From the Dartmouth article:
During his life, the religious
right emerged as a political force. How did he feel about that?
Graham was
profoundly uneasy about the religious right. He made a comment in 1981: “It
would disturb me if there was a wedding between the religious fundamentalists
and the political right. The hard right has no interest in religion except to
manipulate it.” That is probably the most prescient statement that Graham
ever made over the course of his career. At the same time, I think you have to
acknowledge that Graham tilted toward the right politically. He was a political
conservative, and certainly his real engagements tended to be Republican
presidents, beginning, of course, with Eisenhower, but especially with Nixon,
the Bushes, and Reagan to a lesser extent. All of them were important friends
to him.
https://news.dartmouth.edu/news/2018/02/religion-professor-randall-balmer-remembers-billy-graham
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