PASADENA, Calif. (ABP) — Billy Graham's four-day Los Angeles crusade ended Nov. 21 with more than 80,000 people converging on the Rose Bowl on a chilly Sunday afternoon. They were among the 312,000 people who attended the four-day revival, 55 years after the iconic preacher's first Southern California crusade.
“There are many people here today that are uncertain whether you're going to heaven or not,” Graham said in his now-familiar evangelistic formula. “You're not sure, but you'd like to be certain. You must be born again, God said. And when you're born again, God will forgive all of your sins.”
Graham's first Los Angeles revival in 1949 was a four-month event in a tent near downtown Los Angeles. The young preacher attracted the attention of newspaper magnate William Randolph Hearst, whose nationwide chain of newspapers splashed with front-page Billy Graham headlines. That crusade ended Nov. 20, 1949 — 55 years and one day before the end of this crusade, likely to be Graham's last in Southern California.
Graham, hard of hearing and suffering from Parkinson's disease, has been bedridden for most of the past year after breaking his hip and pelvis in two separate falls.
Sarah Berry, 66, of Silver Lake, Calif., was a little girl when she first saw Graham at the 1949 revival meetings. Berry said Graham made a big impression on her. “He was very dynamic, very youthful,” Berry, a retired elementary school principal, told the Pasadena Star-News. “Dark, curly hair, a vibrant and tremendous voice, with a tinge of the Southern accent too. He spoke with such conviction about people finding Christ.”
On opening night of the Pasadena crusade, Berry saw Graham in person for the first time since 1949. His message has not changed as she's tracked his career, Berry said. “The message is still the same: Christ died for your sins, God loves you and there's a better life for you.”
Organizers said the Rose Bowl revival cost $5 million to produce. About 13,400 of the 312,000 people attending the Nov. 18-21 event made personal professions of faith. Saturday's all-day youth revival attracted the largest gathering for a non-sporting event at the Rose Bowl, which in 1997 hosted about 30,000 women for a Promise Keepers-affiliated “Chosen Women” gathering.
“This is the first and only time I've ever seen Billy Graham,” said Chito Lopez, a revival counselor from Chatsworth, Calif., who prays with a Christian motorcycle group.” I've seen God move in this place. This year is a once-in-a-lifetime [event] and I wanted to be part of it.”
Graham, 86, spoke each day for about half an hour, standing or sitting in a large, three-sided wooden podium designed specifically for the ailing preacher. On Sunday he stood for about 20 minutes of his half-hour sermon.
“I'm going to sit down a minute. They built this pulpit for me,” he told the Sunday crowd as his microphone was readjusted by a technician who sat at the entrance of the pulpit for the entire sermon, simply waiting to help Graham. “This man's name is Doug and he does a wonderful job trying to get me arranged. Thank you, Doug.”
“Now, I can preach another hour,” said the seated Graham, the audience bursting into cheers. “And the subject I'm talking about I could last another hour, because it's such a powerful subject — that Jesus Christ loves us, God loves us, and is willing to forgive us, and change our lives.”
Graham's last Southern California crusade was in 1985, and before that in 1974. Given the normal time between such gatherings, it is unlikely Graham will have another crusade here, revival spokesman Larry Ross said.
“His last was a generation ago, in '85,” Ross said. “So, fast forward another generation. He would be 106, it's not likely that he'll be back for any meetings in Los Angeles.”
Graham's next crusade is set for New York City June 23-26.
Crusade organizers in Pasadena arranged for the services to be translated into 26 languages and relayed to translator radios distributed to participants. The language section accounted for a broad patch of the Rose Bowl seats. Languages included Burmese, Romanian, Hungarian, Russian, Japanese, Amharic (Ethiopian), plus tongues representing traditionally Catholic cultures such as Vietnamese and the Tagalog of the Philippines.
During the altar call, language-specific counselors were available. Workers combed the football field looking for Indian immigrants speaking Urdu, Hindi or Gujarati.
Graham tapped into Southern California's historic blending of black, white, Hispanic and Asian-American Christian churches. Looking across the football field during his Saturday night youth sermon, Graham said, “I see down here, a couple obviously of two different ethnic backgrounds, hugging each other. Let's be a generation of huggers.”
The Christian band Jars of Clay entertained the crowd before Graham's closing Sunday night sermon. Band members spoke of the awe they felt performing at a crusade with one of history's greatest preachers.
“No one like that really exists anymore,” guitarist Matt Bronleewe said at a press conference. “I think that's why it heightens the expectation and the depth of the joy we feel to be a part of this. It's an honor.”
Among those witnessing Graham's final sermon on Nov. 21 were singer Pat Boone, sitting onstage behind crusade officials, and President Ronald Reagan's son, Michael Reagan, who told the crowd how he was sexually abused by a camp counselor at age 8 and how he accepted Christ 19 years ago.
The four-day revival, which came off with no serious problems, was interrupted once during the Saturday night youth revival. After Graham left the stage, and as several thousand people were leaving their Rose Bowl seats or praying on the football field, a young man ran up to a stage microphone and yelled, “Homosexuals are people too!”
The still-live microphone was shut off quickly enough so that the word “too” was barely heard. Security guards immediately surrounded and removed the young man.
“Folks, let's just be calm, and let's just pray,” a crusade official said to the youth worshipers who crowded near the stage to check out what happened. “Now that young man's just a little bit excited. …We just need to pray for him. Pray that God will calm him.”
The outburst did not overshadow the clear connection Graham made with the teenagers. In the Saturday night chill, they found themselves warming to his broad message of Christ's love in a cold universe.
“Two hundred billion stars and we're just one little planet around one little star, the sun,” Graham said. “To think that the almighty God, who takes in all of space and all the galaxies, loves me and loves you. You come just as you are, and come to Jesus, who's on the cross for you.”