Billy Graham’s Legacy and Your Yes
Some Reflections on Life and Legacy, Beginnings and Endings on my 21st Birthday.
Few people in the history of mankind have left a legacy as widespread and impactful as Dr. Billy Graham. The life of one of the greatest evangelists of all time ended February 21st, nine days before the writing of this article. Well, I should say, that’s what people have been saying. Dr. Graham himself would have us know better: “Some day you will read or hear that Billy Graham is dead. Don’t you believe a word of it. I shall be more alive than I am now. I will just have changed my address. I will have gone into the presence of God.” Every day since his change of address, every major news network has talked at length about all that happened in and through his life. News anchors and stations that have no allegiance to Jesus and in many ways oppose Christianity’s message and movement, have been talking about the Gospel of Jesus Christ and the power of a life surrendered to Him for over a week. The immediate, widespread response to the passing of Billy Graham is a case study in the power of obedience: when you give God your unconditional yes, it invites Him to use your life in ways beyond anything you could ask for or imagine.
The legacy of Billy Graham can be summed up in two of his quotes: “It is the Holy Spirit’s job to convict, God’s job to judge, and my job to love.” Billy Graham loved people, and he did so primarily in declaring this message, passionately and courageously, for decades: “The cross shows us the seriousness of our sin — but it also shows us the immeasurable love of God…. God proved his love on the Cross. When Christ hung, and bled, and died, it was God saying to the world, ‘I love you.’” His life is now and forever interwoven with the Good News of what Jesus did on the Cross for the entirety of humanity.
As I think of legacy, and specifically Dr. Graham’s legacy, I can’t help but recognize the fact that we’ll all leave a legacy. In fact, we’re leaving one right now. No, ours may not be talked about on news networks across the globe, but it will be held onto by those who know us, and by those whose lives we touch. And the question I’ve been so challenged by over the past few days is the one I’ll give you here: what is the one primary thing you’d be remembered by if you were taken away from this earth today? The one thing that would stand out above all the rest? Would it be your political stances, your workplace prowess, the amount of commas in your bank account, your personal contributions of good to the world? Or would it transcend you all-together? Billy Graham’s legacy transcends him, and that’s why we’re all so moved by him. Christian or not, the world has been captivated by this man for decades, and it’s precisely because he lived passionately, for over eight decades, for someone other than himself.
Lives that captivate and transform the world are never fully understood until after their deaths. It often takes the ending of a life for the world to truly recognize its significance. And I think there’s something special about the ending of a great life that opens up the beginning of a new move of God. For me, as I sit here on this beautiful March 2nd in Charlotte, North Carolina, on my 21st birthday, and, on the day of the funeral of Billy Graham, I can’t help but think: I want to live a life like that; I want to impact the world like that; I want to see people raised to life in Christ like that.
I’m conviced, now more than ever, that it takes just one thing to see God move powerfully through my life: my yes. My unconditional yes to whatever God wants to do with my life. Your yes, unconditionally, before He ever reveals His plan, to whatever He’d do with yours. His thoughts are not our thoughts, His ways are not our ways, and quite often, His plans are not our plans. But, His are better. Every single time. They’re worth saying yes to, even before you know what they are. Surely Billy Graham himself, nor anyone who knew him, had any idea that he’d preach the Gospel to some 200 million people in person, and to hundreds of millions more through television and radio over the course of his lifetime, when, during a meeting conducted by Dr. Mordecai Ham in Charlotte in 1934, he came forward and gave his life to Jesus. No one on earth could’ve foreseen it; but heaven did. From the very beginning of Dr. Graham’s surrender of his life to Jesus, heaven knew exactly what his future would hold.
And the same is true of us. Though we don’t know exactly what it will entail, we know for certain that if we allow God to direct our steps, our lives will be used in ways far greater than we could’ve hoped. That’s my challenge to myself, and to you: you are leaving a legacy. You will be remembered for something. Only you get to choose what it will be. There are many great causes, but only one that lasts forever. The God that moved miraculously through Billy Graham is the same God who has a specific plan and purpose for your life. Will you allow the ending of Dr. Graham’s life on this earth to serve as a beginning in yours, to be a pillar where you decide to use your life as he did; to constantly point people to the hope found in Christ and Christ alone? If you will, I can promise you this: God will do more through your life than you ever could’ve imagined doing on your own. And that is a legacy worth having.
