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PRELIMINARY TRANSCRIPT:
“MY ANSWER: THE EVANGELIST’S INTEGRITY”

Question: HOW TO INSURE YOUR MINISTRY FINANCIAL AND MORAL

INTEGRITY?

Billy Graham: Well, then, again, I had to learn and had to grow, and we sat
down, I remember, Cliff Barrows and one or two of us sat down many years
ago, and we tried to list all the…questions about evangelists and criticisms of
evangelists of this sort, and we said, “We’re going to try to overcome this and
set a new standard in our generation,” and one was pride. One was money,
and one was morals. All of these things that evangelists are susceptible to we
decided that we would try to correct that in our generation, and I think the
Lord has helped us, because we turned it over the Lord, and remember one
day I was riding in a car with a man who was the head of a corporation in New
York, and he said, “Billy,” he said, “How many are on your board?” I said, “There
are only five of us.” He said, “I would get a very strong board if I were you, and
I’d have at least fifteen.” And we did that, and then I remember when I received
a love offering as we lived by love offerings in those days. Back in the late 40s
and early 40s in Atlanta, Georgia I had received a very large love offering which
Cliff Barrows and I divided, and…it came out in the newspaper, The Atlanta
Journal it had a picture of me leaving the city, and then they had a great big
bag filled with money. We didn’t have the money with us. It was a bank
somewhere, but it was an illustration of what the people thought that I was
taking a lot of money out of the city, and I determined from that day on that
would be the last love offering. So, I went to see…the secretary of evangelism
of the National Council of Churches who was a good friend of mine at that
time, and I said, “Here is our problem.” I said, “What would you do?” He said, “I
would form a corporation. I would have a Board of Directions that were people
of standing both clergy and…lay people and let them set a salary and pay you

Preach the word; be prepared in season and out of season; correct, rebuke
and encourage with great patience and careful instruction. 1
2 Timothy 4:2 (NIV)
a salary and not go with these love offerings.” And I would have the salary…the
same salary that a pastor of a fairly large church would have. So, for the first
few years I had a salary of $15,000 a year, and that was my income, and Cliff
Barrows would have about the same, and Bev Shea about the same, and we
went that way for several years until inflation came and other things came,
and then I inherited money. My wife inherited money, and then we came to
the problem of royalties from books what were we going to do about that?
Because the royalties from the books were very large, and I only kept the
royalties from one book, and then after that we put it into an irrevocable trust,
and all of that money upon our death will go to charitable organizations or to
Christian organizations or the work of evangelism or training in evangelism,
because I do not feel that I had the right to keep that money. I’ve always felt
conscious of that because I had two good illustrations when I was in school of
two men that got involved and ruined their ministry and hurt the ministry of
the school and hurt all of those that they knew, and I determined from the
very beginning that I was going to be very careful about that, and I decided
that I would never be in a car alone with another woman outside of my family,
and I would never eat with another woman alone without proper
chaperonage, and that I would not be seen with those… with any woman, and
God has honored that, I believe, and I’ve never been tempted so much along
that line. I don’t know why, but God has just preserved me. That’s all that I can
answer.

I think it’s been stronger because separations because every time we’d come
back together it’s like a honeymoon, and I have a very strong wife who is
strong in the scriptures. She’s a woman of God, born and reared in China, and
she has been great part of my ministry, and her advice, her counsel, and our
prayer life together, and our love life together she always recognized that it
was very important, and she’s always kept herself attractive and well dressed,
not expensively dressed, but well dressed, and she’s always been attractive to
me, and now she’s seventy-three years of age, and she’s just as attractive as
she ever was, and she’s full of vim and vigor all the time, and she has a great
burden for people, and she’s taught me so many lessons. And the Lord gave
us five wonderful children, and all five of them know the Lord, and that’s
largely due to Ruth and her faithfulness in witnessing to them.

©BGEA

Last modified: 5/28/2020 3:56 PM

Preach the word; be prepared in season and out of season; correct, rebuke
and encourage with great patience and careful instruction. 2
2 Timothy 4:2 (NIV)