Being the son of the iconic Rev. Billy Graham comes with high expectations.
And they weren’t the life Franklin Graham was living in his early 20s.
“Whether it was alcohol or going after girls, those were the things in my life,” the younger Graham said in a recent telephone interview.
He had come from a good home, Graham said. A father who had counseled every president since World War II and a strong-willed mother who practiced tough love long before the phrase became en vogue.
At that point in his life, Franklin Graham was at the same crossroads he said he sees many people at today. Running after things they think will bring pleasure, but ultimately will leave them empty.
Graham, 62, said his emptiness disappeared when he reached a decision his parents had long awaited, but one they couldn’t make for him. Alone in a hotel room in Jerusalem four decades ago, Graham committed his life to Jesus Christ.
“I haven’t been the same since,” Graham said.
Since then, he’s followed his father’s career path of ministering around the world, while also pursing his own interests.
His work includes hosting festivals like the one today through Sunday at Veterans Memorial Arena.
The Greater Jacksonville Festival of Hope is free and includes a mix of music and ministering. Graham hopes it also includes new beginnings in life for people in search of answers.
Helping find a way to reconnect
The festival comes at a time when the Pew Research Center said Christianity in America is declining, especially among young adults. But the drop is across all lines — racial, gender and education.
Graham said people in the South are exposed to Christianity more than in other parts of the country. But that doesn’t mean they’re practicing Christians.
They often think because they were baptized when they were young, he said, they are OK.
Or if their parents took them to church when they were young, it’s OK.
But, Graham said, attending church doesn’t make a person a believer. In fact, he said, many people in church don’t believe.
“Going to church was a cultural thing to do,” he said. “Not to have a relationship with God or his son, Jesus Christ.”
So much has changed in life, he said. Culture, politics, family life.
What hasn’t changed, Graham said, is the message he will deliver this weekend.
“God’s word doesn’t change,” he said. “People are looking for a rock.”
Graham wants people to feel the relief he felt in that hotel room when he was 22. And he wants their families to feel the same joy his father experienced after that.
He’d like it to be a turning point for people, much like his decision was. The decision that led him to follow his father, but not try to be his father.
A crusade of help
Graham’s ministry work is rooted in Samaritan’s Purse, an international relief organization he began working with in 1973 on a six-week mission to Asia.
Samaritan’s Purse has done work in more than 100 countries and has offices in nearly two dozen countries on five continents.
Graham said the association has people working in Nepal, where nearly 9,000 people were killed in an April earthquake.
Samaritan’s Purse also worked in Liberia during last year’s Ebola outbreak.
Graham started working with the evangelistic association that bears his father’s name in 1989. He has served as its president since 2002.
Billy Graham retired in 2005, after his final crusade in New York.
For the last 20 years of his father’s ministry, Graham went to each of his father’s renowned crusades. That includes the four-night event in November 2000 that filled what is now EverBank Field.
Franklin Graham remembers it well.
“I was fascinated by the organization of the churches, how well they worked together and operated together,” he said.
Many of those same churches are working together again to bring Franklin Graham here.
Team spends a year in town
The first step came in July 2013, when a local minister made a phone call to the association asking if Franklin Graham would come back to Jacksonville.
Nine months later, a five-member team was in town to plan the event, said Eric Boutieller, director of the festival.
“It’s not just an event where we show up, do a lot of advertising, then roll out of town,” he said.
It’s about engaging the 300 churches that are working with the team, including the 480 pastors who attended a training session in October.
There were thousands of counselors and hundreds of ushers that needed to be recruited and trained, as well.
The churches have helped spread the word about the festival and will minister to people who come forward during the event.
The team will stay in town for two months after the festival to supervise that follow-through, Boutieller said.
Jacksonville is one of six cities in the world hosting one of Graham’s festivals. Others include Oklahoma City, Okla.; Lviv, Ukraine; and Tokyo.
Fulfilling expectations
No matter where the festivals are, Graham starts his sermon the same way.
Just before he goes on stage, he takes a minute to pray for help in communicating the message. Not his message, he says, God’s message.
“It’s not about how clever I am. It’s not about how cute my message may be,” he said. “It’s taking God’s words and trying to explain and communicate them.”
Graham arrived in town last night after spending a couple of weeks in Alaska, opening a camp for veterans wounded after 9/11 and their spouses.
In addition to a few recreational activities, the camp’s counselors and chaplains work to save the marriages of the soldiers.
It’s one of several hats he wears each day, Graham said.
After all, being the son of Billy Graham comes with high expectations.
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The Greater Jacksonville Festival of Hope with Franklin Graham runs today through Sunday at Veterans Memorial Arena. Graham will speak each evening. The schedule is:
Friday and Saturday: 7-9:30 p.m.
Sunday: 4-6:30 p.m.
For more information, visit jacksonvillefestival.org
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