Brannon Howse: Aired January 6, 2012

Part Two: How Billy Graham Helped to Further Ecumenicalism. On today’s program Brannon examines a portion of the book entitled Evangelicalism Divided by Iain H. Murray. Murray’s research reveals that Billy Graham was greatly influenced by Harold Ockenga, one of the founders of Fuller Theological Seminary. Graham’s tendencies toward ecumenicalism is not something he embraced in old age but in fact Graham made the decision to allow his 1957 crusade in New York to be sponsored by a group of liberal modernist who rejected essential Biblical doctrine. Brannon explains the difference between a modernist and a postmodernist. In 1961 Graham was invited, by the World Council of Churches, to attend an ecumenical meeting in New Delhi. An official with the World Council of Churches reportedly said, “We do not agree with Billy Graham’s theology, buy we are using him to build our churches.” In his book, Just as I Am, Graham wrote of his “ecumenical strategy”. One of Grahams biographer, William Martin has written that Graham “doubtless intended to keep himself and his crusades free from Modernist contamination, but success weakened his resolve.” Sadly, the acceptance of pragmatism apparently caused Graham to actually become a major force in the acceptance of the “new evangelicalism” as well as ecumenicalism. It seems that years before Rick Warren, a graduate of Fuller Seminary, Billy Graham was also influenced by a founder of Fuller Seminary and embraced the seeker sensitive movement. The common influence in the promotion of the New Evangelicalism appears to be Fuller Theological Seminary and its leaders. In part two Brannon reveals Graham’s embrace of the Church of Rome openly within his crusades and on the crusade platform.