The Word Guild: Festival of Hope

Showing posts with label Festival of Hope. Show all posts

Thursday, February 09, 2017

Rising Love: A Valentine's Love Story - HIRD

By Rev. Dr. Ed Hird

Prime Minister Lester Pearson’s wife Maryon once famously quipped “Behind every successful man is a surprised woman.”[1] Billy Graham, aged 98, was recently named for the 60^th consecutive year in a Gallup poll as one of the ten most admired people in the world, along with Bernie Sanders, Pope Francis, and Bill Gates. It was Ruth Graham his devoted wife for sixty-three years who enabled Billy Graham to be healthy in the midst of relentless international attention. Without Ruth’s loving care for their five children, it would have been impossible for Billy Graham to have taken part in 417 city-wide celebrations in 185 countries, speaking to live audiences of nearly 215 million people. Billy and Ruth Graham were a Valentine’s love story that we can all learn from.

Ruth, who lived her first seventeen years in China, never wanted to marry, intending instead to become a missionary in Tibet. After going to school in North Korea, she moved to Wheaton College in Illinois. There in 1940, she met her future husband Billy who instantly fell in love with her. Ruth was slightly startled by his intense blue eyes. As her biographer Patricia Cornwell put it, “Billy was unlike anyone Ruth had met....earnest, quietly confident, and personal. Clearly he spoke as one who knew God and knew him well...But what interested Ruth was that as Billy escorted her...,he seemed completely unaware of his uniqueness, his poignancy, his gift.”[2] Billy was very nervous around Ruth, but eventually invited Ruth to hear Handel’s Messiah with him. That night Ruth knelt on the carpet by her bed and prayed, 'God, if You let me serve with that man, I'd consider it the greatest privilege in my life.' Ruth wrote to her medical missionary parents in China, saying: "Despite Bill's fearlessness and sometimes sternness, he is just as thoughtful and gentle as you want a man to be...he makes you feel perfectly natural and looked after without being showy or obnoxious. Sounds like I'm in love, doesn't it? Don't get worried. I'm not."[3] Both Billy and Ruth were independent and very determined people which led to some early challenges in their relationship. It was normal in Ruth’s family for women to be strong and outspoken, something that Billy had to get used to. In writing to her parents in 1941, she said: “(Billy) isn’t easy to love because of his sternness and unwavering stand on certain issues. Many a night I have come in almost hating the man because I wanted my way in some little thing that was either unwise or foolish or something, and he wouldn't give in even if it meant losing my love...” Sometimes Billy and Ruth could be the immovable object and the irresistible force. Writing to her parents later in 1941, she said: "(Billy) has his faults and some people object to his fearless, uncompromising presentation of the gospel. But that was the first thing about him that commanded my attention and later my admiration --as I grew to know him better, my trust."

After accepting his marriage proposal, she visited her sister Rosa in a New Mexico TB Sanitarium. While there suffering from exhaustion, she wrote Billy a crushing letter, telling him that she didn’t think that she was in love with him and that marriage was perhaps unwise.[4] Her sister miraculously recovered, and Ruth went ahead with the wedding. Cornwell commented: “What Ruth would do next, no one could predict, for she was as quietly stubborn as the sphinx and just about as inscrutable...She didn't necessarily do the practical or the expected.”[5]

One of the greatest challenges to their marriage was how much Billy was away. Ruth often said: "I would rather have a little of Bill than a lot of any other man." Many of Billy Graham’s sermon illustrations came directly from Ruth’s voracious reading of biographies, histories, novels, books about art and foreign countries. It was Ruth’s deep faith in God that kept her going through many trying times. One time after Billy unexpectedly went with his buddies to Chicago without Ruth, she tearfully prayed: "God, if you forgive me for marrying him, I'll never do it again." When he realized how much he hurt her, he was full of tender apologies. Ruth often said: " Sometimes beautiful women develop from adjusting to difficult men." By all accounts, Ruth was a beautiful woman in body, mind and spirit. Her medical missionary dad, her evangelist husband Billy and her beloved prodigal son Franklin all helped her become more beautiful.

In 1963, Billy wrote to Ruth: "How can I find words to express my appreciation for all you have meant to me. Your love and patience with me in my ups and downs...have meant more to me than you will ever know. Your counsel, advice, encouragement, and prayer have been my mainstay....It seems in the recent months my capacity to love you has deepened...I love the wife of my youth more every day!...Yes, I am thankful to God for you...No child ever had a greater mother than our children.”[6]

Rev Dr. Ed Hird, Rector

St. Simon’s Church North Vancouver

Anglican Mission InCanada

-an article for the Feb 2017 Light Magazine

-author of Restoring Health: body, mind and spirit

[1] Maryon Pearson spoke her mind". Toronto Star, December 28, 1989.

[2] Patricia Daniels Cornwell, A Time for Remembering: The Ruth Bell Graham Story (Harper & Row, San Francisco), 60.

[3] Cornwell, 63.

[4] Cornwell, 72.

[5] Cornwell, 155.

[6] Cornwell, 149.

Sunday, October 09, 2016

The Joy ot Tolerance -HIRD

By Rev. Dr. Ed Hird

The late Elie Wiesel, famed writer and holocaust survivor, commented that there is divine beauty in learning, just as there is human beauty in tolerance. Most of us as Christians believe in the value of tolerance even if we cannot define what it means. The Concise Oxford Dictionary speaks of tolerance as forbearance which means to completely bear with someone’s failings as you patiently give them time to grow. As Ephesian 4:2 says, we are to be patient, forbearing and bearing with one another in love. To joyfully tolerate someone doesn’t mean that we need to agree with them. As Dr John Gottman puts it, when you honor and respect each other, you're usually able to appreciate each other's point of view, even if you don't agree with it. You don’t need to be a moral relativist winking at sin, in order to be biblically tolerant. The joy of tolerance is the love of neighbour, doing unto others as you would have them do unto you. Tolerance is also about choosing to forgive. As Colossians 3:13 puts it, we need to be forbearing one another and forgiving one another, if you have any quarrel against one another. Sometimes our children and teenagers greatly try our patience, particularly when they may be teasing their siblings. The joy of tolerance includes setting healthy boundaries while not giving up on painful people, including our family members.

The Concise Oxford Dictionary also speaks of tolerance as recognition of the right of private judgement in religious matters, including the liberty to uphold one’s religious opinions and forms of worship. Our democratic freedoms, like freedom of thought, speech and assembly, enshrined in our Bill of Rights, are all rooted in the primary freedom, which is freedom of religion.

The British Act of Toleration in 1689 was a huge step forward in advancing the democratic rights of people to freedom of religion. GK Chesterton commented[1] that tolerance sometimes leads to timidity where people become afraid to even mention their religious views. True tolerance doesn’t push religion into a closet but welcomes it joyfully in the public square. Intolerance is often like bad breath and body odor; it is difficult to always notice one’s own intolerance. Sometimes people who pride themselves on being more tolerant than others end up intolerantly looking down on other people. Dr Timothy Keller commented: “If you're intolerant of people you think are intolerant, you're still intolerant. If you are judgmental of people you think are judgmental, you are judgmental.” Sometimes smokers in our postmodern culture are intolerantly treated like outcasts. We Christians need to remember to love the smoker even if we cannot tolerate their second-hand smoke.

Recently we visited all 10,000 homes in the Seymour/Deep Cove area, inviting people to the March 3^rd to 5th Festival of Hope at Rogers Arena with Franklin Graham. We were impressed by the tolerant welcome and hospitality of our neighbours. Even atheists would kindly engage us in fascinating conversations. True tolerance does not have to agree in order to love. As Romans 2:4 says, God himself is tolerant, forbearing, kind and patient, giving us time to change and turn back. My prayer for the Lower Mainland Christian community is that we would grow in joyful tolerance as we share our common faith in the one Lord Jesus.