Warning!!!! Please read through prayerfully....
GRACE FOR FINISHING STRONG
Almost everybody in the 20th and the 21st century has heard of EVANGELIST BILLY GRAHAM , but have you heard about EVANVELIST CHUCK TEMPLETON? What about EVANGELIST BRON CLIFFORD ? Have you ever heard of them?
EVANGELIST CHUCK & EVANGELIST BRON were also packing AUDITORIUMS and STADIUMS full in 1945 when Billy Graham first preached to large crowds?
According to Pastor Tommy Barnett of Phoenix, all three of these young men rose to prominence in their mid twenties.
A seminary president, after HEARING Evangelist Chuck Templeton spoke as a brilliant and dynamic preacher called him the most gifted, talented young preacher in America.
Templeton and Billy Graham became very close friends. They started preaching together with the Youth For Christ organization. Most observers thought that Templeton would be the one who would go to the top.
One magazine wrote a feature article calling Templeton the “Babe Ruth of evangelism”.
As for Evangelist Bron Clifford, he was another gifted, young fire brand evangelist. Many believed that Bron Clifford was the most gifted powerful preacher to come up in the church for many centuries.
People lined up for hours to hear him preach. When he went to Baylor University to give a discourse, they actually cut the ropes off the bells of the tower. They wanted nothing to interfere with his preaching.
For two and one half-hours the students of Baylor sat on the edges of their seats as he gave a powerful homily titled “CHRIST and the PHILOSOPHER’S Stone.”
AT the age of 25, BRON CLIFFORD touched more lives, influenced more leaders and set more attendance records than any other clergyman in American history.
National political and government leaders vied for his attention. He was tall, handsome, dashing, sophisticated and intelligent. Hollywood actually tried to cast him in the lead role for the famous movie, “The Robe”. He seemed to have everything.
GRAHAM, TEMPLETON , and CLIFFORD launched out of the starting blocks like those running for Olympic gold medals in 1945.
Why have we not heard of CHUCK TEMPLETON or BRON CLIFFORD? The answer is shocking and surprising to keep you speechless.
SO SAD:
By 1950 TEMPLETON had left the MINISTRY. He pursued a radio career. He became an announcer and a newscaster, TELLING THE WORLD THAT HE NO LONGER BELIEVED JESUS CHRIST WAS THE SON of GOD. He became an ATHEIST.
By 1950, this future Babe Ruth of preaching was not even in the ball game!
SO SAD ALSO:
By 1954 CLIFFORD had lost his family, ministry and health. Eventually he lost his life because of ADDICTION to ALCOHOL. FINANCIAL irresponsibility left his WIFE and their two Downs syndrome children penniless. This once famous preacher dies of cirrhosis of the liver at the age of 35 in a rundown hotel on the edge of Amarillo, Texas.
CLIFFORD died a pitiful, dishonorable and unsung death. Some pastors from Amarillo, Texas got together and collected enough money to buy a cheap casket. They shipped his body back to the East Coast, where he was buried in a pauper’s cemetery.
In 1945 all three of these men with extraordinary gifts were preaching for the purpose of multiplying the church by thousands of people. But within 10 years only one of them was still on track for Christ. THAT IS BILLY GRAHAM.
In this Christian life it’s not how you started, it’s how you finish! There is a recent survey that is really shocking and mind boggling.
It reported that only ONE out of TEN who start in ministry at the age of 21 serve the Lord to age 65.
They FALL AWAY from ministry due to IMMORALITY, PRIDE, BITTERNESS OF HEART, DISCOURAGEMENT, STRANGE THEOLOGICAL BELIEFS and a LOVE for WEALTH and the THINGS of this WORLD.
Sir or Ma, he who thinks he is standing should seek God always to remain standing, the grounds are very slippery these days.
Not all men who can shout are a voice for God. You can be a voice for God or a voice for man. Choose right.
THE CHALLENGE TO YOU AND MY SELF WHO are TODAY PREACHERS.... WILL YOU FINISH STRONG FOR CHRIST?
Let us continue to pray for one another because even the seeming successful ones needs our prayers more than ever before.
PRAYER:
Dear Lord keep us strong by your grace only and for you only till the end of days in Jesus name.
My comment
1Co 10:11-12
Now all these things happened unto them for ensamples: and they are written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the world are come.
Wherefore let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall.