tributetomyfather ebook final

7/29/2019 TributeToMyFather eBook Final

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John PiPer


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Table o ConTenTs

i Introduction

01 A ribute to My Father09 Hello, My Father Just Died

14 Funeral Message or William

S. H. Piper

26 Toughts on My Father

29 Evangelist Bill Piper:Fundamentalist Full o

Grace and Joy

59 A ribute to My Father, on

My Last Fathers Day

at Bethlehem


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InTroduCTIon

My ather turned 94 in heaven this year (013). I have spent

this aernoon listening to him as he read his poems and sang

hymns with me. I recorded these little duets three years beore

he died. It has been a sweet aernoon.

I wish I had elt at 17 what I eel at 67. I wish I had known

and elt the value o a athers Song. I wish I had sung with him

earlier, just the two o us. Perhaps some young son reading thiswill ask the Lord Jesus to take away the immature embarrass-

ment at his athers Songthe Song o his lie.

My ather was an evangelist-poet-singer-songwriter. I have

in ront o me a older with the lyrics and the musical scores

that he wrote. Five o these are the actual pre-lined music paper

where he drew in the notes and printed by hand the lyrics

between the treble and bass cles.

Tere are titles like Im in Debt to Jesus, Christ Is the

Answer, Ty Hand upon Me, Lord, ake ime to Pray,

and Lord, Make Me Pure. One, called His Grace Is Su-

cient, is printed with the words Copyright, 1943, by William

S. H. Piper in the bottom margin.

I have written beore that my ather was the happiest man I


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ever knew. One o the reasons or this was his singing aith. o

eel the signicance o this, you need to understand that he was

a undamentalist. Tats not a bad word in my vocabulary. And

hes the reason. Fundamentals are worth dying or and ght-

ing or. But that ght has killed the Song in the hearts o many

people. But not in Bill Piper.

What you ght orwhat you die oris the joy. Te Song.

So i you lose it, all is in vain. Fundamentalists ght worldli-

ness. But worldliness means ascination with inerior joys.

Tats what I learned rom his kind o conservatism. You dontcreate donts to destroy joy, but to protect it. Te Christ-less

pleasures o the world are a kind o music that has no eternal

soul. You resist or the sake o the Song.

So the music never died. Late in lie he was still celebrating

the suciency o gracethe theme-Song o his lie.

When the days o youth have ended,

And your body bends with pain,

When the strength o early years has passed away,

Bear in mind that Christ has promised

He is coming back again

And His grace will prove sucient til that day.

He wrote that when he was 7. His aith in the suciency o

Gods grace never wavered. So the Song never ceased. Trough

loss and aging, and, nally, death, he wept and he sang. Actu-

ally, in his death I had to sing or him. We were alone in the

hospital room. He drew his last breath. I stroked his orehead,

and sang,


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My gracious Master and My God

Assist me to proclaim

o spread through all the earth abroad

Te honors o Ty name.

His Master was gracious. He believed that. So he gave himsel

to proclaim the grace o God all his lie. And lest anyone think

that ollowing his Master was a miserable aair, he sang.

O how I love my ather, and his great Saviorand his Song.

Surely this indomitable Song in our home was the birthplace o

my lies theme: God is most gloried in us when we are most sat-

ised in him. May God make this legacy a tting tribute to my

ather, and a great honor to his song-inspiring King.

John Piper

May 8, 013


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a TrIbuTe To My aTher

J 19, 2005

Tis is a ragment o the legacy o truth imparted to me by my

ather. Te word impartedwas no mere transmission o inor-

mation. It involved a whole lie o proclamation and demon-

stration. I will mention eleven precious truths imparted to me

by my ather.

1. T i gt, mjtic G i , w

w mt t i i g.

Most o these truths that I will mention are rooted in my

memory o particular texts that were branded on my mind at

home. Few texts were more oen on Daddys lips in relation to

me than 1 Corinthians 10:31: So, whether you eat or drink, or

whatever you do, do all to the glory o God.

I am sure that in heaven some day the Lord will make plain

the unbreakable chain o infuences that led rom that verse

when I was a boy to the mission statement o Bethlehem Bap-

tist Church: We exist to spread a passion or the supremacy o

God in all things or the joy o all peoples through Jesus Christ.


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Tis wont be the only infuence you will see o my ather on

that mission statement.

2. W tig t g t w t G -

w mk tm t g.

Even more prominent in my growing up was the presence o

Romans 8:8 in our amily: God works all things together

or good or those who love him and are called according to

his purpose.

I have several vivid memories o this truth. One was in 1974when I rode with my ather in the ambulance rom Atlanta

to Greenville with my mothers body in the hearse ollowing

behind. Tey had just been fown in rom Israel where Mother

had been killed in an accident and Daddy was seriously injured.

All the way home, or three-and-a-hal hours, he would weep

and talk and weep and talk. He was y-six. Tey had been

married thirty-six years.

And when he talked, it was Romans 8:8. I remember the

very words: God must have a reason or me to live. God must

have a reason or me to live. In other words, God governs our

accidents and makes no mistakes.

I will never cease to be thankul that I heard and saw the

truth o Romans 8:8 in my athers lie, When things dontgo the way they should, God always makes them turn or good.

3. G c tt.

How many times did I hear the words o Proverbs 3:6: rust in

the Lord with all your heart and do not rely on your own insight;

in all your ways acknowledge him and he will make straight your


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paths. And Philippians 4:19: My God will supply every need o

yours according to his riches in glory in Christ Jesus.

I can see us as a amily when I was just a child. We were all

(Mother, Daddy, and my older sister Beverly) sitting around a

card table in my parents bedroom olding letters and stung

envelopes which would be sent to pastors asking them to con-

sider having my ather come lead their churches in evangelistic

meetings. Tis was Daddys liehe was a ulltime evangelist

and our livelihood. Te answers to these letters meant bread on

the table and paid bills. Ten we prayed over these envelopes,and Daddy closed in a spirit o utter condence: God will

answer and meet every need. He can be trusted.

He told me more than once o a nancial crisis when I

was six years old in which he almost lost everything. And he

said that God used Psalm 37: to sustain him and bring him

through: Commit your way to the Lord, trust in him, and he

will act. And so I saw and I learned: God can be trusted.

4. li i pci, i i pci. dt pm

tt wi it tmw, t wt it t.

My memory o my athers preaching was that he always began

with humor, but within seconds, he was blood-earnest and

talking about heaven and hell and sin and Christ and lie anddeath. One text above all others rings in my ears with terrible

seriousness. He squinted when he said it, and his mouth pursed

tightly the way it does aer you taste a lemon: It is appointed

unto men once to die, aer that comes judgment (Hebrews

9:7). It made a huge impression on me as a boy.

Te motto on Daddys college wall was, Te wise man


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prepares or the inevitable. Te plaque in our kitchen when

I was growing up was, Only one lie twill soon be past, only

whats done or Christ will last.

5. a m t g ik mici, Cit

i t gt ht-stif.

Tats a quote rom Proverbs 17:. My ather has been the hap-

piest man I have ever known. Here is the kind o things he said

in a sermon called A Good ime and How to Have It.

Right rom the start, lets get one thing straight: a

Christian is not a sour puss. I grant you that some

o them look and act that way, but you simply cant

blame God or it . Some olks seem to have been

born in the objective case, the contrary gender and

the bilious mood.

What a legacy o joy my ather has le!

6. a Citi i gt t gt t.

We Pipers were undamentalistswithout the attitude. We

had our lists o things not to do. But that wasnt the main thing.

Heres what my ather preached in a sermon called Te

Greatest Menace to Modern Youth.

Millions insist upon thinking that Christianity is a

negative religion. You dont do this and you cant do

that. You dont go here and you cant go there. o the

contrary, the Bible constantly sounds the triumphant

and positive note. Be ye doers o the Word and not


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hearers only. Whatsoever your hand ndeth to do,

do with all your might.

God wants us to be doers, not donters. A Christianwho is only a donter is a sour saint who spreads gloom

wherever he goes. A donter is usually a hypocritical

Pharisee. Years ago, I heard the late Dr. Bob Jones say,

Do so ast you dont have time to dont.

Tat le an indelible mark on my lie. We had strict standards,

but I never chaed under them. Tey were not the point. Enjoy-ing Christ, doing good, and loving people was the point. Te

rest was just encing to protect the good eld o aith and purity.

7. T Citi i i pt.

I have one precious DVD o my ather preaching. It is a message

on the new birth rom John 3:7: Do not marvel that I said to

you, You must be born again. Becoming a Christian is not a

mere decision. It is a supernatural work o the Holy Spirit.

And thereore he believed in prayercrying out to God

to do the miracle o the new birth. We prayed together every

night as a amily, because the great need in lie is supernatural,

divine power to live a lie o sacricial love with joyand that

is a ruit o the Holy Spirit, not a work o our own. I saw thatmy athers work was not a human work. It was divine work.

Impossible work. But with God all things are possible.

8. bi cti i imptt, t t t

pp p wit it.

At this point, he admitted openly to me with grie that our


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undamentalist tradition let him down. Tere was great truth,

but too many o them were not great lovers. I can remember

him saying: I they only understood Ephesians 4:1, speak-

ing the truth in love. So rom as early as I can remember, he

showed me the importance o both right doctrine and the way

o love. Tey must never be separated.

9. rpct mt.

I you wanted to see Daddy angry, let one o his children sass

our mother. He not only knew the command o God to honorour mothers; he also knew the extraordinary debt that every

child owes a mother.

ime and again, he would compare true love not to married

love but to mothers love. He knew the price my mother paid

or him to be away so much in ulltime evangelism. Tereore,

he would tolerate no insolence or disrespect toward her. I trem-

bled at the erce gaze in his eyes i I said something sarcastic to

my mother.

10. b w G m t t m .

My ather was shorta good bit shorter than I am. But he was

content and could joke about it. Te one I remember is his rec-

ollection as a boy that he was part o a ootball team called Lit-

tle Potatoes but Hard to Peel. I think God delights to make

short men great preachers. (Remember John Wesley!)

For me, this contentment with being who God made us to

be meant reedom. Daddy never orced me or pressured me to

be an evangelist or a pastor or anything elsejust holy. Tis

is the will o God, your sanctication (1 Tessalonians 4:3).


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Daddys counsel was always: Love God with all your heart and

be what he has made you to be. Ten, what your hand nds to

do, do it with all your might or the glory o Christ.

I close with one more truththe central truth o my

athers lie. Tis was what he preached and what he loved. So I

will let him preach it again.

11. Pp t t tg it

i J Cit.

My ather was an evangelist. His absence rom home two-thirds o the year (in and out, in and out) meant one main

thing: Sin and hell are real and horrible, and Jesus Christ is a

great Savior. Heres a direct quote rom my ather:

In my evangelistic career I have had the thril l o seeing

people rom all walks o lie come to Christ. I have

seen many proessional people saved. I have kneltwith Ph.D.s and led them to Jesus. College proessors,

bankers, lawyers, doctors. I have seen them all saved.

Ten I have seen many rom the other side o lie come

to the Lord. I have put my arm around drunkards in

city missions and prayed with them. I have sat by the

bedside o dying alcoholics and led them to Christ. Ihave seen the poor, the orsaken, the derelicts, the

outcasts all come to the Savior. Yes, God takes them,

too. Isnt it wonderul that anyone who wants to can

come to Christ? (Grace or the Guilty, p. 111)

Perhaps you never had a ather like this, but right now you hear

your heavenly Father calling. How many times did I hear the


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Fathers voice in my athers voice and see His pleading ace in

my athers pleading ace.

Soly and tenderly Jesus is calling...Come home! Come home!

Ye who are weary, come home!

Earnestly, tenderly, Jesus is calling,

Calling, O sinner, come home!

I thank you, heavenly Father, or my earthly ather. What

a legacy he has le to me and my sister and our children andgrandchildrenand to the church o Jesus Christ. And to the

nations o the world to the glory o Jesus Christ.


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hello, My aTher JusT dIed

Mc 6, 2007

Te big hospital clock in room 436 o Greenville Memorial Hos-

pital said, with both hands straight up, midnight. Daddy had just

taken his last breath. My watch said 1:01, March 6, 007.

I had slept a little since his last morphine shot at ten. One

ear sleeping, one on the breathing. At 11:4, I awoke. Tebreaths were coming more requently and were very shallow. I

will not sleep again, I thought. For ten minutes, I prayed aloud

into his le ear with Bible texts and pleadings to Jesus to come

and take him. I had made this case beore, and this time elt an

unusual sense o partnership with Daddy as I pressed on the

Lord to relieve this warrior o his burden.

I nished and lay down. Good. Tank you, Lord. It will not

be long. And, grace upon grace, hundreds o prayers are being

answered: He is not choking. Te gurgling that threatened to

spill over and drown him in the aernoon had sunk deep, and

now there was simple clear air, shorter and shorter. I listened

rom where I lay next to him on a oldout chair.

Tats it. I rose and waited. Will he breathe again? Nothing.


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Fieen or twenty seconds, and then a gasp. I was told to expect

these alse endings. But it was not alse. Te gasp was the rst

o two. But no more breaths. I waited, watching. No acial

expressions. His ace had rozen in place hours beore. One

more jerk. Tat was al l. Perhaps an eyebrow twitch a moment

later. Nothing more.

I stroked his orehead and sang,

My gracious Master and My God

Assist me to proclaim

o spread through all the earth abroad

Te honors o thy name.

Daddy, how many thousands awaited you because o your proc-

lamation o the great gospel. You were aithul. You kept the

aith, nished the race, ought the ght. Make riends or

yourselves with unrighteous mammon that they might receive

you into eternal habitations (Luke 16:9). I watched, wonder-ing i there could be other refexes. I combed his hair. He always

wore a tie. Te indignities o death are many, but we tried to

minimize them. Keep the covers straight. Pull the gown up

around his neck so it looks like a sharp turtleneck. uck the

gappy shoulder slits down behind so they dont show. Use a wet

washcloth to keep the secretions rom crusting in the eyelashes.

And by all means, keep his hair combed. So now I straightened

his bedding and combed his hair and wiped his eyes and put

the mouth moisturizer on his lips and tried to close his mouth.

His mouth would not stay closed. It had been set in that posi-

tion rom hours and hours o strained breathing. But he was

neat. A strong, dignied ace.

I called my sister Beverly rst, then Nol. earully we gave


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thanks. Get a good nights rest. I will take care o things here

with the doctor and the nurses and the mortuary arrangements.

I will gather all our things and take them back to the motel. I

wish I had been there, Beverly lamented. Yes. Tat is good. But

dont let that eeling dominate now. In the days to come, you

will look back with enormous gratitude or the hundreds o

hours you gave serving Daddy. It is my turn to be blessed.

Te nurse came to give him his scheduled morphine shot.

As she walked toward me I said, He wont need that any more.

Is he gone? Yes. And thank you so much or your ministry tohim. I will notiy the doctor so he can come and veriy. I will

leave you alone. Yes, thank you.

Te doctor in his green rock came at 1:40 and listened

with his stethoscope to our dierent places on Daddys chest.

Ten he pulled back the sheet and said, I must apply some

pain stimuli to his nail base to see i he reacts. Ten he used

his fashlight to test Daddys eyes. Te nurse supervisor willcome and get the inormation we need about the mortuary.

Tank you.

Alone again, I elt his cheeks. Finally cool aer the evered

and fushed ght. I elt his nose, as though I were blind. Ten I

elt mine. I thought, very soon my nose will be like your nose. It

is already like your nose.

Te nurse came. No thank you, an autopsy will not be nec-

essary. Mackey Mortuary on Century Drive. My name is John,

his son. My cell phone is . You may stay as long as you like.

Tank you. I will be leaving soon.

Now I just look at him. Nothing has changed in his ace

here in the darkness o this dim light. Just no movement. But I

have watched his chest so longeven now, was that a slight rise


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and all? No, surely not. Its like sailing on the sea or days. On

the land the waves still roll.

He has our-days beard and dark eyes. I li an eyelid to see

him eye to eye. Tey are dilated.

Tank you, Daddy. Tank you or sixty-one years o aith-

ulness to me. I am simply looking into his ace now. Tank you.

You were a good ather. You never put me down. Discipline, yes.

Spankings, yes. But you never scorned me. You never treated

me with contempt. You never spoke o my uture with hope-

lessness in your voice. You believed Gods hand was on me. Youapproved o my ministry. You prayed or me. Everyday. Tat

may be the biggest change in these new days: Daddy is no lon-

ger praying or me.

I look you in the ace and promise you with all my heart:

Never will I orsake your gospel. O how you believed in hell

and heaven and Christ and cross and blood and righteous-

ness and aith and salvation and the Holy Spirit and the lieo holiness and love. I rededicate mysel, Daddy, to serve your

great and glorious Lord Jesus with all my heart and with all my

strength. You have not lived in vain. Your lie goes on in thou-

sands. I am glad to be one.

I kissed him on his cold cheek and on his orehead. I love

you, Daddy. Tank you.

It was 1: as I walked out o room 436. Just beore the

elevators on the ourth foor in the lounge, a young man in

his twenties was sitting alone listening to his iPod with head-

phones. I paused. Ten I walked toward him. He stopped his

music. Hello, my ather just died. One o the greatest tributes

I could pay to him is to ask you, Are you ready to meet God?

Yes, Sir. Tat would make my ather very happy. You know


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Jesus is the only way? Yes, Sir. Good. Tank you or letting

me talk to you.

As I drove out o the parking lot, I stopped. Te moon was a

day past ull. It was coldor Greenville. I looked at this great

hospital. Tank you, Lord, or this hospital. I will probably nev-

er lay eyes on it again.


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uneral MessaGe or

WIllIaM s. h. PIPer

Mc 9, 2007

Everybody with a little lie experience knows that in many cas-

es parting is sweet sorrow. Te experience is so common that

we have proverbs to express it. Actually, it comes rom Shake-speares Romeo and Julietwhich is more than incidental to

say because my ather was trained in Shakespearean drama at

Bob Jones University.

Good night, Good night! Parting is such sweet sorrow,

that I shall say good night till it be morrow.

Tat experience is not new. Every tear has been a sad and happy

tear. But what has been new or me is that it is not the imme-

diate experience o my athers death that makes me cry. It

doesnt work on me directly. It works indirectly. It comes at me

through other people. Most o my tears since Daddy died on

uesday have been sitting in ront o my computer and reading

emails. My athers death and my athers lie are touching me


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most in these days through the way they are touching others.

Tat was new to me.

Tk y

I mention this simply to say that so many people have touched

me and touched my ather in these last years and months o

departing rom us mentally and then bodily. And I want to

thank God and you publicly.

Tank you, Beverly and Bob. Nobody knows what you paid.

You have the right middle name. She would have done the same.And thanks to Berchetta and Steve and Brande who supported

her and in the last days have made a place or us to be at home.

Tank you, John and Marilyn Vanden Akker or your part-

nership in the ministry o Rogma and your relentless care or

my ather. And thanks to all the Rogma board who respected

and loved my ather.

Tank you, Brent Armstrong, my athers aithul pastor,

and all the riends at his church, Oakwood Baptist in Anderson.

He could not have asked or a better pastor, even rom a distance.

Tank you, Sharon and Larry, Nancy and Fred, Paul and

Linda, and Pam and John or loving your uncle well, especial-

ly aer Elmer and Naomi were gone. What an extraordinary

bond existed between our athers.Tank you to Shepherds Care where he spent the last two

years o his lie. He liked his place and turned it into a sanctuary

where memories o gospel triumph were happening all over again.

Tank you to Dr. Bill Logan and the sta at Greenville

Memorial Hospital who tenderly honored my ather with dig-

nied care and protected him rom pain in his last week.


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Tank you to Bill Philips and the team here at White Oak who

have lied so many burdens rom us and made this day possible.

Tank you to all o you or coming to express your support

to us and to honor my ather. Your presence is a grace that we

do not take or granted.

Tank you to Bethlehem, the church I serve, and to the

hundreds o riends who have prayed and written. It is a beauti-

ul thing when the sheep shepherd the shepherd.

Tank you to Karsten and Shelly and Millie and Frances

and Able and Ben and Melissa and Lilia and Abraham andMolly and Barnabas and Lesley and Grace or coming to hon-

or their grandather and great grandather. And to Oscar and

Orison who were willing to stay behind.

And thanks, above all, to Jesus Christ, my athers God and

my God. o use the words o George Mueller when he preached

his wies uneral sermon in 1870: Te Lord was good to give

her to me. Te Lord was good to leave her with me so long. TeLord was good to take her rom me. So we thank him or Bill

Piper: Te Lord was good to give him to usa child does not

choose his parents, God does. Te Lord was good to leave him

with us so longsixty-one years or me, more than I deserved.

Te Lord was good to take him rom usso quickly, so gently,

so ree rom pain. Tank you, Lord Jesus.

lt M t Pc o M Tim

When Daddy turned eighty, there was a great celebration.

Some o you were there. When I stood to speak I said, I have

come to preach my athers uneral sermon. What I meant was

that I wanted Daddy to be alive and to hear my tribute. And he


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heard it. And so I dont intend to preach it again. Instead, it is

printed in the booklet you have called A ribute to My Father.

oday what I want to do, as much as possible, is let my ather

preach to you one more time. Not with a recording but through

the heart and mouth o his son. You know, when someone asks

you, Who were the key infuences in your lie that made you

what you are? your answer to that question is only as valid

as your memory. And you dont remember but a tiny raction

o the infuences that made you what you are. Many decisive

infuences came into your lie beore they could even register inyour memory. And millions upon millions o infuences have

entered your lie o which you have no memory. Tis is not only

because you have orgotten millions o moments in your lie,

but because thousands o infuences on you, you never knew

about in the rst place. For example, the prayers o others or

you. You dont know about them, but they shape your lie.

Tis act has two eects on me. One is to make me thankulor the sovereignty o God. He governs all the infuences over my

lie. Paul said in 1 Corinthians 1:10, By the grace o God I am

what I am. I am glad that neither I nor any other human governs

my lie. God does. My days are in his hands. And I am glad.

Te other eect this truth has on me is to send me back to

my athers preaching to uncover more deeply my roots. I have

seven o my athers books here. Te more that I read them, the

more I marvel at how unoriginal I am. And this makes me very

happy. Original theologians tend be heretics. I want what I say

to have roots. I dont want to be new in what I believe. I want

to be true.


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s, s, stif

And so I have chosen one o my athers sermons rom the

bookA Good ime and How to Have It. Te sermon is onpages 4349, and it is called, Saved, Sae, and Satised. Te

date on the book is 1964. I have simply marveled at how what

I preach and write is simply an updating o his vision o the

Christian lie. He never used the phrase Christian Hedonism;

he just preached it. He never used the phrase God is the gos-

pel. He preached it. He never wrote a book called Counted

Righteous in Christ. He just preached it. So I have reveled inthe roots o my lie. And I thought I should let the root speak

through the branch.

Saved, Sae, and Satisedthree o the great themes o

his preaching. First, everyone must be saved or perish. Second,

when God saves you by his sovereign grace, he keeps you sae by

his sovereign grace. Tird, Christ himsel is our supreme satis-

action. A ew comments about these three great themes o my

athers preaching and lie:

1. Saved

Always, as he introduces a new theme, there fows o o Dad-

dys tongue a stream o verses rom all over the Bible that lays

the oundation or his comments:

Isaiah 4:: urn to me and besaved, all the ends o

the earth! For I am God, and there is no other.

Jeremiah 8:0: Te harvest is past, the summer is ended,

and we are notsaved.


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Luke 8:1: Te devil comes and takes away the word rom

their hearts, so that they may not believe and besaved.

John 3:17: God did not send his Son into the world tocondemn the world, but in order that the world might

besavedthrough him.

Acts :47: Te Lord added to their number day by day

those who were beingsaved.

Acts 16:31: Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will besaved.

Saved?

But why talk so much o being saved? Why give your whole lie

to this? Te world doesnt think it needs to be saved. Daddy

told me more than once: Getting people lost is much harder

than getting them saved. People dont think they need to be

saved. It doesnt mean anything to them. So why talk so muchabout it? Four reasons:

1) Because we are by nature corrupt. We dont just sin, weare

sinul. Our nature is bent, corrupted, depraved. We are sel-

ish to the core. We are dead in our trespasses and sins (Ephe-

sians :13).

) We have all acted on this nature relentlessly all our lives and

piled up a huge debt o guilt. All have sinned and all short

o the glory o God (Romans 3:3). In act, since Paul says,

Whatever does not proceed rom aith is sin (Romans

14:3), and Hebrews says, Without aith it is impossible to

please God (Hebrews 11:6), all that we do apart rom aith

in Christ is sinno matter how virtuous it is.


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3) Because o this sinul nature and these mounting sins, we

are under the just sentence o condemnation. Te judge o

the universe pronounces a sentence o guilt over us. And

this is impeccable justice.

4) Te punishment ollowing this sentence o condemnation

is everlasting torment in hell. Matthew :41: Ten he will

say to those on his le, Depart rom me, you cursed, into

the eternal re prepared or the devil and his angels. My

athers eyes were never more penetrating than when he

looked into your eyes and warned about the unspeakablereality o eternal punishment. Tis is a kind o love with

which the world does not want to be loved.

The Remedy

And o course the great burden o his message was that there

is Grace or the Guilty, the title o one o his books. And he was

unapologetic about being rigorously doctrinal in his evangelis-

tic preaching, because the remedy or each o these our condi-

tions rom which we need to be saved involves proound bibli-

cal doctrine.

1) Te remedy or our corruption and our sinul nature is regen-

eration. Tat is, we must be born again. And this is a gi and

miracle o sovereign grace. You cant make yoursel to be

born again any more than you made yoursel be born. Jesus

said in John 3:78, Do not marvel that I said to you, You

must be born again. Te wind blows where it wishes, and you

hear its sound, but you do not know where it comes rom or

where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born o the Spirit.


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Tis is the work o God. I you have not been born again, ask

God to do this miracle and give you spiritual lie.

) Te remedy or the guilt o sin and the mounting up o sinsday aer day is the redemption in Christ Jesus, the orgive-

ness o our sins, because he bore them or us. Colossians

:1314: He has orgiven us all our trespasses, by cancel-

ing the record o debt that stood against us with its legal

demands. Tis he set aside, nailing it to the cross. Christ

bore our sins in his body on the tree (1 Peter :4).

3) Te remedy or the sentence o condemnation that hangs

over us because o our depravity and our sins is justica-

tion. Tis is the declaration in the courtroom o heaven that

those who are in Christ Jesus are not only orgiven, but also

counted perectly righteous as though they had ullled

every demand o the law. How can this be? How can I, a

sinner, be counted righteous beore God? Romans :19: Asby the one man's disobedience the many were made sinners,

so by the one mans obedience the many will be made righ-

teous. Corinthians :1: For our sake he made him to be

sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the

righteousness o God. Te remedy or our condemnation

is that, because o Christs righteousness being imputed to

us, Tere is thereore now no condemnation or those who

are in Christ Jesus (Romans 8:1).

4) And the remedy or the curse and the penalty o hell and

the wrath o God that hangs over us because o our deprav-

ity and sins and condemnation is propitiation. When you

propitiate someone, you remove his anger. Tat is what


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Christ did when he died (Romans 3:). Christ redeemed

us rom the curse o the law by becoming a curse or usor

it is written, Cursed is everyone who is hanged on a tree

(Galatians 3:13). First Tessalonians :910: God has not

destined us or wrath, but to obtain salvation through our

Lord Jesus Christ, who died or us so that whether we are

awake or asleep we might live with him. Tis is not because

there was no wrath, but because Christ suered in our place

not only to cover our sins but to remove the wrath o God.

My ather preached, Tere is no other name under heaven giv-en among men by which we must be saved (Acts 4:1), because

everyone is sinul, guilty, condemned, and hell-bound, and

because Christ is a great Savior. Everything hangs on whether

you are united to Christ. In Christ we are orgiven, justied,

and ree rom wrath. And union with Christ comes by one

means: being born again through aith in him.

2. Sae

And when you are united to Christ by aith, you are sae. Forev-

er. Not because the rest o your lie doesnt matteras though

you can live your lie as though other things in your lie are

more precious than Christ. Tis is the great misunderstanding

o eternal security in so many churches, which causes so much

alse Christianity. And my ather was greatly burdened by this.

Te saety o a Christian does not lie in the act that I

once prayed to ask Jesus into my heart and now I can know I

am saved even i he has no central place in my lie. Te saety

o a Christian lies in the biblical act that those who embrace

Christ as their Savior and Lord and reasure, God preserves.


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Tat is, God comes aer us again and again to make himsel

central in our lives. Jeremiah 3:40 is one o the greatest state-

ments o the new covenant that Christ bought with his blood:

I will make with them an everlasting covenant, that I will not

turn away rom doing good to them. And I will put the ear o

me in their hearts, that they may not turn rom me.

Our saety rests on Gods promise that because o Christ

he will not let us minimize him without convicting us and

causing us again to pursue him. In other words, the mark o

a Christian is not perectionwe oen stumble and yield totemptation to put other things ahead o Christ in our aec-

tions. But the mark o a Christian is that we grieve over this.

We hate this about ourselves. And again and again we renounce

our love or other things more than Christ and pursue him as

our highest reasure. Tat is what God promises to do or all

who are justied by aith alone. Tose whom he justied he

gloried (Romans 8:30). It is as good as done. It is sure. Tejustied are sae.

Do we coast because we are sae? Do we love what the world

loves because Christ died or us that we might love him above

al things? No. Tat is not the heart o a Christian. Rather, we

do what Paul says in Philippians 3:1: Not that I have already

obtained this or am already perect, but I press on to make it

my own, because Christ Jesus has made me his own. Because

we are saeJesus made us his ownwe press on to make it our

own. We resolve everyday what? Which brings us to the nal

point: Saved. Sae. Satised.


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3. Satisfed

We resolve everyday that today Christ will be our supreme sat-

isaction. Te psalmist prays in Psalm 90:14, Satisy us in themorning with your steadast love, that we may rejoice and be

glad all our days. Satisy us with your love. Not with the toys

o the world. Do you pray like that? Is this your longing?

Can you resonate with Paul when he says, Whatever gain

I had, I counted as loss or the sake o Christ. Indeed, I count

everything as loss because o the surpassing worth o knowing

Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suered the loss oall things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain

Christ (Philippians 3:78)?

How oen I have quoted C. S. Lewis that people who pre-

er the worldeven the innocent worldto Christ are like

children making mud pies in the slums because they cannot

imagine what a holiday at the sea is like. Daddy put it like

this: I have oen seen a cow stick her head through a barbed

wire ence to chew the stubby grass bordering a highway, when

behind her lay a whole pasture o grass (A Good ime and

How to Have It, p. 48).

a i P: i y sticti i J Cit

Tis is my athers nal pleait is what I intend to devote the

rest o my lie to: Find your supreme satisaction in Jesus Christ.

It does not come naturally to allen human beings. But Chris-

tians have the Holy Spirit. Tey are in Christ Jesus. We are not

o the world. We have a new nature. Te mark o a Christian is

not perection but new aections or Christ.

Here are his closing words and mine:


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Just remember, my riend, who Jesus is. He is God.

When you ully trust Him you have all that God is

and all that God has. You cannot be otherwise than

satised with the perect ullness o Christ. Because he

is God, He is all you need and more. Tere is no corner

o your lie He cannot ll, no problem He cannot solve

and no need He cannot supply .Yes, my riend, in

Christ we aresaved,sae, andsatised. He is a perect,

a complete, Savior. And I must add, He is the ONLY

Savior. rusting Christ spells JOY. Failure to trust himspellsjudgment. Now is the time to accept him. oday,

i you will hear His voice, harden not your heart.

(A Good ime and How to Have It, pp. 4849)


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ThouGhTs on My aTher

J 13, 2008

My ather, Bill Piper, was an incredibly intense preacher o the

gospel with a strong evangelistic bent. Tats because he was an

evangelist. He was not a pastor and never was a pastor. For 0+

years he served as an itinerant evangelist trying all the time to

rescue people rom perishing.Because o this he always had the smell o hell singeing his

garments and the aroma o heaven beckoning him on. Te

result was an amazing combination o blazing-eyed intensity as

he preached with high levels o joy, praise, and exultation over

the hope that he had in Jesus Christ.

My ather was one o the most intense people Ive ever

known when he was in the pulpit and perhaps the happiest per-

son Ive ever known when he was at the dinner table. Ive never

thought those things were in confict, and they always struck

me as describing the way one ought to be.

A Christian has to be realistic. Te world is in a horrible

state and eternity is looming very close with either hell or heav-

en, and we must be serious and intense. And on the other hand


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Christ has come to redeem the world. He has rescued us. How

can we not serve the Lord with gladness and rejoice always?

My ather seemed to combine those in a remarkable way.

He was a lover o humor. Nobody laughed more than my ather

laughed. I he told a joke he always laughed most at it, so wheth-

er you thought the joke was unny or not you were just drawn in

by his belly laughter.

Practically speaking, what I remember about my ather is

that he le home a lot. He would leave home on Monday and

get back the ollowing Monday. Sometimes he would be goneor two or three weeks. Te whole rhythm o our lie was built

around my athers comings and goings.

Ive never elt any resentment about my ather traveling so

much because it was or such a glorious cause. It wasnt like busi-

ness. It was our lie. Tis is what we lived or: we lived or the

gospel as a amily. My mother knew what she had gotten into.

It wasnt easy or her to be without her husband approximate-ly two-thirds o the year, but we were in it as a amily together.

Daddys leaving was our part in the gospel spreading. And when

he came home he would tell us great stories about people who

had come to Christ aer resisting or years, people who broke

on the last day o the crusade and walked with tears to the ront.

We would hear these glorious stories and how could we not sup-

port that or be thrilled to be a part o it somehow?

He did little things or us kids too. My sister had a spoon

collection and I had a coin collection, and when he was travel-

ing he would always be looking out or a spoon or Beverly and

some coins or Johnny. And because he traveled so many places

he could nd some pretty unusual items. Little things like that

made his going and coming poignant and special.


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Now that he is with Jesus, I eel the weight o being the

patriarch in the Piper amily. Tat eels like a burden, but its

a good one. I was happy to let him keep it and wouldnt have

wanted it rom him, but when God said, Bill, time or you to

come home, then that mantel came to me.

Tere is no great-grandather anymore, only grandather,

and it eels like a wonderul opportunity or me to love my

grandchildren and my kids. I do that mainly through daily

prayer. I name beore God every day all o my children and all

o my grandchildren the way Job did.Scripture says that Job got up and sacriced or his children

every day, i perchance they had sinned. I pray rather to try and

keep them rom sinning. Nonetheless, there is a prayer cover

that I eel like I owe this Piper clan which my dad once kept up.

About 10 years ago, Sam Storms wrote me and said, John

I elt led and made a commitment to pray or you every day or

the rest o my lie. I couldnt believe that! So I wrote in the Stararticleour churchs weekly newsletterthat Ive never had

anybody make that commitment to me beore. Tat was a bad

mistake. I got a letter rom my dad the next week saying, John-

ny, beore you were born I made the pledge to pray or you every

day o my lieand I havent ailed. I just elt awul!

I called him on the phone and said, Daddy, I knew that! I

dont know why I said what I said.

So there are actually at least two people in the world who have

made that commitment to me. But that prayer cover as the patri-

arch is gone. I dont have it anymore. Rather, I am that patriarch.

And I want to be as aithul as he was to name all o my children,

my wie, my daughters-in-law, and all o my grandchildren, inter-

ceding or them every day and covering them with prayer.


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evanGelIsT bIll PIPer:undaMenTalIsT ull o

GraCe and Joy 5, 2008

Te title I have given this message about my ather is Evange-

list Bill Piper: Fundamentalist Full o Grace and Joy. Tat title

is meant to carry several apparent incongruities or paradoxes or

ironies. I expect you to eel tension between the wordundamen-

talistand the phrase ull o grace, and between the wordunda-

mentalistand the phrase ull o joy. But the lead word is evange-

list. Underneath being a child o God, redeemed by the blood o

the Lamb, and justied by aith, and possessing all the riches o

the glory o God in Christunderneath that most basic identity,

my athers chie identity was evangelist. Independent, unda-mentalist, Baptist evangelistull o grace and joy.

T Pxic Citi Itit

It seems to me that any serious analysis or exploration o a

human beings lie will always deal in paradoxes. It will see ten-

sions. Again and again, the serious eort to understand another


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person will meet with ironic realities. Here is what I mean by

irony: Its the incongruity between what might be expected

and what actually occurs (www.dictionary.com). Te diction-

ary gives this example: Hyde noted the irony o Irelands copy-

ing the nation she most hated. In other words, its a great irony

to imitate the people you like the least.

It seems to me that there are very deep and basic reasons

why every serious eort to understand another personespe-

cially a Christianorces us to deal in irony or paradox. One

o the most basic reasons is that Christians are both allen andredeemed. We are saved (Ephesians :89), and we not yet saved

(Romans 13:11). We are adopted (Romans 8:1), yet we wait or

adoption (Romans 8:3). We are pure in Christ, but not yet

pure: Cleanse out the old leaven that you may be a new lump,

as you really are unleavened (1 Corinthians :7). What an irony

that unleavened bread should be told to become unleavened.

Our citizenship is in heaven (Philippians 3:0); we aresojourners and exiles here (1 Peter :11). But the earth is the

Lords and everything in it (1 Corinthians 10:6); and all

things are yours, whether the world or lie or death or the

present or the utureall are yours (1 Corinthians 3:1).

We were bought with a price and are slaves o no man (1 Corin-

thians 7:3). Yet, Be subject or the Lords sake to every human

institution (1 Peter :13). Our lives are hidden with Christ in

God (Colossians 3:3). Yet Jesus prays that we not be taken out

o the world (John 17:1). Indeed, some o you they will put to

death but not a hair o your head will perish (Luke 1:16, 18).

In act, you have already died (Romans 6:8). So consider your-

selves dead (Romans 6:11). How ironic that dead should be told

to consider themselves dead.


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In other words, irony and paradox and incongruities are

ound in every Christian lie because our very identity as

Christians is paradoxical. Tats what it means to be a Chris-

tian. I youre not a paradox, youre not saved. In act, I would

go even arther and say, i youre not a paradox, youre not a

human. What could be more basic to allen humanityand

what could be more ironicthan that those who are created

by God in his own image should use that God-like personhood

to deny their Maker? Like a digging ant denying the earth; or a

fying bird denying the wind; or swimming sh denying the sea.

bi Pip: hm, Citi

So there are these two great reasons why, as I have pondered my

athers lie, I have ound him to be a paradoxical person: He is

a Christian, and he is a human. Does it not seem like a strange

incongruityperhaps not a real onethat a blood-earnest,

soul-winner, who hammered away at the temptations o the

world and the dangers o the fesh should in his sixties celebrate

the body o his wie with words like these:

Her hair is like an auburn sea,

Wind-whipped, waved, mysterious.

Her orehead, like a wall o pearl

Stands majestic, proud, serene.

Her wide-set eyes are like clear, sparkling,

hazel-green pools, calm, compassionate, penetrating.

Her nely chiseled nose stands rmly between

cheeks that are air,

like pillows o down.

Her mouth is so, pleasant and ruby rich.


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Her skin is like the eathers o a dove.

Her breasts are like rose-tipped apples o ivory,

And her belly is like a ocean wave, smooth and restul.

Her legs are like pillars o granite, strong and rm.

And her eet like those o a deer, swi and beautiul.

Her breath is like sweet nectar,

Her kisses like perumed owers,

And her love like paradise.

Perhaps I shouldnt be surprised that Bob Jones University

should produce soul-winners that write like Song o Songs.Maybe the incongruity is just biblical aithulness. But almost

everywhere I turned in my athers lie, there were these seem-

ing paradoxes. He was human, and he was Christian.

Cpt Px

And he lived with other humans and other Christians, whotogether created corporate paradoxes. Does it not seem like a

strange incongruityperhaps not a real onethat the most

undamentalistic, separatistic, worldliness-renouncing school

in America, Bob Jones University, where my ather graduated

in 194, should have as part o the commencement celebra-

tion in those days a perormance o As You Like It (1939) and

Romeo and Juliet (1940) both written by William Shake-

speare, who in his own day ridiculed the Puritans, and whose

Globe Teater was demolished by the Puritans in 1644? Isnt it

a strange irony how three centuries can turn worldliness into a

delightul comedyas the BJU program said in 1939?

So whether personal or corporate, my athers lie appears to

be permeated with paradoxes. And under the title Evangelist


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Bill Piper: Fundamentalist Full o Grace and Joy, I hope to

capture some o them in a way that gives you hope in the grace

o God through the gospel o Christ.

a o-i, n-n rig

William Solomon Hottle Pipernamed aer a Bible expositor

that his ather admiredwas born in Reading, Pennsylvania,

January 8, 1919. He was the third and youngest son o Elmer

and Emma Piper. His ather had been a machinist (I couldnt

orget that he was missing hal o one nger), but aer his con-version, he became a sel-taught Bible student and then the

pastor o West Wyomissing Nonsectarian Church. My ather

told me that he wouldnt have been surprised i his ather could

quote virtually the entire New estament rom memory. My

guess is that this was an overstatement, but it signals the mas-

sive priority o the Bible and Bible Study that passed rom my

grandather to my ather to me.

Te upbringing o the three boys, Harold, Elmer, and

Bill, was old-ashioned, no-nonsense, and strict. He gives us a

glimpse into the discipline o his ather in one o his sermons.

Behavioristic psychologists teach that temper

tantrums and deiant attitudes are normal and

healthy. o curb them is dangerous. I you discipline

the child you will develop within him inhibitions

and warp his personality.

Im glad I had a ather who believed otherwise. I

got warped a good many times, but it wasnt my

personality! O, yes, we had plenty o counseling


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sessions but generally he did the talking and when he

nished I said, Yes, sir.

Old ashioned? Indeed it was! Scriptural? Absolutely!Right to the letter.

I was reared in a amily o three boys. o this day I

can hear some o the neighbors and church members

say, Brother Piper, you are just too hard on those boys.

Nevertheless, all three are ollowing Christ and two

o them are Baptist preachers. Tere was no doing asyou please in our home. My ather believed he was

responsible or the behavior o his children and as long

as we were under his roo we were expected to obey.1

Te strictness o his ather had some surprising side eects that

were proound. He told me about one o them. It turns out that

both Bill and Elmer had disobeyed their ather. Elmer was the

older, so his ather said that he was the more responsible and

that he would get the whipping or both boys. My ather told

me with tears in his eyes a ew years ago that he could hear the

belt on the backside. Tough he was just a boy, he said it was

one o the most vivid pictures in his lie o the substitionary

atonement o Christ in our place.

In a sermon about the salvation o children, he tells usabout his own conversion to make the point that young chil-

dren can be saved.

Tat children can be saved I know rom my own

experience. I have a brother who was saved at the age o

seven and another who gave his heart to Christ when he

was eight. I received Christ as my Savior when I was a boy


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o six. Certainly there were many things I did not know,

nor need to know. I knew enough to be saved. I knew I

was sinul and needed a Savior. I knew that Christ was

that Savior I needed. I knew that i I would believe on

Him and coness Him as my Savior He would save me.

Tat is all I needed to know and that all any child needs to

know to be saved. I trusted Christ and he saved me.

T C t ag it

Besides his conversion at the age o six, probably the most deci-

sive event in his teenage lie (and I mean even more decisive

than his marriage to my mother at age nineteen) was what hap-

pened when he was een. He told me this story ace to ace

several times over the years, and he always came to tears as he

said it. He saw it as a moment o supernatural conrmation

on his divine calling that never le him and that stamped hisentire lie. I will let him tell the story rom his bookTe Great-

est Menace to Modern Youth.

I can vividly recall the thrills that accompanied the

delivery o my rst Gospel sermon. I was een years

o age and had just surrendered my lie ully to the

will and service o Christ. Te young people o ourcommunity had joined together to promote a city-wide

revival and had invited a well known evangelist.

For the Saturday night service, the evangelist decided

to turn the entire service over to the young people. For

some reason I was asked to bring the message and to

give the invitation.


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I had been reared in a Baptist parsonage. All my lie I

had heard great preaching but I had never tried to do it

mysel. Tis was to be my rst attempt. I didnt know

how but I tried. My heart was lled with zeal and I

wanted to do my best or the Lord. Te big night came.

For my message I had selected some thoughts on about

a hal dozen Gospel tracts. At the time o the sermon

I spread these tracts all over the pulpit and I simply

preached rom one tract to the next.

I dont recall a thing I said. It probably was a poorsermon. But the thing that mattered was that when I

gave the invitation to receive Christ [this is where the

tears would inevitably come], ten precious souls le

their seats, came weeping to an improvised altar and

surrendered to the Lord Jesus Christ.

Te thrill that came to me then is still with memany years later. I knew that Jesus had walked on

the water but I elt as I le the building that night

that I was walking on air! Believe me, I was on cloud

nine! And, better still, Ive never come down. What

thrilled me most was the sudden realization that I had

immeasurable power at my disposal. Tat the God

o heaven, the God o the Bible, was willing to speak

through me in such a way as to touch other lives and

transorm them and change their destinies.

I never dreamed such a thrill was possible or me. I had

not known such power was at my disposal. I said then,

God, let me know this power the rest o my lie. Let me


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be so yielded to Tee that Ill never cease to know the

thrill and joy o winning others to Christ. And I can say

with honesty, I am just as excited right now [this book

was published in 1980, orty-six years later] about the

soul-winning power o God as I was at the age o een.

Young people, believe me, the greatest thrill youll ever

have this side o heaven is the thrill o leading another

precious soul to Christ.3

From that day on, my athers ace was set like fint to be a ull-time evangelist. Beside his name in his senior yearbook are the

words: He wants to be an evangelistic preacher. He never

turned back.

bi e: T Gp sgt

In the last two years that he and his brother Elmer were in

high school together, they had their own radio program on

WRW in Reading, Pennsylvania, cal led Bill and El, the Gos-

pel Songsters. Tey sang and preached. Teir theme song was

a song called Wonderul Peace. Until you hear it, you can

hardly imagine how dierent the teenage world was seventy-

ve years ago.

Perhaps my wie is right in her analysis: When she saw this,she pointed out that in 1936 adolescence as a distinct cultural

phenomenon hadnt yet been created. Tere was no such thing

as a vast teen culture. Tere was no teenage music. Frank Sina-

tra was born our years beore my ather. He is usually consid-

ered the rst teen idol. Te beginnings o a distinct youth cul-

ture was just about to begin. So when my ather was in high


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school the overlap between the music that mom and dad liked

and what teens liked was much greater then than now.

In other words, my ather grew up much more quickly than

I did. He skipped a good bit o the usually-wasted years called

adolescence, or what later was called the teenage yearsthe

term teenagerdid not occur in the English language until 1941.

He graduated rom high school with his sweetheart Ruth Eula-

lia Mohn in 1936. You can see rom the note in her senior year-

book that her heart was bound together already in the calling o

his lie. Hers reads: She intends to take up evangelistic work.

Mig t rt, Cg t b J

Aer graduation, my ather traveled with the Students League

o Nations and studied at John A. Davis Memorial Bible

School in Binghamton, New York. Ten on May 6, 1938, he

and his brother Elmer in the same wedding ceremony married

Ruth and Naomi. Elmer married Naomi Werner. And Bill

married Ruth Mohn. Bill and Ruth were both nineteen.

Tey moved to Cleveland, ennessee, to attend Bob Jones

College. Te school had moved to Cleveland in 1933 rom near

Panama City, Florida, where it was ounded in 197. Ruth and

Bill both enrolled. My ather was an average student and a

very gied speaker and actor. He had leading roles in severalShakespearean plays. He developed a deep admiration or Dr.

Bob Senior, the ounder o the school, and quoted him oen

the rest o his lie. My ather loved the education he got at Bob

Jones. He never belittled the school as an educational institu-

tion. When the time would come or cutting o ties with the

school, it was a deeply painul thing.


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He graduated in 194 and entered ull-time evangelism. My

sister Beverly was born in 1943, and I was born in 1946. Tat

same year Bob Jones moved to Greenville, South Carolina,

and our amily moved with them. Greenville became the base

o Daddys evangelistic ministry or the rest o his lie. Tis is

where I grew up.

T rtm lig Cmig hm

Lie, in my memory, was a rhythm o Daddys leaving or one

week or two weeks or as long as our weeks, almost always onSaturday, and then coming home on Monday. When I dedicat-

ed the bookDesiring Godto him, I wrote

I can recall Mother laughing so hard at the dinner

table that the tears ran down her ace. She was a very

happy woman. But especially when you came home on

Monday. You had been gone two weeks. Or sometimesthree or our. She would glow on Monday mornings

when you were coming home.

At the dinner table that night (these were the happiest

o times in my memory) we would hear about the

victories o the gospel. Surely it is more exciting to be

the son o an evangelist than to sit with knights andwarriors. As I grew older I saw more o the wounds. But

you spared me most o that until I was mature enough

to count it all joy. Holy and happy were those Monday

meals. O, how good it was to have you home!4

He had been elected to the board o trustees o Bob Jones beore

coming to Greenville in 1946, the youngest board member ever


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elected at that time. In 19, the University awarded him the

Doctor o Divinity degree in recognition o the impact o his

ministry in the churches o the United States.

Over the next decades, he preached in all y states, hal

a dozen other countries, held over 1,0 evangelistic crusades,

recorded over 30,000 proessions o aith, and published seven

books o sermons.

T Cg -Tim egim

Te personal toll this took on him, and what it cost my mother,was extraordinary. What keeps you going to hard new chal-

lenges week aer week when it means you must leave the ones

you love again and again? Heres what he wrote in his book

Stones Out o the Rubbish.

As an evangelist, my work necessarily keeps me away

rom my sweet wie and children much o the time.Some have asked me, How can you endure being away

rom them? Why dont you get a church and settle

down? Tere is but one answer. When I was a boy

o een, I sold out to the will o God. His will since

that day has been the supreme passion o my lie. Tere

have been ailures, mistakes and sins since then, but

His blessed will has remained more important to me

than amily, home or riends. God called me to be an

evangelist. I said, Lord, this will mean homesickness,

separation rom loved ones, loneliness and sacrice, but

NEVERHELESS, i that is your will, I will let down

the net. Te blessings He has given have oen been

more than I could contain. Te ruit I have seen has


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repaid me a million times over or whatever sacrices I

may have made.

Part o the burden he carried was the sordid stereotype o itiner-ant southern evangelists. It grieved him, but it didnt stop him.

Tere is a reason why the words evangelist and

evangelism meet with a eeling o nausea and disgust

in the minds o thousands o thinking people today.

All emotionalism worked up in the energy o the fesh,

deliberately aroused or outward results, or toyullyplayed upon by the impression-seeking preacher can

leave nothing but bitterness in the bottom o the cup.

Still others o my colleagues have been guilty o

employing cheap vaudeville showmanship tactics

which have done permanent injury to the cause o

true revivals. Spectacular, misleading, crowd-pulling

sermon titles, sensational predictions, erroneous

prophetic interpretations, high pressure money raising

methods, ostentatious dress and dramatic presentations

are but a ew o the current evils in evangelism. We

serve a spectacular God. Te universe He made is

ull o the spectacular. Christ is a spectacular Saviour.

Te Gospel o Jesus Christ is a spectacular Gospel.Te trouble is that some poor sinners saved by grace

endeavor to make themselvesspectacular, thus injuring

the Gospel they preach and the cause they represent.

Te glorious, beautiul, powerul Gospel o Christ

does not need to be garnished with vain predictions or

colored with sordid emotionalism.6


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nt y Tpic egit

My ather was not your typical evangelist. He was a doctrin-

ally driven, Bible-saturated evangelist. When he preachedto save sinners, he explained doctrine. One outline rom his

sermon notes goes like thisand it is typical o the sort o

preaching he did:

I. Christ is our redemption

II. Christ is our propitiation

III. Christ is our righteousnessIV. Christ is our sanctication

V. Christ is our example

VI. Christ is our expectation

VII. Christ is our completeness

He believed that the best way to call or repentance and aith

was to unpack the glories o Christ in the gospel, which meant

unpacking doctrine. He had about 00 sermons in his arsenal.

He told me that about twenty o them were blessed above all oth-

ers, and he would return to these again and again. What marked

out his evangelistic preaching as unusual was not the stories, but

basic doctrines o mans helpless condition in sin, Gods holiness

and wrath and the immanent danger o damnation, the glorious

ullness o Christs saving work on the cross, and the ree oer oorgiveness and righteousness to any who believed.

He was the most Bible-saturated preacher I have ever heard.

When he took up the reality o the new birth, or example, the

message was ull o the Bible. Here is what I remember most

o all rom my athers preachingthe relentless onrush o the

Bible spilling over rom his mind and heart. My ather loved


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the Bible. He believed the Bible. He built his lie on the Bible,

and he preached the gospel at the center o the Bible with

unashamed authority and almost no rills. And God used him

mightily in the salvation o sinners.

spti exi

In 197, something happened that broke his heart and changed

the scope o his relationships. I dont know all the details. I just

know that in June o 197, Daddy called Bob Jones rom a meet-

ing in Wisconsin and resigned rom the board o the school. Teways parted. I was eleven years old. Beore that I had watched

soccer games at BJU and seen lms that they made. Te campus

was just across the highway rom our home. But aer 197, there

was no more connection. We were not welcome.

Te larger issue above the particular details was the issue o

separation. Christian undamentalism today is dened largely

by the doctrine o separation. Te issue o whether to separate

rom Billy Graham and renounce his work became pivotal in

197. His New York crusade began on May 1 and ran nightly

or our months. Te supporters o the crusade were not all

evangelical. And the lines o separation became blurred. My

ather would not renounce Billy. And in the end, there was a

division between my ather and Bob Jones. Tis was one o thegreat ironies o his lie. Te movement that nurtured him and

shaped him, the school that he loved and served, would no lon-

ger support him. Only near the end o his lie was there a rec-

onciliation as Bob Jones III reached out to my ather. It was a

sweet ending to a long exile.


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dt rt, Mig t lv

In 1974, my mother was killed in a bus accident in Israel. My

ather was seriously injured but survived. Tey had been mar-ried thirty-six years. A year later, God gave my lonely ather a

second wie, LaVonne Nalley. I perormed the wedding cere-

mony in December o 197.

Te eect o my mothers death and my athers second mar-

riage was proound on our relationship. It took my ather one

more step away rom closeness to me. LaVonne was a southern

lady with deep roots in amily and place. In the twenty-eightyears o their marriage, LaVonne never came to Minneapolis.

My ather came twice. Since we only saw each other once a year

or so, the relationship with the new relatives was cordial but

not deep. It never elt very much like amily. So it elt like my

ather had been drawn into an intimacy that was no longer

ocused on the amily he athered but the new relationship he

had with LaVonne.

My relationship with my ather had always been one o

admiration and respect and tremendous enjoyment when we

played games together or shed. But we never talked much

about personal things. And with the death o my mother, and

the movement o my athers heart into a new world o relation-

ships, the distance that I elt grew even greater.

I t sw egitic ecti

It never changed my basic eelings or him. I elt a tremendous

aection and admiration or him. In act, in my adult years, I

elt a huge compassion or pity or my ather, rst because o

the sacrices he made to do the work o evangelism, and then


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because o the death o my mother, and then because o his

increasing dementia. My emotional deault reaction to my

ather was never resentment that he wasnt home enough. My

reaction was: How can I show him that I love him and help him

to know how much I esteem his work and the aithulness he

has shown?

I always elt supported, loved, and admired by my ather.

He spoke well o me. He thought I was crazy or leaving my

proessorship at Bethel to be a pastor, since he thought I was

exactly where I belonged. But when the decision was made in1980, he supported me and loved hearing news rom the church.

Most o all he loved hearing stories o conversions.

I have always lived in the shadow o my athers evangelistic

eectiveness. I think its been good or me, because my athers

lie is like a living parable o the priority that God puts on

the salvation o one sinner who repents. I tell you, there will

be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than overninety-nine righteous persons who need no repentance (Luke

1:7). My athers lie is a constant reminder o that truth. I am

thankul or it.

hmcmig

During the years aer my mothers death and my athersincreasing inability to travel in evangelism, the Lord opened

an amazing door with the creation o international correspon-

dence courses that my ather wrote. Rod o God Ministries

grew up with tens o thousands o people in Arica and Asia

taking these courses. Tat ministry continues today under the

leadership that my ather put in place. It was a thrilling gi to


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him as he aged because he was able to be involved in writing

and teaching into his mid-eighties.

Only in the last couple years was his memory so impaired

that he couldnt serve in that way. His second wie LaVonne

died August 4, 003. Aer a brie stay in independent living in

Anderson, South Carolina, near his church, Oakwood Baptist,

that cared or him so well, we moved him to Shepherds Care

in Greenville, owned and operated by Bob Jones University. It

was, in my mind and his, a kind o homecomingto the school

he loved and to the undamentalism he never really leandparadoxically never really belonged to. I look back on Gods

mercy in my athers nal days with tremendous gratitude. Te

Lord took him on March 6, 007.

s-digt mtit

Aer his deepest identity as a gospel-glorying child o God, my

athers identity was most essentially evangelist. Tis dened

his lie rom age 1 to 88. In the last days, the unreality that his

mind created at Shepherds Care was not casual times with

his amily but evangelistic crusades. Across the lawn there is

where the meeting will be tonight. From beginning to end, he

was dened by evangelism.

But he was also a undamentalist. By his own sel-desig-nation. It was not a term o reproach but o honor. In the rst

decade o the twentieth century, liberalism was gaining a oot-

hold in most denominations. Te common word or the liber-

als then was moderniststhose who believed that modern sci-

ence had made some essentials o the Christian aith untenable.

My ather dened modernism like this:


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By modernists, we mean ministers who deny the truth

concerning Jesus Christ: His miraculous conception,

His absolute deity, His vicarious atonement or the sins

o mankind, His bodily resurrection, and His personal

visible return to this earth. Modernists also deny the

need o regeneration by the Holy Spirit and the act o

a literal hell.7

In other words, in the early days o the undamentalist-mod-

ernist controversy, the battle was not or marginal doctrines

or behaviors but essential doctrineundamentals. WhenJ. Gresham Machen wrote his response to liberalism in 193,

he did not title it Fundamentalism and Liberalism but Chris-

tianity and Liberalism because he believed liberalism was not

Christianity at all.8

wo years beore my ather was born, the our-volume set

o books called Te Fundamentals was published (1917). In

19, Harry Emerson Fosdick red his shot across the bow o

the ship o the church called Shall the Fundamentalists Win?

My ather grew up in this super-charged atmosphere o mod-

ernism threatening the very lie o the churches in America. In

his early sermons in the orties and ies, he returned to this

battle again and again:

Christianity is in the throes o a gigantic confict with

the enemies o the Lord. Te ollowers o Satan have

shown their colors and the Faith is being blatantly

denied and rejected. Corruption and disintegration

have begun in a dozen denominations where the enemy

had spread his deadly poison.9


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Te breach between modernism and undamentalism

keeps getting wider. Te aith once or all delivered

unto the saints has been shunned in avor o bloodless

aith which glories man, denies his depravity, rejects

the absolute authority o the Bible and the Deity o

Jesus Christ.10

In act, by the time my ather was ten-years old, most people

recognized that the battle to save the mainline denominations

rom liberalism was being lost. Ten the question became how

to deal with this, and the debates about degrees o separationaltered the meaning o the term undamentalism in the 1930s.

It ceased to mean orthodox Christianity over against those

who denied essentials, and came to reer one group o ortho-

dox Christians, namely, the ones who believed that the biblical

way orward was strict separation rom denominations, groups,

and relationships that were not ully orthodox and were not

separated rom those who were not ully orthodox.

Bob Jones University was and is one o the strongest rep-

resentations o this development o undamentalism. And my

ather embraced it and was dened by itup to a point. For

him, the heart o undamentalism was the true doctrine. His

passion was evangelismsaving people rom perishing in hell

by leading them to the divine Savior and his substitutionarywork on the cross. In other words, i the undamentals were not

true, the gospel is a alse hope, and evangelism is misleading.

Tereore, the note struck more clearly than all notes was the

doctrinal importance o undamentalism:

Tough undamentalists do not agree upon every point

o doctrine, they are denitely agreed upon the essential


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elements o the Christian aith: the total depravity

o man, the absolute deity o Christ, the vicarious,

substitutionary atonement or sin through the blood

o Christ, His bodily resurrection, the need o the new

birth and the blessed return o Christ to the earth.11

Another dimension o undamentalism that he embraced was

authoritative preaching that was willing to name evil and

deend truth.

oo many present-day pulpiteers are so pedaling theGospel. Even many who are robed in the vestments

o undamentalism are void o a semblance o holy

boldness in their preaching. Tey handle sin with kid

gloves, avoid great issues and shrink rom declaring

cardinal doctrines. Pussyooters in the pulpit! What a

tragedy! Tey are a blight to the Church and a blockade

to the Holy Spirits blessing.

God wants trumpets in the pulpit, not violins,

trumpets that sound the reveille and warn o the

judgment to come. Te tabooing o negative

preaching has taken the re and brimstone out o

the pulpit, dried the tears o repentance and kept the

altars empty. I would not or a moment minimizethe eectiveness o the positive proclamation o the

glorious transorming gospel o Jesus Christ. It is my

contention, however, that the sledgehammer preachers

o yesterday were not entirely wrong, and that a

balanced, middle-o-the road position must be taken.1

Ten there was the undamentalist vision o separation not


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just rom alse doctrine but rom all orms o worldliness that

weaken the boldness and spiritual power o a Christian.

Every Christian who indulges in the sinul pleasureso this world is a compromiser and a stumbling-block.

No dancing, theater-going, card-playing, gambling

Christian can hope to be a soul winner or have a

testimony or God. I men see this world in you, you

will never point them to the next.13

I grew up in a home where it was assumed we would not smoke,or drink, or gamble, or play cards, or dance, or go to movies. We

were undamentalists. So why didnt I kick against this growing

up? I have never thought ill o my parents or these standards.

I have never resented it or belittled it. When I was in my early

twenties, I was indignant in some o my classes at Fuller Semi-

nary when certain young aculty members were cynical and

sarcastic about undamentalism. Tey sounded to me like ado-lescents who were angry at their parents and their backgrounds

and couldnt seem to grow up. I never elt that way about my

parents or about the undamentalism o my past. Why?

mtit m

I think I know why. My mother and my ather were the happi-est people I have ever known. Tis strikes many as an incongru-

ity, a paradox. But this is the key to my athers infuence on me

and, I believe, one o the keys to the power o his ministry. Te

undamentalist orceulness in the pulpit, the undamentalist

vision o the razorsharp edge o truth,14 the undamentalist

standards that move rom the en Commandments down to


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dancing and card-playingall o this was enveloped in a world

o joy and reedom.

Freedom? Fundamentalistic reedom? Yes. Ill illustrate.

When I was in the seventh grade, our class, Mrs. Adams home-

room, won the attendance award or the year. Te award? Te

whole class would go to a movie at the Carolina Teater on

Main Street during school time. My heart pounded. I went

home and asked my motherDaddy wasnt homewhat

should I do? She said, Do what you think is right. I weighed

all the actors, and I went.Te next year, in the eighth grade, a girl called me one night

and asked i I would go with her to a dance. It was one o those

Sadie Hawkins events where the girls invite the guys. She was a

pretty girl. My heart pounded again: Uh I dont dance, I said.

She said, We dont have to dance, we can just sit and watch. Uh

just a minute. I went and asked my mother what I should do. (Dad-

dy wasnt home.) She said, Do what you think is right. Ten shechecked her calendar, and we were going to be out o town. Saved.

What was my mother, speaking or my ather, doing? She

was saying: We have standards, son, but they need to come

rom the inside. I they dont come rom the inside, they are

worthless. On these issues, youre old enough now to discov-

er who you are deep inside. When my parents said, Do what

you think is right, they were not oolish relativists. Tey were

wise undamentalists.

Ttig i l

Soon I was old enough to start talking about these issues with

my ather. Daddy, why is there a split between you and some


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other undamentalists? One thing I remember above all about

these conversations. He went to Ephesians 4:1 over and over

and reminded me that in all our devotion to the truth we must

speak the truth in love. He used to love to play on the Greek

verb and translate it truthing in love. He elt as i undamen-

talism was losing the battle mainly or spiritual and attitudinal

reasons, not doctrinal ones.

Already in the 1940s, there had emerged in my athers

preaching and teaching and writing a warning about the dan-

gers o undamentalism. For the careless listener, this couldsound like he was abandoning the ship o undamentalism.

Some would say he did. He would surely say he didnt. I dont

think he did. Let me try to capture the spirit o this warning

rom his own words:

Some proessing Christians, oen those who boast

o their undamentalism, are given to a grievous

censorious and critical attitude toward everything an

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