CONFRONTING LIFE’S ISSUES

HANDLING CRITICISM 

SD: Bill, sometime after I joined staff I learned of a very difficult moment you faced with some of your top leaders who marched into your office and demanded your resignation. Could you tell us a little about that?

BB: Well, that was one of those challenging moments.

SD: I'd say.

BB: The scripture says, "In all things give thanks for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you." I was just learning how to say thank you. I was just learning how to love. As a matter of fact I wrote a book, a little booklet entitled, How to Love by Faith.

SD: And you wrote that just after this incident; didn’t you?

BB: Well, actually it took place during the process. But some of the young men whom I love to this day, were like my own sons whom I had trained, discipled and they played major leadership roles in this movement and their theology began to waver and I would get letters from churches and pastors concerned. Have you changed your theology, because out on the field there was a teaching that grace was so abundant that the implication was you can do anything you want.

SD: Didn't matter if you sinned. Didn't have to confess.

BB: It was kind of an adhominem emphasis, sadly. And these men were brilliant and gifted. They were pied pipers, half a dozen of them, and one of them made an appointment to see me one morning and 13 of them came into my office.

SD: Oh, my goodness. What were you thinking at that time?

BB: Well, it was the Holy Spirit cushioned me and when they said, we've come to accept your resignation. You're too old to lead this movement and we need new fresh blood. Now, that was in 1967, so you can see I wasn't yet an old fogey.

SD: I wouldn't call you an old something or other just yet. That's right.

BB: But they had plans for the movement and I said, well let's talk about it. What's your problem? Of course I knew the problem. Their theology had changed and they knew, as I had warned them on different occasions that if they continued to teach as they were I'd have to make some changes. Well, they were beating me to it. They were going to accept my resignation before I accepted theirs. So, when one of them said to me later when you said let's talk, we knew we had lost, because we thought we would just intimidate you if we came in, 13 of us. Well, some of them didn't know why they were there actually. They came to me later and said we didn't know what we were getting into. But the coup leader had been on staff for many years and he had led one of the other coup leaders to Christ and influenced another and he came to me about six months later and he said, "You know, I'm so sorry. What we did was wrong and we were all on an ego kick and will you forgive me?" A couple of years later he came back to say you know, you're the most influential man in my life. No one has helped me understand the Christian life like you. Well, God gave me peace with it all. It was as though they were talking about somebody else. That's grace. By nature I would have struck out and said who do you think you are, but I called Henry Brandt, a very famous psychologist who was very blunt. I called and said come and talk to us and he called all of us together and he said, now what's your beef?

SD: What's your beef? That was pretty blunt.

BB: The end result was they were going to take the whole movement, they thought, and would you believe only six of those men left. They were good men. I love them to this day and I said when they left, the next time I see you I'll embrace you and say I love you because I do. But that very summer after they left, God sent -- if I remember the number -- it was over 700, 750 people, new staff came and many of them had been a part of the controversy out on the field because these men were incredibly gifted and had every reason to believe they could have taken the movement because I had entrusted the leadership to them. And of course, the out on the field leadership. So, all I could do was praise God. He allowed me to have that crucible experience where He demonstrated His faithfulness.

SD: Bill, how have you handled your critics through the years?

BB: I love them. That's what the scripture admonishes. Jesus said, "Love your enemies," and I don't view my critics as my enemies necessarily but some are, and as a matter of fact I did something that was very offensive to the president of a very well-known college and he wrote me a letter calling me many names, and indicating he wanted nothing more to do with me and I was a heretic, and of course all I did was just with Chuck Colson and some others, open our arms in love to fellow believers in other groups and other denominations. But anyway, I wrote him a letter telling him I loved him and said please give my love to your father and mother and one of my associates said, "How can you write a letter like that to such a scandalous letter accusing you?" I said, "Look, that's his problem not mine." It's been a great relief to me to know that I don't have to defend myself. When I signed the contract to be a Slave of Jesus with Vonette in 1951, He took over and He takes care of these things. As long as I am sure that He is in control, I don't have to worry about what's going to happen. He runs the universe. He can do a better job of running my life than I can and this movement. So, this experience helped me to see how much I needed him, how needy I am every split second to depend on Him.

HANDLING ADVERSITY 

SD: Bill, has there been good that's occurred in your life as a result of difficult times, not just criticism perhaps, but adversity? What kind of good do you see in all of that?

BB: Oh, my. I think we learn more from adversity than we do blessings. Now, I don't ever look forward to adversity.

SD: And you wouldn’t mind blessings right?

BB: But the fact is when we experience trials and tribulations, testings as James says, "Rejoice" and Paul in Romans 5 says, "Rejoice." Why? Because it's an opportunity to demonstrate faith and the Bible says, "The just shall live by faith. That which is not of faith is sin. Without faith it's impossible to please God." So, whenever I face trials and temptations, such as I'm now facing with an incurable pulmonary fibrosis, I as a demonstration of faith say thank you Lord, and what does He do? He is pleased with our faith, and Jesus said, "When you obey me, I will reveal myself to you," and I have to tell you -- and it's hard to understand this -- that since I learned that I’m dying of pulmonary fibrosis, I have known joy and blessing upon joy and blessing. This is one of the highlights of my life, and you say how can that be? That's ridiculous, you're making that up. That's what the scripture says, and if we obey the scripture and it pleases God and He blesses. You know, He blesses and honors faith. So, when I say, Lord I don't understand it, but I don't have to understand it. Thank you very much, and I must tell you even in terms of production, I have been able to do more creative writing and thinking in the last year since in a way I tossed the torch to you and asked all the men who reported to me in Amsterdam to start reporting to you. So, for a year as of this date you have been pretty much doing what I used to do. So, I've had the freedom to write, to edit and do the videotaping of very important messages that I want to leave behind for the International Leadership University et cetera, et cetera. And so, some ways it may well be that what I’m doing during this period of time will accomplish more than I've done in 50 years of ministry because you know the technology available today multiplies everything. So, in all things give thanks is one of the greatest lessons I've ever learned and I am thanking God.

HANDLING SUCCESS 

SD: Bill, God has been so gracious to Campus Crusade for Christ that we've touched the lives of approximately one half of the world in the last three years, and you've been the leader of this organization during that time. How do you handle that success that God's given you?

BB: Well, Jesus said without me you can do nothing.

SD: Well, that's a good start.

BB: So, I don't have any problem saying this is what God has done, not what we as a movement have done, and certainly not what I have done. I do thank God for the incredible staff, including your leadership, Paul Eshelman and many others whom I could name, Bailey Marks and on and on, but it's God's doing. There's no human way to explain what's happened over the last 50 years apart from God.

SD: In the process of God doing things through the ministry and through you personally, He has allowed you to receive some honors and one of those was the 1996 Templeton Prize for religion. What's the significance of that in your life, not just how do you feel about it, but what do you think was God's reasoning behind you receiving that?

BB: Well, it's probably the most, at least to me, the most prestigious award one can receive internationally. It's more important to me than the Nobel Prize or the Pulitzer Prize because it deals with spirit instead of all the material benefits of man and the achievements of man. So, it's given not just to Christians. It's a religious award. It's given to Muslims and Hindus and Jews as well as Christians, but I was very humbled to receive it and I look back upon it as one of the great blessings in terms of having a platform to minister with credibility to the leaders of the world. So that you know when you receive the Templeton Prize you can go talk to anyone in the world and not have to worry about getting an audience.

SD: That’s right. It's been very helpful hasn't it in that regard?

BB: Yes.

SD: And there was a little bit of a stipend associated with that wasn't there? Whatever happened to that?

BB: Well, that million dollar award which Prince Phillip gave me in Buckingham Palace, Dr. Templeton and his father, Sir John Templeton were there and he handed me the prize along with some medals and the day before that million dollars would have been worth a million dollars, but over night the dollar value went up and the British pound went down and I picked up another 57 thousand dollars overnight.

SD: That's not bad for a night's sleep.

BB: But people asked me what are you going to do with that and I explained in 1951 my wife and I signed a contract to be Slaves of Jesus and we laid everything we owned or ever would own on the altar. So, I explain I gave it away in 1951. So, it's being used to help promote fasting and prayer throughout the world.
 

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