From the Archives: Greg Laurie Interviews Will Graham

Hey everybody, Greg Laurie here. You're listening to the Greg Laurie Podcast, and my objective is to deliver, hopefully, compelling practical insights in faith, culture, and current events from a biblical perspective. To find out more about our ministry, just go to our website, harvest.org.

So thanks for joining me for this podcast. Now, Will is the son of Franklin and Jane Graham, and he is the grandson of Billy Graham. And Will also travels around the world, like his dad and like his grandfather, and preaches the gospel. He also is the director of the Billy Graham Training Center at the Cove in Asheville, North Carolina, a great place to go and study the Bible. But God has really put his hand on Will, and it's been so exciting to see how the Lord has just got him ready for the work he's called him to do. And before Will comes out and speaks tonight, I thought I'd introduce him to you, so let's welcome Will Graham. Will, come on out.

Good to have you. Now, Will, a lot of people have been wondering about how your grandfather is doing. It's in the news that your father has asked that people be in prayer for Billy, so what is his status?

How is his health right now? Yeah, my grandfather, you know, back in November 7th, turned 95. And he's actually been, he's just, the best way to describe it, he's just old. And he's just his, but on his birthday, his health started to turn for the worse. There's nothing actually wrong with him.

It's just old. And so there's nothing, you know, medically wrong, but just old age, and his life is starting to turn. But, you know, my grandfather's always said, you know, one day you're going to hear that Billy Graham is dead. And he said, this is what my grandfather said, he said, one day you're going to hear that Billy Graham is dead.

He said, but don't believe it. He said, for on that day I'll be more alive than any other time in my life. He spent his whole life traveling the world preaching, and we just had this great outreach in the United States, and it was on the Fox News channel, and also in thousands of homes around the country called My Hope America. And he probably reached as many people as he's reached in a long time in one night using media, didn't he? He did, and this is all because of what God's been doing. And, you know, I mean, how in the world would Fox News ever put something like this on their television?

I mean, you kind of wonder, how in the world? Well, this is the type of God that we serve, because God introduced my grandfather to Rupert Murdoch in 1959 in Melbourne, Australia, when Rupert was a nobody. He's the owner of the Fox. Yeah, he owns Fox News, Sky News in Europe and in the UK, and he's an Aussie from Melbourne who took over his father's business, who had just died. And when my grandfather went there in 1959, they had a businessman's lunch, and a little round table, and my grandfather was sitting beside him, and that's how Rupert Murdoch and Billy Graham met. And so it was all these years that, and now Rupert said, you know, we want to put this on our programming, and we said thank you so much. And your dad told me, Franklin, your dad told me that 55,000 people made a Profession of Faith that they know about in one night from that broadcast going out.

So the 55,000 people, that's great. So, Will, tell us about yourself. Now, how long have you been married? I've been married, we celebrated 15 years this year. Well, congratulations, you have three children.

Three children. Now, did you always feel, just because, you know, you're the grandson of Billy and the son of Franklin, that you're going to end up as a preacher, or did you kind of fight that, or what? No, I never fought it, but there was no pressure. A lot of people wonder if there was always pressure to be a preacher or an evangelist, and my dad did very good at protecting us from that. Because he got that pressure, and he didn't want his own children to have that pressure, so dad protected us.

For example, when I was starting to get into college, people said, hey, we want Will to come and speak, and I wasn't really speaking at the time, but we want Will. And my dad said, you can't ask him unless you ask me first. And so then after our time, dad said, no, Will can make up his own mind on that stuff. But dad always protected us, and grateful for that. I mean, we grew up normal.

I mean, we grew up on a farm in North Carolina, pig, I mean, cows, horses, motorcycles. And that's about your father. What about, no, I'm kidding. I couldn't miss that opportunity. I had to jump in there.

So you did. I've been to your house, and you grew up in a country environment, just a normal life, but God put his hand on you. Now, you're traveling around the world, and where are some of the places you've been, and where are some of the places you're going? Yeah, we've been very blessed, and we only go where we get invitations.

We don't spin the globe and say, oh, Hawaii, this looks good this year. We go where we get invited, and so this past year, I was invited to India. You've been there many times, haven't you? I've been there many times.

I had a first this time. I was denied entry into India. And so I'd messed up last time with some police.

I didn't get in trouble with the law in that sense, but I went to a restricted area. You have to go present your passport to a certain individual. I gave my passport to an individual to go get it registered. I thought it was done. They didn't do it, and so I didn't know it was ignorance on my part. And so when I left the country, they said, well, Will didn't follow our procedures.

He can't come back in. It's all cleared up now, but I was supposed to go to India. I didn't quite make it. I went to Africa this year to Kenya and preached. I was in Australia earlier this year.

I'll be going back to Australia this coming year. I just got back from Thailand and Japan. In Japan, God is really doing something unique in Japan right now.

Some things that most Christian pastors there in Japan have never seen before, and we're seeing a great God really begin to do something mighty in Japan, which has never happened before. So less than half of one percent. Very small percentage of the Japanese are Christians.

Less than half of one percent. So a megachurch would be 50 people. So I mean, there's 12 megachurches here. But God's doing some great things, and we're looking forward to what God's going to continue to do. So tonight, what are you going to talk to us about? I'm going to be talking a little bit about the Christmas story, and especially when it's that time of the year. I mean, it's hard to believe it's less than two weeks away. I know.

That's the only time I get to preach Christmas. So I'm going to be talking about Herod tonight and the wise men. All right. Well, thanks for being here, Will. Let's thank Will for being here, and God bless you, man. Thank you. Hey, everybody.

Greg Laurie here. Thanks for listening to our podcast. And to learn more about Harvest Ministries, please subscribe and consider supporting this show. Just go to harvest.org. And by the way, if you want to find out how to come into a personal relationship with God, go to knowgod.org. That's K-N-O-W-G-O-D dot org.