The Man Who Started the Jesus Hippie Revolution

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Here's Greg Laurie with his story. So I was born in 1952. That seems like ancient history now. Yes, I was actually alive in the 50s. Eisenhower was president. We had just come through World War Two.

There was this buoyant optimism in our country. Everything had this sort of futuristic look that now we call 50s design, but in the day it was supposed to look like the future. And it was actually a really great time to be alive. I read a survey a while ago that said if people could live in any era, what era would you pick? And the most popular choice was the 50s.

But it wasn't long until the 50s turned to the 60s and then the 60s turned very dark. I was born in Long Beach, California, in 1952 to a woman named Charlene McDaniel. She was from a very large family with many siblings. They were from Friendship, Arkansas, old fashioned values. And as you look at the old photographs of my mother with her siblings, she stands out. It's not that the siblings weren't good looking men and women. It's just that my mom was extraordinarily beautiful, literally a Marilyn Monroe lookalike. And so she ran away from home at a very early age.

My mom was a rebel at heart. And she would wear pants when you weren't supposed to wear pants. And to show you what her home was like, her father, Charles McDaniel, once saw her wearing pants. He made her take them off.

He cut them up with scissors and threw them into the fire. That just fueled my mother's rebellion. And my Aunt Willie actually helped her pack a suitcase and she eloped with some guy. And off my mother went to her series of what would become seven marriages that would take her all around the United States. So along the way, she met a guy.

I found this out later. His name was Barney. He was a sailor in the U.S. Navy and they had a one night stand, a fling, and my mom got pregnant and she married another guy named Kim and put his name on my birth certificate.

And I believed he was my father. So my mother just went on a series of marriages and divorces. She was a raging alcoholic. She was a literal man magnet.

Men were always coming to her. So she had a lot of boyfriends in between the husbands. And I went along for what we might describe as Charlene's Wild Ride.

You've heard of Mr. Toad's Wild Ride in Disneyland. It was Charlene's Wild Ride. But at times she would leave me to live with my grandparents. So I now as a little boy was living with the parents she rebelled from. And it's not just that they were older.

They were from another generation. But they were strong disciplinarians. They forced me to adhere to standards and rules, which was actually kind of good for me because up to that point I felt like I'd been raised by wolves almost.

I really didn't have any absolutes or standards to live by. So it was a stable time in my life. But they would take me to church and I was bored and I remember drawing on the little church bulletin. But in the house where my grandparents lived there was a little portrait of Jesus hanging up on the wall. And I would often find myself just staring at that portrait. There was something about Jesus that fascinated me at a very young age. Another thing that we used to do is watch television together.

They had these two big lazy boy type chairs and I had a little stool in the middle. And we would watch this little black and white TV and watch Bonanza and Gunsmoke and all these popular shows of the late 50s early 60s. And I remember we also watched a preacher named Billy Graham.

And I really liked him. Sometimes at night after my grandparents went to bed I would pull a cover over my head and I would talk to an imaginary character I'd invented and I named him Mr. Nobody. And I would just kind of pour my heart out to him, tell him what was troubling me, what was bothering me. And I think in my own little kid way I was reaching out to God. You know the Bible says God has placed eternity in our hearts. And I knew that God was out there somewhere.

I just didn't know who he was or what his name was. So fast forward now and we're in the turbulent 60s and youth are starting to rebel against their parents. And I joined them and there was a saying of the day, never trust anyone over 30. And that rang true for me because all of the adult role models that I was exposed to disappointed me. And there was not one adult that I admired or looked up to or wanted to be like. Now I left out one of my mother's seven husbands.

She was married to divorce seven times. He was different than all the other husbands. His name was Oscar Laurie. He actually took the time to adopt me. He treated me as a father should treat a son. He disciplined me. He gave me an allowance. He took time to help me explain things to me and I really loved him. So it was really a big shock when one day I came out of school in New Jersey where we lived.

He was a practicing attorney and our Cadillac was loaded up with luggage. And I asked my mother, where are we going? She said, we're going to Hawaii. Well, I'd never been to Hawaii before. I was very excited. I said, where's dad?

She said, he's not coming. So we got in the car. We went to the airport.

We land in Honolulu, Hawaii. And there standing before me is this very tall man named Eddie. And this was my mother's new husband.

How she met him, how this came about, I did not know, but I remember one thing. They literally had recreated the room I had in New Jersey in Hawaii, which I found very surreal. And you're listening to Pastor Greg Laurie tell the story of his own life. A surreal life is right. And he said something so, so haunting.

I had not one adult I admired or looked up to or wanted to be like in my life. What a sad thing to hear. But in the end, it would fuel who we'd become when we come back. More of Greg Laurie's life here on Our American Stories. This is Lee Habib, host of Our American Stories, the show where America is the star in the American people.

And we do it all from the heart of the South, Oxford, Mississippi. But we truly can't do this show without you. Our shows will always be free to listen to, but they're not free to make. If you love what you hear, consider making a tax deductible donation to Our American Stories. Go to OurAmericanStories.com.

Give a little, give a lot. That's OurAmericanStories.com. From football playoffs to basketball madness, TCL Roku TVs are the best way to stream your favorite live sports. With all the biggest sports channels, a sports zone with all available games in one place, and apps like iHeartRadio, with sports podcasts such as The Herd with Colin Cowherd. Cheering on your favorite team has never been easier. A big screen TCL Roku TV offers premium picture and sound quality, so you'll feel like you're right in the action.

Find the perfect TCL Roku TV for you today at go.tcl.com slash TCL Roku TV. Are you ready to share some joy and celebrate International Women's Day? M&M's has partnered with iHeart for Women Take the Mic, treating you to the most uplifting and empowering stories of women supporting and celebrating each other. And of course, there is a smooth and creamy companion for your listening pleasure, peanut butter M&M's, because they're just another way to help treat yourself in situations where you deserve a little added delight, like listening to your favorite podcast. So grab a handful of that creamy deliciousness, kick back and spread some positivity into the world. From smashing glass ceilings to breaking records in sports, on stages and at the box office, women are crushing it in every way imaginable.

And with peanut butter M&M's by your side, relax and keep listening to Women Take the Mic podcasts, as you dance your way through inspiring stories, share laughs and savor the deliciousness of peanut butter M&M's and the unstoppable force of women. Happy International Women's Day. Upgrade your home now at Blinds.com's anniversary sale. And celebrate savings up to 50% off premium window treatments for years to come. Shop for your house from the comfort of home. For modern Roman and woven wood shades, shutters, motorized options and more, 100% online. Blinds.com invented the better way to shop.

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Let's pick up where we last left off. This man, Eddie, was very violent. He and my mother would drink every night and they would start hitting each other. And one night I was in bed and I heard a loud crash and a thud and I came out and my mother was lying on the floor in a pool of blood. Eddie was standing over her holding onto, I remember it distinctly, a Don Quixote wooden statue, which were very popular back in those days.

I have no idea why. And there was blood on it and he said, go back to bed, it's just ketchup. But even as a little kid, I knew this was real and I knew he had hit my mother.

I thought she was dead. I climbed out of the window of my bedroom, ran to a neighbor and the ambulance came and we left Hawaii and moved to California. Well, now I'm in high school. I'm at Corona Del Mar High School.

I know everybody on campus. I'm the cartoonist for the school paper. I started to correspond with Charles M. Schulz, creator of Peanuts. And I would send him my cartoons and ask him to critique them, which he very graciously did. I have no idea why he took the time to write letters to me. But I can tell you, when I got a letter from Charles M. Schulz, it was like getting a letter from heaven. Because I would open it and it had a little Snoopy and Charlie Brown drawing on the envelope. I still have one, I actually framed it. And he would talk about my artwork.

This is looking good, Greg. And one time I asked him, can I have a piece of original art? Who asked for that? I did. And he sent it to me, one of his comic strips, which are actually quite large.

Those panels he would draw that would be in the newspapers. So the whole drug culture is coming on strong. And I was a big fan of the Beatles. And the Beatles now are in their drug phase singing things like, I'd love to turn you on.

And we're hearing about LSD. And I decided that I wanted to change my life. I decided I didn't want to be the person I was. I was kind of this surfer, preppy-ish kid in this very affluent high school.

I wasn't affluent. And I thought, I want to become a hippie. Because I thought, hey, if I start doing drugs, maybe I'll find what I'm looking for in life. So I literally transferred to this other campus called Harbor High School, also in Newport Beach.

No one knew me there. And my objective and goal was to become a different person. So I started using drugs quite heavily. I was smoking marijuana every day, taking LSD on most weekends, and living my altered state of existence. I noticed that my artistic skills were going down the tubes. I noticed my creativity was being sapped.

I realized I was not the person I used to be, and I didn't like the person I was becoming. So one day on my high school campus at Harbor High, I see this cute girl. Her name is Chrissy. So I noticed she had a textbook for class and a notebook. And then I noticed she had one of those Bibles. And I thought, oh no, she's a Jesus freak.

What a waste of a perfectly cute girl. And when I transferred to this campus, all my loady, doper friends said, careful Greg, there's a lot of Jesus freaks on this campus. I said, the last thing you'll ever see is Greg Laurie becoming a Jesus freak.

Famous last words. So one day, I'm walking along, and there are a group of Jesus freaks sitting on the front lawn of Harbor High. And they're singing songs about God.

And Chrissy is sitting among them. And I was looking around at them, and I was thinking, these people are delusional. They're crazy.

They're weird. But there was one problem, because one of the people there, his name was Bill. I went to elementary school with him.

I knew Bill was a normal person. And he used to be a good friend of mine. And he had become a Jesus freak.

So I couldn't completely dismiss it. And then this guy stands up, who had joined them. He was from off campus. He had long hair, parted down the middle, and a full beard, and this kind of flowing, hippie shirt that almost looked like a robe. Frankly, he looked a lot like Jesus. He got my attention.

And I thought, whoa, what's going on here? But he made one statement. He said, Jesus said, you're either for me or against me. And I looked around at the Christians, and I thought, well, they're for him.

And I'm not one of them. Does that mean I'm against Jesus? Well, I don't want to be against Jesus. I always admire Jesus.

So one, he says, you're either for me or against me. And if you would like to accept Jesus Christ, get up and walk forward right now. Next thing I knew, I was up there praying with a group of people. And then the school bell rang, and we all had to go back to class. So one day, some guy sees me walking across the campus, and he yells out, brother Greg! He yells out really loudly, bro!

I'm like, uh, yeah, what? And he goes, I saw that you prayed and accepted Jesus the other day. And I'm kind of resentful and sort of, yeah, so, hey, bro, I got you a Bible. And he gives me this Bible that is the most obnoxious-looking Bible I think I've ever seen. It had two popsicle sticks glued together in the shape of a cross.

Bro, it's the Bible here! And I took it from him. I just wanted him to go away. I shoved it in the pocket of my coat I was wearing. And I hadn't been over to see my old friends.

And we would always go over to this guy's house at lunchtime and literally get high and go back to class high. And so I walked in the door, and as I was walking in, I thought, I can't walk in with a Bible. So I pulled this Bible out, and he had a little hedge in front of his house, a little planter with a hedge.

So I hid my Bible in the hedge. And I walked in, and my friend said, Greg, Lori. They called me Lori, actually. Lori, where you been? I said, I'm nowhere. What have you been doing?

We haven't seen you for a while. I said, nothing. And they said, hey, you want to get stoned? I said, no. You don't want to get stoned? No, I don't want to. Why?

I just don't want to. And they're seeing something's happened to me, and I felt very uncomfortable there, where I used to feel very comfortable. All of a sudden, the front door bursts open, and they're standing in the doorway as the mother of one of the guys that lived in the house. And she's holding my Bible up, and in a very accusatory way, says, who does this Bible belong to? And I look up at it, and everyone in the room looks at the Bible, and they look at me. It's like, I'm thinking, what's going on with this woman?

Is there something wrong with having a Bible? It's like kids are doing drugs in her house, and she's alarmed that there's a Bible in her bushes. Who does this belong to? Everyone figured out really quickly I was connected to it. I said, it's me. And someone said, what is that, Greg? I said, it's a Bible. No, Greg, what is that?

A what? A Bible. A Bible. And one of my friends said, oh, praise the Lord, brother Greg. Are we going to start reading the Bible now? And I said, no, I'm going to hit you is what I'm going to do. I hadn't read the Bible yet. I didn't know I'm supposed to love people yet. And I left there realizing something very significant had happened. First of all, I didn't want to live this old life anymore, but what now? So I was in sort of this no man's land, where I wasn't comfortable with my old friends, and I didn't quite feel comfortable with the Christians.

They seemed a little intense for me. And the Lord brought just the right guy into my life. His name was Mark.

I didn't know him from Adam's house cat. Just walks up to me. Hi, my name is Mark. Oh, hi, Mark. Yeah, I saw that you became a Christian.

Yeah, I did. Well, I'd like to take you to church. And I said, no, that's OK. And he goes, no, I want to take you to church with me.

I said, no, I don't really want to go. And he said, where do you live? I'll come pick you up.

No, no, I don't want you to pick me up. Next thing I know, I gave him my address. He's at my house.

And I'm on my way to church. And then someone comes out to speak. And it wasn't Lonnie Frisbee, the cool hippie preacher. It was an older gentleman named Chuck Smith.

Turns out he was the senior pastor of the church. And I thought, oh, no, an adult. I just had this problem with adults.

When I was in high school, I was always mouthing off to teachers, always getting sent to the vice principal's office for disciplinary measures. And I just had a whole problem with authority figures in the adult world. This adult comes out, opens up his Bible. I immediately begin to close off. But then I found that he was really understandable. And I really enjoyed listening to him. And all of a sudden, I began to change.

And I thought, I actually really like this. And we've been listening to Pastor Greg Laurie. And what a story he's telling us.

Boy, the many marriages of his mom. He comes to Los Angeles and he wants to reinvent himself. And he's entranced by the music of the Beatles, particularly their psychedelic music.

And there's Jefferson Airplane and Jimi Hendrix. And, well, psychedelic drugs and the like are everywhere in Southern California. And so he chooses to reinvent himself through drugs.

Only he knows that's not working. And there are those Jesus freaks. As he starts to gravitate towards the beginning of his Christian life, he finds himself caught between two worlds. Not comfortable with his old friends and not quite comfortable with his new ones.

When we return, more of Greg Laurie's story, here on Our American Stories. With so many streaming devices out there today, what sets Roku apart? Roku players are made for one thing. To get you the entertainment you want quick and easy.

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Find the perfect Roku player for you today at Roku.com. Happy streaming! Are you ready to share some joy and celebrate International Women's Day? M&M's has partnered with iHeart for Women Take the Mic. Treating you to the most uplifting and empowering stories of women supporting and celebrating each other. And of course, there is a smooth and creamy companion for your listening pleasure. Peanut butter M&M's.

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From smashing glass ceilings to breaking records in sports, on stages, and at the box office. Women are crushing it in every way imaginable. Plan with peanut butter M&M's by your side. Relax and keep listening to Women Take the Mic podcasts as you dance your way through inspiring stories. Share laughs and savor the deliciousness of peanut butter M&M's and the unstoppable force of women.

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Head to Walmart.com today and score the 4K TV you've been waiting for. And we continue with our American stories and Pastor Greg Laurie's story. Let's pick up where we last left off. And so my life started changing rapidly and I began to read the Bible. And what surprised me so much about the Bible, I had a modern translation that I was reading called Good News for Modern Man, is that this book related to me. I understood it.

And so I'd never had anything like that to guide my life by, to have principles to live by. So my life began to change and I began to attend Calvary Chapel pretty much every night of the week. They had all kinds of services going there. And it wasn't long after that that I thought I would use my cartooning ability for my faith. And I found out where Chuck Smith lived. So I went to his house. He had never met me before. I said, hi, Pastor Chuck.

I attend Calvary Chapel and I heard you give a message on the woman at the wall. And I drew this little cartoon booklet. He's looking at it and he starts smiling.

He goes, I love this. Hey, can you redraw it in this other format? Why don't we publish it?

Ultimately, I think well over a million of those were printed. And that was my entree, if you will, into what we'll call ministry. And I remember one day I was walking along down to Newport Beach and there was this woman about the age of my mom sitting on the beach. And I had heard that we needed to talk to people about our faith. So I walked up and engaged her in a conversation. And much to my surprise, after I was done talking to her, this woman said she wanted to accept Christ. So I prayed with her. And she put her faith in Jesus. And I realized that God was putting a call on my life to reach people a lot like I was.

Cynical, who had had rough lives, who weren't raised in the church. And so that became the start of what was ministry for me. So I'm still living with my mother. I go home and I decide I want to tell her what has happened to me. She didn't look very excited about it. I think she went out of her way to keep me from ever hearing anything about Jesus. I remember when I was a younger boy, I once asked her, what is Easter about?

She said, I don't know. She knew. My mother was raised in the church. She went to church with her siblings and mom and dad Sunday morning, Sunday night, and even to a midweek study.

My mother knew all about it. And she was rebelling against it, and she didn't want her son to know anything about it. But my first attempt to reach my mother was not successful, nor was it good. I think I was way too blunt, way too harsh. I think I said something along the lines of, you're going to go to hell.

So repent. And I realized I needed to move out of this house because it was this drinking world of hers still and getting in fights with her husband every night and passing out from a night of drinking. And I just was really sick of it, you know, because I had to be the parent through most of this relationship when I was a little boy. Well, now I'm like 17 years old.

I'm about to turn 18. I don't want to do this anymore. I don't want to live my mother's life anymore. So I went home and I told my mother I'm going to move out. I was really surprised to see her be very sad.

She teared up, but I had to leave for my own survival. Well, coming back to Lonnie Frisbee, the guy who was preaching, he befriended me. I was hanging around him, and he took me once up to a city called Riverside, which is about 45 minutes away from where I was living in Orange County.

There was an Episcopalian church that wanted their own version of the Jesus movement. So they came to Chuck Smith and said, could we have Lonnie come up to our church? And he agreed, and Lonnie was up there preaching. And I went up there a few times with Lonnie, and it grew to around 300 people. And then Lonnie moves off to Florida with his wife to work in his marriage.

And this little Bible study started being handed around to various pastors at work at Calvary Chapel who were all around 10 years older than I was. And I would just hang around. I would do whatever needed to be done. I'd do janitorial work. I'd run an errand.

And I had my drawing board set up, and I was doing my artwork. I wanted to be used by God. So they would give me the things that no one else wanted to do, like, hey, somebody wants someone to speak in a home Bible study two hours away.

Greg, why don't you do it? And so I literally went and did all these things no one else wanted. But it was great experience because I was being exposed to every kind of person in every kind of setting imaginable. And so one day they're talking to pastors, and one of them said, who's going to go to the church this Sunday? The church is called All Saints Episcopal Church. Who's going to go this Sunday? Well, I'm going next Sunday.

What about you? Well, I went last Sunday. Oh, well, I don't want to go. And then they turned to me and said, well, Greg, you want to go? And I said, I'll go. And so I went up that Sunday and sort of the head deacon didn't know I was coming.

No one took the time to tell him. So I said, hi, I'm here to preach tonight. Understand, I'm an 18 year old kid.

I have hair down past my shoulders, full length beard. I'm here to preach tonight. He said, well, I don't know you. I don't know if you've come from Calvary Chapel.

We'll just wait until the right guy shows up. I said, I am the right guy. Well, no one else showed up because I was a speaker.

He said, OK, you can go ahead and speak, which I did. And then I went back the next Sunday and the next Sunday. And before I knew it, people started calling me Pastor Greg. The last thing I felt qualified to be was a pastor. But I saw this little church was growing and it was becoming a congregation.

And I tried to find someone to take it over, but no one wanted to take it over. So then I started a midweek study and we started teaching through books of the Bible. Greg, I was literally reading things for the first time in that morning and teaching them that night.

It was like on the job training. And so that became the beginning of our church that now just celebrated its 50th anniversary. Now, if you've seen the Jesus Revolution film, which is on Netflix right now and on the Apple streaming platform, Amazon, you know, the story is a little different in the film.

But the arc of the story is the same. OK, so fast forward many years. Now we're in the 90s and I have started evangelistic crusades again because of Chuck Smith. And one day Chuck comes to me and says, Greg, I think we ought to take this to a larger venue.

And I think we ought to do a Billy Graham style crusade and have you preach out it. And so we rented a venue called the Pacific Amphitheater, which seated around 17000 people. That's a big place. We were in a church that seated around 2500.

So that's a big jump. But we booked the Pacific Amphitheater for maybe five nights and we had our first crusade. We broke attendance records.

And then the next year we went to Angel Stadium. So my crusade ministry is now launched and I'm speaking around the United States. And I come on the radar of Billy Graham. And I became friends with his son, Franklin, and Billy was doing a crusade at Angel Stadium in 1985. And I was asked to get up on the stage and pray, which I did. And then Billy and I became friends and he was kind of coming toward the end of his evangelistic ministry as I was starting mine. And he said that he wanted help with his sermon illustrations to reach younger people.

I'm in my 30s at this point. And so I said I'd be thrilled. I'd be honored to help you in any way I could. So I found myself traveling with Billy. And you've been listening to Pastor Greg Lurie tell his story. And he discovers the Bible and for the first time reads a book that, as he put it, related to me. And then he started to attend church regularly.

Chuck Smith's Cavalry Chapel. And he used his prolific artistic skills, his cartooning talents, to help the church spread the gospel. God was putting a call on my life, Greg said. And then he had to deal with his mom. He just couldn't live that life anymore.

And he just had to move out. And I love that part about him talking about reading the Bible verse in the morning and preaching on it in the afternoon. What courage that took, what faith that took, and how else to learn but to teach. And he just had the faith to step out and do that. And then began his crusade life. And my goodness, being able to have the helping hand of Billy Graham as Graham is ending his evangelistic life. Greg Lurie is beginning his.

When we come back, more of this remarkable journey, this story of one man's faith journey here on Our American Stories. Whether you're hosting a party or just cleaning the house, turn it up and rock out with iHeartRadio in room-filling sound. Learn more about Roku Stream Bar today at roku.com.

Happy streaming. Are you ready to share some joy and celebrate International Women's Day? M&M's has partnered with iHeart for Women Take the Mic, treating you to the most uplifting and empowering stories of women supporting and celebrating each other. And of course, there is a smooth and creamy companion for your listening pleasure, peanut butter M&M's.

Because they're just another way to help treat yourself in situations where you deserve a little added delight. Like listening to your favorite podcast. So grab a handful of that creamy deliciousness. Kick back and spread some positivity into the world. From smashing glass ceilings to breaking records in sports, on stages, and at the box office, women are crushing it in every way imaginable. And with peanut butter M&M's by your side. Relax and keep listening to Women Take the Mic podcasts as you dance your way through inspiring stories. Share laughs and savor the deliciousness of peanut butter M&M's and the unstoppable force of women.

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Head to Walmart.com today and score the 4K TV you've been waiting for. I found out later she was very proud of me because my aunt said she kept like a little scrapbook. And every time an article was written about me or I appeared somewhere and it was interviewed, she would keep a record of it. But she never said it to me.

She never said to me once, I love you or I'm proud of you or anything. And so I thought she wasn't even paying attention. But I was seeing kind of that hard shell of my mother start to crack a little bit. Because her lifestyle had taken its toll. She was no longer a Marilyn Monroe look-alike. She was now a woman who had been ravaged by bad choices of drinking to excess and smoking. And when she was 70, she looked like she was in her late 90s. She was getting dialysis treatment.

Her kidneys were failing. So one day I'm driving to church and God just spoke to my heart as clear as day and said, go talk to your mother. So I called my wife Kathy and I said, I'm going to go talk to my mom today about her relationship with God or lack thereof.

Pray for me. So I went over to my mom's house and I walked in and she goes, what are you doing here? I said, I'm here to talk to you today about your soul. She said, I don't want to talk about it. And this was her response. Every time I brought spiritual issues up, she would say, I don't want to talk about it.

I said, today we're going to talk about it. And I pressed her. And that conversation thankfully resulted in my mother making a recommitment to the Lord. And little, how was I to know that? One month later, she would die. But I had a full time ministry sharing the gospel with my mother's former husbands.

Oscar Laurie was the first. So I mentioned earlier that we loaded up the car and drove to the airport. And I didn't see him for my childhood.

But now I'm a young adult. Our church is just starting and I decide I need to talk with him somehow. So I found him. I located him.

This is pre-Google and I found him practicing law still in New Jersey. So I called him on the phone. It's kind of funny because I called his law office and I said, yes, is Oscar Laurie there? And the secretary said, well, Mr. Laurie's out to lunch right now. Can I say who called?

I said, yes. Tell him Greg Laurie called. She said, how do you spell your last name? I said, L-A-U-R-I-E, the same way he spells his.

This is his son. Well, I got a call not long after that. And he said, oh, Greg, so good to hear your voice. And I said, well, you know, I'm going to be in New York. I'm going to be speaking. I'm a minister now.

I don't know what he thought of that. And I said, I'd love to maybe have lunch with you. He says, oh, come and stay at our house. I'm remarried to a woman named Barbara and we would love to have you come. And I said, well, I'm married. I have a wife and a son, Christopher.

Oh, come on, join us. And so I spoke at Central Park at this event. Then we got on the train and we made our way out to New Jersey, where he lived, Red Bank, New Jersey. As I got off the train, I saw him and boy, it was just like I went back in time. I still recognized him, though it had been many years. And so that night we caught up on all that had happened since we last saw each other. And before I knew it, I was calling him dad. And so it was a great reunion. And he actually told me he had tried to get custody of me when he heard about the crazy decisions my mother was making and the life she was living. But she fought him tooth and nail, which I found ironic because she never seemed to want to have me around.

She was gone so much. I live with my grandparents. I even did a stint in military school twice. But I look back and I realize God was in control because if I had lived with him, my life would have probably followed a different course. So the next night, his wife Barbara made us a great Italian meal and she said, Greg, tell me how you became a Christian and a minister. So I shared my entire life story and my dad is sitting on the opposite end of the table. Now, remember, he's a lawyer.

He spends a lot of time in courtrooms and he was going to eventually become a judge. The whole night he just sat there with his hands up to his face, kind of folded, analyzing what I was saying. So as I'm talking about what Christ has done for me, I'm thinking this is not going over well.

He's not liking this at all. Barbara was very responsible. That's wonderful.

That's fantastic. He just stared and listened. And at the end of the night, he said, Greg, will you walk with me tomorrow morning? Because he had to walk every morning. And one part I left out is he had had a heart attack.

He was in his later 60s at this point and blacked out behind the steering wheel of his car and had driven into a telephone pole. So now he's on medication. He has to walk every day.

He has a very strict diet. Will you walk with me in the morning? He asked. I said, sure, dad. So the next morning, he knocks at the door of my bedroom. It's six o'clock in the morning, New Jersey time, three o'clock California time. I roll out of bed, wiping the sleep out of my eyes. And we're walking now.

The brisk New Jersey air is in our face. And he says, Greg, I listened very carefully to what you said last night. I said, yeah. And he said, and I want to become a Christian. And I couldn't believe what I was hearing. I said, well, dad, let me go over it one more time so you understand what it means.

I went over it again. He goes, yes, I understand that. What do I need to do? We're still walking at this point. We're in a park. I said, well, you need to pray. And he drops to his knees in this park, on his knees. So I, too, dropped to my knees.

What do I do? He said, well, we pray. And I led him in this prayer to accept Christ. And after we're done praying, he says, Greg, pray that Jesus heals my heart. So I prayed for his heart. And after we're done praying, he says, Greg, my doctor's office is right over here. Why don't we go over there? I want to tell him I've just become a Christian and that God's healed my heart.

And I said, well, wait, dad, we don't know that God's healed your heart. He goes, well, let's go over there. And so I walk over with him to his doctor's office.

He walks in. Hey, doc, this is my son, Greg. He's from California. He's a preacher. And I'm thinking, what is this doctor thinking, you know? And he says to the doctor, I've just become a Christian and I believe God has healed my heart.

The doctor says, now, Oscar, we we have to run some tests. We don't know that your heart is healed. And they ran tests on him. And sure enough, his heart was healed. And he lived 15 more years and got very involved in this church. And I have never seen such a radical transformation of a person's life.

I was living in California still, so I had to go home. I did find him a church to go to. And when I returned maybe a month and a half later, I was talking to him and sharing scriptures. He had pretty much read the whole Bible already because my dad would read these really thick books on history that lined his bookshelf. So this was a deep thinker, an intellect, and he was processing it all so quickly.

So that was wonderful. So coming back to my mother, she married a man named Eddie that I referred to. Someone told me that Eddie was really sick and wasn't going to live long. And he lived in Hawaii while I was over there preaching. So I had not really seen him since he had knocked my mother unconscious and almost killed her. I had a deep resentment towards him and I didn't really even want to talk to him about God. I didn't care about him, but I felt bad about that and I knew I should talk to him. So someone said, you need to go see him.

He's not going to live much longer. So I went over to his little apartment, which is right across the street from the Waikiki show where I was going to be preaching that night. And I told him my whole story of how I came to faith and he just listened. And I said, would you like to accept Jesus Christ? He said, no. Well, do you want to get closer to God? No, no.

He's just totally closed off to it all. I said, well, I'm going to be speaking across the street over here. Would you like to come over and listen to me? No, I don't want to. So it wasn't always successful. And there were others that my mom was involved with that I shared the gospel with, with varying degrees of success. But the point of it all is, you know, you look back in your life and you can't control what hand you're dealt in life. All you can control is how you react to it.

You know, you can become better or you can become better. And I decided to go back to these rough times of my childhood and try to do the best I could to reach people with this gospel that had changed my life. And a terrific job on the production, editing and storytelling by our own Greg Hengler. And a special thanks to Pastor Greg Laurie, who's the founder and senior pastor of Harvest Christian Fellowship. And it's one of the largest and most influential churches in the country with campuses in California and Hawaii.

Greg is also the author of 70 books, including Jesus Revolution. By the way, it streams everywhere. Watch it with the kids.

I think over 14 or 15, actually, not too young. But it's beautiful, beautiful movie about his life and about a moment in time in America. And that's, of course, the early 1970s where America is in turmoil.

The kids are up for grabs. It's drugs. It's anti-authoritarianism. It's America at one of its darkest times. And up arises this youth movement towards Christ and towards God. And my goodness, he's preaching around the world, we learn. But still his mom, his mom is not a believer. And this is just aching his heart. His mom, he learns, kept a secret scrapbook.

And yet she had never, ever once told him she loved him. And, of course, his mission, which he said so beautifully, God was putting a call on my life to reach people like me, people who led rough lives, people who were cynical like me. The story of Pastor Greg Laurie here on Now American Stories. Ready to celebrate International Women's Day? M&M's and IHART present Women Take the Mic, sharing empowering stories of women supporting and celebrating each other. And, of course, there is a smooth and creamy companion for your listening pleasure, peanut butter M&M's, because they're just another way to help treat yourself in situations where you deserve a little added delight, like listening to your favorite podcast. So savor the deliciousness of peanut butter M&M's and spread some positivity.

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