Standing Strong at the Intersection of Faith and Culture: Larry Ross

00:00 - Speaker 1
I think we're at a watershed point in history. We hear a lot of talk about how we're in a post-Christian world. We are actually in a pre-Christian culture. We have the opportunity to act like the first century church, so that gives us opportunity to run towards people rather than away from them, to stop criticizing and start creating, and to partner with a generation that wants to restore things that are broken.

00:35 - Speaker 2
Hi, this is Paul Louis Cole. You're listening to the Brave Men Podcast. Larry Ross is one of the most fascinating men I've ever met. I have so enjoyed my time with him. We've been friends maybe we were thinking about it maybe three decades, but he has worked with some of the leading Christian statesmen in the world over the years and political figures worked in major situations. He's the CEO of Larry Ross Communications. You know, I'll tell you what he is. He is a passionate follower of Jesus Christ and God has put him in the middle of putting together events, of being able to be a communicator for others in such a remarkable way, and we'll hear some of that today. He worked with Evangelist Billy Graham for 33 years as his media spokesperson, Rick Warren, bishop, TD Jakes, and many others, but he's got some amazing ideas on how we should be conducting our lives. He's got some things that Rick Warren shared with him privately that he unfolds today on brave men. So having Larry Ross on is something I've wanted for a long time and it worked out schedule wise. He is in and out, always in the middle of something spearheading media relations for major projects and major situations, and so it's going to be awesome. Thanks for being with us.

02:07
Hey, I'm holding in my hand the Majoring in Men brochure, which talks about what we do at Christian Men's Network in terms of launching strong, sustainable ministry to men in a local church and majoringinmencom. Majoringinmencom is a place to go to. It's a 12-part series, 20 minutes each, that will help walk you into what does it look like to build a powerful ministry of men in a local church. I'm looking on the back. Oh, it says this is a great quote. You can have great crowds with great sermons, but you will never change a nation until you disciple a man. Great quote, because I wrote that, so anyway it's. And then a number of people who stand behind it. I see you know we've got Chuck Norris on here and Robert Morris, joe Champion, pastor Tommy Barnett, many other friends who have endorsed what we do with Christian Men's Network and the website cmnmen. Cmnmen, hey, be praying for us when you're listening to this.

03:15
There is something going on every single day around the world. Make sure you sign up to the Brave Men email, which is a motivational email. It comes out three times a week and you do that at cmnmen and just sign up somewhere on there I'm not sure it's on the website somewhere, cmnmen, and you'll see the Brave Men email. It comes out three times a week and I'm headed actually just right after taping this with Larry, I'm headed into Indonesia for the Lions Roar Asia Conference. Men from 26 nations fired up about that. That's followed up by our major event in Cairo More about that in another session podcast with Steve Trevino and then there's just something going on all the time and the whole purpose of that is to disciple men, if you will, to rescue families and build the local church.

04:12
If we do that, we change the future. That's it. So it's not kumbaya stuff. People say, oh, you're doing these men's groups, that's nice. No, no, no. It's what rescues a nation. It's what changes the future If we solve John Eldredge said this recently he said if we solve the fatherless issue.

04:33
He said it changes everything, and I'm in with him on that and appreciate John. We need to have him on again on Brave Men. He's been becoming more and more of a good friend as we spend time together. It's great. I love what he does and what everybody's doing, whether it's Brett Clemmer or Rod Jones, you know, paul Andrew, everybody working on raising up strong men and keeping men in the game includes pastors, leaders, whoever it may be. Hey, thanks for being with us today on Brave Men, this conversation with Larry Ross. I believe, as you sit down and listen to this, as you're working out, driving in your car, wherever you may be right now, as you listen to this, I believe the Lord's going to unpack something into your spirit that Larry speaks, that will help you make better decisions, be more successful as a man. Here's my friend, larry Ross. So, larry, you've been in communications since communications began, is that right? Well, I mean when did you get into communications and media and all these things?

05:47 - Speaker 1
Well, Paul, first of all, thank you for having me. We've known each other for over 40 years and been in a couple of foxholes together. And it's just fun, to just sit down and chat. I guess you could say I'm the poster child for a liberal arts education. I went to school at Wheaton College and I was a biology and economics major and I've been a PR guy for 47 years, Go figure.

06:14 - Speaker 2
Yeah, so in other words, you had to get a real job.

06:16 - Speaker 1
That's right, and I kind of fell into it. I started out with a nonprofit in the mid-'70s and went to work for the General Motors Corporation. Did you really, on their corporate PR staff, traveled nationally representing them.

06:29 - Speaker 2
I don't know if I knew this, because I think when we first met you were with Walter Bennett, agency Communications, working with Dr Graham.

06:36 - Speaker 1
Well prior to that in the late 70s I'd worked for GM and it was the longest-running stage show in America. It was the longest-running stage show in America. We traveled, spoke at high schools, encouraged them to consider careers in engineering. Really we had like a magic show, all these science projects that their engineers had developed and it was true PR, because the idea was to get GM in the community in a non-commercial way so when it came time for mom and dad to buy a car over dinner, the kids would say, hey, we have this cool GM guy.

07:07
Why don't you go look at a GM car? The magic, yeah. And we were judged by how much radio and television time we got interviews. We'd book our own shows.

07:15 - Speaker 2
So, in other words, if you got free interviews, it was worth something? Oh well, we would, because you guys were out there doing all this.

07:22 - Speaker 1
I cracked the code so.

07:24
I had a talking computer, All the technology that's in our cars today, which was gee whiz back then. And I had to type things into the computer phonetically. And back then Johnny Carson the late show would do these Carnac routines. Yeah, of course. So I just took some of his and I would type the answer into this computer and I'd go on rock and roll radio stations for two, three hours at a time, morning drive with the DJ and we would do cornek routines in between songs and I was getting you know 900 minutes one month, I remember of radio time.

07:58
Nobody else came nowhere near that, but it just became a game for me.

08:03
But I learned how the PR, how media liaison, works and then was hired by at the time the eighth largest PR firm in the country in New York City and among other things I handled PR or the media positioning for Joe DiMaggio the Hall of Famer and he was the spokesperson for the Bowery savings bank and I would bring him into new york a couple times a month and I would book him on talk shows, take him around town and, yeah, one of the greatest baseball players ever and married to marilyn monroe.

08:36 - Speaker 2
That's right.

08:36 - Speaker 1
In fact, he probably his record of uh 56 game hitting streak will probably never be broken. But I'll tell you, paul, he he was. It was sad because he was. I was the son he never had.

08:49
I was I wasn't his best friend. I had a job to do, so I did my job and I got out and and and we had this really interesting working relationship. But over two years and. But the sad thing was he had not done anything except playing celebrity golf tournament since he stopped playing baseball. And yet he couldn't walk down the street without being mobbed by people who weren't even alive when he played, but they were.

09:15
The accolades are for who he was, not for who he is, and that weighed on him. But, um, we had some deep talks and um, uh, that was just a great experience. And then in 81, I went from—.

09:26 - Speaker 2
That was an amazing experience. I remember seeing him in a restaurant in San Francisco. It was on Fisherman's Wharf, Aliotto's.

09:33 - Speaker 1
He lived there, right by Fisherman's Wharf.

09:36 - Speaker 2
Exactly, and he was in a restaurant with Mayor Aliotto he owned that restaurant. He and his brother Dom.

09:41 - Speaker 1
Yeah, both baseball players. Yeah, he and his brother Dom.

09:43 - Speaker 2
Yeah, both baseball players, yeah, dom DiMaggio, who played a lot of the Pacific Coast League, yeah. And so I remember my dad pointing him out, going, that's Joe DiMaggio. And as a kid I went oh my, yeah, he was famous way before I was alive.

09:57 - Speaker 1
Well, I'll tell you a quick, a funny story. This is a lesson you only learn once. So we had a reception at the bowery bank in brooklyn. 5 000 people came to hear mr demaggio speak. Wow and um. So it was a. All these people were there and he was. They used the bank vault as a green room. He and the bank president were there and I had to go get him and bring him out to speak. Well, they had this huge name uh table, all these tables with your name tags. And I saw his name tag. I thought, well, I'll name tags. And I saw his name tag. I thought, well, I'll help him out, I'll take his name tag. And so I'm feeling like I'm really being helpful here and I walk in and I say, mr DiMaggio, I've got your name tag. And he looked at me, he looked down at the name tag, he looked back at me and he said I don't do name tags, name tag.

10:47 - Speaker 2
I thought, oh my goodness, one of the most recognizable people on the planet.

10:50 - Speaker 1
What am I doing? I don't do name tags.

10:51 - Speaker 2
It'd be like Muhammad Ali here, sir, that's right.

10:52 - Speaker 1
So I went from a sports icon to a faith icon in 81, where I had the opportunity to serve as a personal media spokesperson for Dr Billy Graham, and I was able to do that for nearly 35 years. And he didn't need a name tag. Well, here's the thing One of the first committee receptions at a crusade over in Sheffield, england.

11:13
they had a reception for all of the Billy Graham team and there were all these name tags laid out and somebody made a name tag for Billy Graham. I just pick up the name tag and put it in my pocket, put it in your pocket. Because I thought, you know, I think the same thing applies to Mr Graham.

11:26 - Speaker 2
So that is a great story, man. I love that Talking with Larry Ross, my friend, who has a Larry Ross agency in communications in Dallas, texas. But really you've been a global person basically your whole career.

11:42 - Speaker 1
Well, we are in the world, helping people amplify the message of Jesus Christ the way I describe it, paul, is we operate at the intersection of faith and culture, providing crossover communications out of the church and into the mainstream, or vice versa, such as when we helped Mel Gibson with the Passion of the Christ.

12:00
Right, I remember that he wanted to get to the faith community, but we lift up the arms of the men and women of God. If you remember the story of Moses, as long as he held his arms up, the children of Israel were winning, and when he dropped them they would lose. And so Aaron and Hur held up his arms. And that's what we do. We're not the story, but we're able to help them, increase their influence and then the impact of the organizations they lead to and through the media. You know, I was never called to preach, but yet I feel what we do in helping these Christian leaders and organizations have a greater impact through the media is every bit as much ministry, I'll tell you.

12:43 - Speaker 2
Yeah, there's no question, and I think this goes back to who was it St Ignatius or who was it that said and you would know this, you're a communications specialist but who said you know, preach at all times and, if need be, use words. And I think about what you do and in reality, quite often what you've done is actually speak louder through the events. You've put together the things you've done, the people you've put in the right place at the right time, and you've also done some damage control. You've helped people navigate what it is when a firestorm happens.

13:21 - Speaker 1
That's right, and I, you know, I did a seminar at a faith convention years ago. It was get me in the news, get me out of the news. So some ministries want us to get coverage and some help keep us out. But you know my motto, my mantra through the years has always been suit up and show up and let God do the rest. But, paul, in recent years I've added a third, and that's Lift Up the Name of Jesus. Wow, because my testimony and this may sound counterintuitive to some of the men listening here is at the time, for 27 years I traveled in global evangelism with Billy Graham, writing news releases read by tens of millions of people around the world. Right Then I met Jesus. What does that mean Now? I thought I knew Jesus. I asked him into my heart as a young boy, age five, five years old.

14:16 - Speaker 2
So your parents were followers of Christ.

14:17 - Speaker 1
They were. My dad was actually a New Testament scholar. He would bring a Greek New Testament to church. He wouldn't take an English Bible because he went to the original manuscripts and he taught at the seminary level at Wheaton College and at Moody Bible Institute, a faith seminary, but God has no grandchildren, so you have to come to faith on your own.

14:38 - Speaker 2
You've got to have your own faith.

14:40 - Speaker 1
I recommitted my life at a Youth for Christ rally at Winona Lake in high school but, you know, got busy career and here I was working helping ministries communicate. But I was. Jesus was a commodity to be marketed.

14:59 - Speaker 2
Yeah, it was part of what you did, rather than who you were Right, I was raised.

15:05 - Speaker 1
My faith, my religion can beat up your religion. So we'll talk a while.

15:09 - Speaker 3
I'll bring you over to my side.

15:10 - Speaker 1
That's right. So imagine Paul.

15:12 - Speaker 2
There's been a lot of that.

15:14 - Speaker 1
Whatever the topic was, you said to your wife honey, we're going to talk about this, but before we do, I just want to tell you everything you think about. It is wrong, ok, before we do.

15:24 - Speaker 2
I just want to tell you everything you think about it is wrong.

15:25 - Speaker 1
Okay, I'm going to show you so you know You'd be sleeping on the couch, dude.

15:29 - Speaker 2
So that was the way I approached it. Well, the couch would be a nice place to sleep at that point.

15:31 - Speaker 1
yeah, but I wasn't—a friend of mine who became another mentor who runs the prayer breakfast the National Prayer Breakfast helped me to understand. He asked me what's the gospel and I gave him the party line. You know what Jesus did on the cross for our sins, what we all know and understand from our church experience. But he helped me understand that the gospel is a person. He said that's what. Jesus did.

15:59
Jesus is the gospel and I'd never heard that. I'd heard hundreds of Billy Graham sermons, but I'd never heard that. It rocked my world, and so I realized that I didn't know Jesus. I was doing Jesus and ever since Jesus has been doing me, and so we try, wherever we go now, to lift up the name of Jesus, and even especially I can't tell you how many Muslim cab drivers I've air quotes now witnessed to on the way to the airport.

16:33 - Speaker 3
Now.

16:33 - Speaker 1
I just say well, you're a Muslim, I'm a Christian. Jesus Isa is in your book a hundred times. Let's talk about Jesus and you can't get them to shut up. They talk about Jesus all the way to the airport. It's really changed my paradigm.

16:48 - Speaker 2
And then you trust the Holy Spirit. That's right, you know, and that's what we do. That is a really remarkable thing. It's very vulnerable, larry, I appreciate you sharing that Because I think for many of us as men, we would say, no, I'm good, I'm good. I men, we would say, no, I'm good, I'm good, I'm good, I got this thing. You know, I go to church, you know when I need to all that, and I'm good, I'm a Christian. But it's a Christian, if you will, in a label rather than in your heart. It's something you know rather than who you are. And the issue is for us as men, is we become who we are? We become our hands do what's in our heart. That's right. So that's why the word says you know them in your heart, not just in your mind, right, it's a heart issue, you know yeah, go ahead.

17:41 - Speaker 1
I was going to say I was at the National. My wife and I were at the National Prayer Breakfast last week.

17:44 - Speaker 2
Yeah, your wife Autumn Married. How many children do you have?

17:46 - Speaker 1
I have five Excuse me three boys and five grandchildren. Five grandchildren and I'm the shortest in our family now, no, you're not. Yeah, my middle son is four inches taller than me. He's almost 6'10", so.

18:00 - Speaker 2
That's fantastic. Yeah, and they're awesome, and I've seen some of the stuff. Which son is it that's doing the—? Richard, his creative director yeah.

18:07 - Speaker 1
Yeah creative director. But we were at the prayer breakfast and one of my prayer breakfast colleagues shared something I'd never heard anybody else say. He said Jesus emphasized relational integrity over intellectual accuracy. Think about that Relational integrity over intellectual accuracy. We tend to always focus on doctrine and doctrine's important. I don't want to minimize that, but often what's done in the church is at the expense of relationships, and I think that Jesus really—the example my friend used is that that's why he made Judas treasurer. He gave him the purse even though he knew he would rip him off. Let's see what he does with it. And you know, I think that—have you seen the movie—remember the movie City Slickers with Billy Crystal? Yeah, billy Crystal.

18:56 - Speaker 2
Billy.

18:57 - Speaker 1
Crystal is a type-A businessman. You know hard-driving and his friends encourage him. You need some time off. So he goes to a dude ranch in Colorado and the wrangler, curly is out teaching him about life. And at one point Curly says, mitch, the secret to life is to discover the one thing. And Mitch says, well, what's the one thing? And he said that's for you to find out. And I think that the Word of God gives us an idea of the one thing From Jesus' perspective in Mark. It's to love God and love others, and the Apostle Paul in Galatians talks about that. To put love, express love.

19:46 - Speaker 2
Yeah, let love be your greatest aim.

19:48 - Speaker 1
Right, and my paraphrase of that is trust God and let love happen, come on. And so I think that you know.

19:57 - Speaker 2
How do you practice? Let me ask you this how do you practice that? Because you do have metrics. You've got metrics. You're working with Dr Graham. You want to make sure that you amplify the message that's happening. You've got metrics of being in front of enough people, right, you're helping Rick Warren with things. You're helping people like that. How do you with that? Okay, so that's business. How do you? And at the same time, hey, how do you know? And at the same time, hey, I'm going to live my faith, I'm going to speak christ. How do you balance business metrics right with, yeah, but I'm going to just love people?

20:35 - Speaker 1
yeah, well, for me the harder balance is work life. So I there's another point of vulnerability. I was in 1997, I had to check myself in for work addiction. I was working 100 hours a week and one of my clients said watching Larry work is like watching someone run a marathon with ski boots on.

20:57 - Speaker 2
And you took that as a compliment at the time?

21:00 - Speaker 1
No, it was. I knew that I was in trouble. I was redlining. And here's the problem, paul. If I was a vacuum cleaner salesman working 100 hours a week, people would say you're crazy, you're out of control. But when you're in ministry, they say praise God. Yeah, burn out for Jesus, Right, but he burned out for Jesus and you know, as I studied the life of Jesus Paul, I realized he was never in a hurry, but he was always on time. I don't know about you but, as a type A guy.

21:33
I've had FOMO. I've had to fight FOMO my whole life fear of missing out. And I had a friend share with me.

21:41
he said you know, as I read the example of Jesus, he never had to be where things were happening, he just made things happen where he was turned water into wine at the wedding and such, and so I think that what I've truly tried to focus on in that balance is to be present in the moment, and I think that that's a difficult thing to do because we're so distracted. There's so many things. We're multitasking all the time.

22:14 - Speaker 2
What did that do to your marriage, when you were working 100 hours a week?

22:17 - Speaker 1
Well, it was tough. Well, let me say this the first six years my wife went with me, so we spent our entire discretionary income with her traveling together on the Crusades. I was traveling 300 days, the first year of marriage, goodness. But she was with me most of the time, okay, but once the kids came— so then it was an adventure. Right, it was, it was Well.

22:40 - Speaker 2
I get that.

22:41 - Speaker 1
Although they say and this may be something someone out there, your listeners, are dealing with, but someone once told me that the hardest two years of marriage are your first and the one you're in now. So if some of you are discouraged out there, know that you're not alone, brother. That's great, that's a great line.

23:02
But the Lord can really use our wives to speak to us and to really mold us and shape us, and my wife is my best friend, like I know. Judy is with you, and yet we've been fortunate because our bedroom is our boardroom and we're marriage and we're ministry partners, and so that in recent years we've been able to do that even more together, and that's been yeah, that's fantastic, the kids have gotten older.

23:28 - Speaker 2
But but how did you so? You checked yourself in. How did you recover that and how did the marriage recover?

23:35 - Speaker 1
Because obviously, my wife is a saint and it was really more the kids and I think the kids paid a price. You know Dr Graham had the same issue. He traveled all the time.

23:50 - Speaker 2
He put it in his book, he put it in his autobiography If he could do it over, what would he do?

23:56 - Speaker 1
again, what would he do different? He would say I travel less and study more.

24:00 - Speaker 2
Isn't that?

24:00 - Speaker 1
something. I'm grateful that. I think it was hardest on my oldest son. He and I did a two-part dad awesome podcast a couple of years ago.

24:11 - Speaker 3
Oh yeah, of course.

24:11 - Speaker 1
And we talked about it from my perspective and his perspective, and you know we hear about father wounds. It's something people talk about all the time.

24:21 - Speaker 2
Of course, because it's real.

24:22 - Speaker 1
Pretty sobering, paul, when you're sitting across from your son and he's talking about his father wounds and you realize well, I'm the perpetrator there. And so we've had to go deep and forgive each other and really seek the Lord, and my prayer for him is that he doesn't recreate, you know, the cats in the cradle. Yeah, there you go song because, uh, you know somebody again. I also forgive me for all these anonymous quotes no, no, no.

24:51 - Speaker 2
What's great? Because you're a pr person and a communication guy, you've got tons of quotes. Well, you always have quotes. I don't know who said it was. Even when we hang out, you have stuff. You're just like, hey, did you hear the what the guy said?

25:04 - Speaker 1
No, I never heard that. I don't know who said it, but I heard someone say that it's better to spend all your time playing golf than being at church, because then when your kids grow up, they'll grow up hating golf rather than hating church. And I don't know. You and I both had dads in ministry. We could probably give a little truth to that.

25:26 - Speaker 2
You know that's interesting because my dad was a great dad. People always ask me because he wrote these books for men, maximize Magnitude.

25:33 - Speaker 1
He blessed me for sure.

25:34 - Speaker 2
Yeah, but I tell them you know, a lot of what he did in the ministry of the last 25, 30 years of his life was a response to how he had lived his first 50 years. That's right, and that he had been taught by his mentors you sacrifice everything for the gospel.

25:52 - Speaker 1
It's a generational thing Sacrifice everything, yeah.

25:54 - Speaker 2
And including your family, and so when we kind of tracked it back, I look back at it, I wasn't a great athlete, but I played a lot of sports and I tried to figure out how many games he came to and we could only come up with about five or six games out of basketball, baseball, everything else, football I mean going back to third grade that he actually ever was at right, you know, and and um, and it was. That was a sobering moment for both of us. And then there were, you know, issues that you know we all have that. We all have things we have to deal with.

26:33
But I was talking with a guy recently and we were talking about these kinds of things and he's talking about what he's doing as a grandparent and and grandparents have an incredible impact on their grandchildren. Now, that's right, these kinds of things and he's talking about what he's doing as a grandparent, and grandparents have an incredible impact on their grandchildren. Now, and I think that's part of you know, you've got five grandkids and I think that's part of, if you will, some of that work you've done with your son. They now recover part of that in pouring your life into.

27:03 - Speaker 1
No doubt about it. Our longtime pastor Pete Briscoe used to say his definition of success was when people who know you best love you most. And how many men in ministry would their kids say that about them?

27:21 - Speaker 2
So that's pretty Well you and I have seen the um, the fallout of guys who, uh, sacrifice our families for the sake of the ministry, and and and then some of those same and particularly men we're talking about some of those same men who end up off the track themselves because really they were living an unhealthy life.

27:43 - Speaker 1
Well, years ago we represented Bishop TD Jakes who's one of the best preachers on the planet right here in the Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex, and he and I were traveling back. He had written a book and we were up for three days in New York doing a book tour. And we were traveling back and he asked me to accompany him to the Potter's House, his church where he immediately went and spoke to 300 Hispanic pastors a pastor's conference and he got up and he shared something I'll never forget. He said I just flew in from New York and before we took off I heard the announcement We've all heard a hundred times.

28:19
We tune it out about in case of an emergency, an air mask will drop down. It out about in case of an emergency, a mask will drop down and if you're traveling with children, put the mask on yourself first and then on your child. Yeah, and he said it sounds counterintuitive, but it's the right thing to do, because while you can take care of yourself or you can take care of your child, your child can't take care of you. Yeah.

28:45 - Speaker 2
Yeah, yeah. And he said I would venture you have to be healthy.

28:47 - Speaker 1
First Right. I would venture to say that many of you are in love with your church and you maybe like your wife, he said. But you could preach your heart out for two years and then say one thing and someone goes to the church down the street they're not going to take care of you, you're not going to be here, but you get all the accolades and then you go home and your wife tells you to take out the garbage and that's where the strokes are. And so he said really you've got to take care of your family. And I had a pastor friend explain it to me this way. We were chatting and he asked me to list priorities in life and I said God first, family second, friend's job. He said no. And then he took God off the list and yourself first, and I said no, that's not right. I said where's God in that list? He said God is the piece of paper it's written on. Because if God isn't in every aspect of that.

29:48
It becomes God. Little G, big G.

29:52 - Speaker 2
That's got to be a part of everything. We have a motivational email that comes out three times a week called Brave Men a motivational email. This is Brave Men podcast. And we have this motivational email that comes out three times a week and we wrote a little article recently. It was. Jesus is not number one on your list. He is the list. That's right. He is the list. Seek first the kingdom of heaven. All these things will be added to you.

30:16 - Speaker 1
Can I just say one more thing, as we're talking about this area.

30:18 - Speaker 2
Is that okay yeah?

30:19 - Speaker 1
So my wife and I we serve on a board. My wife and I we serve on a board, joel Rosenberg Joshua Fund. It's a ministry to the Middle East and he has an annual event called the Epicenter Briefing. Last fall, governor Mike Huckabee was the closer and so he came over and sat with my wife and me for dinner and we had a lovely chat and as and they pulled him to speak, my wife said, governor, how can we pray for you? And his response was, without hesitation, he said pray that I end. Well, he said many of my friends, at this stage of life, after 50 years of faithful marriage, 50 years of faithful ministry, they're dropping the ball in the end zone. And he said I don't want to do that, I don't want to dishonor the cause of Christ. That was always Dr Graham's big fear. He would get nervous before every interview media interview.

31:15
Yeah, not because he was stage fright, but he did not want to say something that would dishonor the gospel. So he said I want to end well. And then he told us a story about George Brett. Do you know that name? Of course he was the iconic third baseman for the Kansas City Royals.

31:33 - Speaker 2
Kansas City Royals, yeah Hall of Fame.

31:34 - Speaker 1
Hall of Fame. I think he might have played his entire career with the Royals, I'm not sure. Anyway, on his last season, at a press conference he was asked how he wanted to end his career, how he wanted to go out. He was asked how he wanted to end his career, how he wanted to go out, and of course everyone thought he would give the classic answer. You know, seventh game of the World Series tied 3-3, bottom of the ninth, 1-1. On the 3-2 pitch bases loaded, I hit a walk-off home run and you know, win the series.

32:04 - Speaker 2
Yeah, Bill Mazeroski.

32:05 - Speaker 1
There you go. But you know what his response was, what he said at my last at-bat. He said I want to hit a routine grounder to first and I'm going to grind it out, run as fast as I can, as hard as I can, knowing that there's no way I'm going to make it and that I'll be thrown out. So that it can always be said to his last bat, george Brett left it all out on the field.

32:32 - Speaker 2
Yeah, man, that's great and that really is it. Now, you, you, you were with Dr Billy Graham for quite a number of years traveled together. Tell me, what was it that? How does a man like that, like he lived to be 99 or 100? 99. 99. By the way, sidebarbar, which is which I can do because it's my podcast, so here's a little sidebar. My favorite epitaph of anybody is his wife because, if I'm not mistaken, on her epitaph on the, it says end of construction. Thank you for your patience. Right, that's right. Yeah, it's, it's down at of construction. Thank you for your patience.

33:10 - Speaker 1
That's right. That's right. Yeah, it's down at the Cove and you can go see it. Yeah, at the Cove, right.

33:14 - Speaker 2
I was trying to remember where it was. That's where it is and I thought that is that's. That is the most humble, most remarkable and self-aware comment that anybody would make. But you watch Dr Graham and the ebb and flow of life travel. You know people pulling on him, many directions. How did he maintain a focus in the middle of all that? What did you watch and observe in his life that has helped you in your life?

33:41 - Speaker 1
Well, people have asked me. First of all, I'm just grateful for the opportunity to serve one of God's great servants. Have a front row seat on all. God did through his ministry for more than half of his more than six years of public ministry. People have asked me what one word I would use to describe Mr Graham, and I have to use four Humility, integrity. Humility, authenticity and transparency. And then I would also add to that he was an ambassador of God's love around the world.

34:18 - Speaker 2
That's amazing, that list that you just gave. Authenticity transparency because he's in front of everybody all the time he was. With how many presidents that he Well?

34:30 - Speaker 1
there's a great book, if you're interested, called the Preacher and the Presidents, and there's a chapter with each of the 12 presidents during his public ministry.

34:38
But I think the secret was there weren't two Billy Grahams. The Billy Graham you would be with one-on-one is the same one you'd see preaching. He was very authentic and he just his humility. He considered himself a country boy called to preach. He had no idea, he couldn't fathom why God picked him. Can I tell you an interesting story? So, and I think it's nine, what year was it that John F Kennedy Jr's plane went down?

35:06 - Speaker 2
Right, I was traveling with my wife Off of Martha's Vineyard.

35:10 - Speaker 1
That's right. In Florida we were going to take a week vacation at her folks' place and I got up at the hotel on Saturday morning saw the news. I said my wife, I'm going to drop you and the kids off, I'm going to have to go straight to Jacksonville. Billy was there at the Mayo Clinic Because I would imagine we're going to have to do all three morning shows. This is before cable news, because he was several months earlier had been on the cover of George magazine, gave him an interview as a wedding gift.

35:40 - Speaker 2
Which John Kennedy had was the magazine he was producing.

35:43 - Speaker 1
Right. So sure enough, we had all three, and so we were up there at the affiliates and we traveled around and so we were at the NBC affiliate, which was the most—it was just a decrepit old rundown station it was hard to believe it was—.

36:04 - Speaker 2
People don't realize where some of these TV shows come from. They come from old studios and places warehouses.

36:10 - Speaker 1
And I don't mean to be critical, but it was just. We sat in a conference room waiting to go out with Katie Couric and a young African-American woman probably in her mid-20s. The floor producer came in with a dog-eared copy of his memoirs Just. As I Am.

36:27
And she pulled me aside and she said Mr Graham is my spiritual father. I came to faith at his crusade here in Jacksonville. And she said I grew up in the church but I read his book and she had it all underlined Could he sign my book for me? And my job was to say no because he had Parkinson's symptoms. But I couldn't say no to this young woman and so I said well, if you ask him directly I'm sure he'll oblige. And I got busy and so she went and asked him and he did. He just very carefully signed his name and then, before she had to go, she did something. I'd never at that point you know 25 or so years traveling with Mr Graham seen anyone else do. She said Mr Graham, can I pray for you? I've seen hundreds of people say will you pray for?

37:20 - Speaker 2
me. Would you give me a blessing? Yeah, of course.

37:23 - Speaker 1
But it even disoriented, it threw him a bit. He was taken aback. He said well, okay, and this young lady I'm sure she was Pentecostal or charismatic, although she didn't pray in tongues, she knew how to pray. She brought down heaven, put her hand on his shoulder, prayed up a storm and then left. So Mr Graham and I were sitting in this little small conference room, and when he gets pensive, I know enough to, not enough to to not, I just just just sit. So we sat there for about a minute and he was thinking, and then he said you know, I don't understand why anyone would want my autograph. And I laughed. I thought he was joking. Billy Graham, are you kidding me?

38:05 - Speaker 4
And then I realized he was serious and so I had to explain what an autograph was to mr graham what it meant to someone.

38:12 - Speaker 1
This woman sees you as her spiritual father honored to meet. You read your book, wanted to codify the moment, whatever yeah, exactly my favorite photograph so then he says I've never asked. I've only asked one person in my whole life for an autograph. Now, I was the one who was trying to. So let me ask you, Paul, who's the one person Billy Graham would have asked for an autograph? Well, I don't know.

38:39 - Speaker 2
Sports Athlete, the Pope.

38:43 - Speaker 1
He's met them all. I'll tell you the two. I sat there for about a minute or two myself. The two that came to mind I knew when he was 12, his dad took him to spring training in Florida. He met Babe Ruth. So I thought he was a big baseball fan. I thought, well, it had to be Babe Ruth. I thought no, he played baseball.

38:59
He did, yeah, it was baseball, yeah. And then I thought, well, maybe it was Winston Churchill, because he got summoned to number 10 the morning after he sold out Wembley Stadium in 46, his first visit to England. And the prime minister asked him. He said, billy, if I brought Marilyn Monroe over, could we sell out Wembley? And he said, mr Prime Minister, it's not me, it's the Holy Spirit. And he shared the gospel with the prime minister. So, anyway, it wasn't either. I said, mr Graham, who is the one person you asked for an autograph? John Glenn, really.

39:35 - Speaker 2
The astronaut? Yeah, and I said later a senator.

39:38 - Speaker 1
He said in 2000,. Time Magazine had a dinner for all living cover subjects on their 100th anniversary in Radio City Music Hall. They cleared out the seats and put in tables and he must have been sitting next to John Glenn. And when the dinner was over, mr Glenn said Senator. Glenn said hey, billy, can I get your autograph? And he said well, I have never asked anybody for an autograph. Can I get yours?

40:04 - Speaker 2
And they swapped autographs. That's a great story. I love that man. That's remarkable story. I love that man. That is, that's remarkable, and that humility. My favorite photo of Dr Graham is shot. I would assume it is house at the Cove or somewhere up in that area and it's him sitting with his Bible open and he's got a work shirt on.

40:25 - Speaker 1
Oh yeah, Kind of like this Johnny Cash gave that shirt to him. It was his favorite shirt. Really they were close friends.

40:31 - Speaker 2
Yeah, and glasses maybe off to the side and an open Bible over his knee, and I just thought, god, that's just. You know the photo, you know how a photo can speak to you. I've always thought I want to be like that. Isn't that something? That's amazing.

40:48 - Speaker 1
But you know what, paul? It was what I observed. It wasn't Mr Graham's ability, as legion as that was, but it was his availability that God used. I was with him when he was sick of the dog, couldn't hardly get out of a chair, and yet when it it came time to preach he would bound up to the pulpit and and go for it and and have energy, and then then just collapse when it was over.

41:15 - Speaker 2
He was anointed by the holy spirit he was.

41:17
He was a spirit-filled man, he, uh. But I I've watched some of his early things. You know close mutual friend of ours, uh, roger flessing. Uh directed his shows for many, many, many years and I remember watching some of those earlier programs. He was a fiery preacher man he was. He crushed it, he did. And then what I appreciated about Dr Billy Graham was he started bringing and maybe it happened after I Explode 72 with Bill Bright and all that. But he started bringing a lot of the young musicians on and then he created a very ethnic stage in all of his crusades. I think Billy Preston actually played at a number of his crusades, who was known as the fifth Beatle, and so he had this worldview. That was very inclusive and I can't imagine Billy Graham walking around with his 8x10 photographs, you know, like hey, oh yeah.

42:19
Well, what you?

42:19 - Speaker 1
mentioned about Youth Night, the last 22 crusades that he held. They put a bullet in Bev Shea, his longtime soloist, and fired the choir and cleared the stage and brought in contemporary music oh yeah, and presented with integrity, coupled with a biblical sermon from Mr Graham. Letting these kids Eleven of the 22 set stadium attendance records. Wow, primarily teenagers coming to hear an 87-year-old evangelist. That's a man bites dog story.

42:53 - Speaker 2
I remember years ago Andre Crouch sang on stage. Billy Preston play Michael W Smith, I think, sang on some things, and there's a sense, when a man like that is willing to be humble and transparent, that the Holy Spirit begins to speak to him about. Here's what's going on. You had something you told me about Rick Warren and about how he looked at communications and all of a sudden, you know, as he's thinking about it, he goes wait a second, I can do something different with this twitter, because I think when twitter came out, everybody's putting food on there right, right, like facebook and all that sort of stuff.

43:34
Yeah, and tell me about that, because to me that's the power of a man being humble enough to hear from the world.

43:43 - Speaker 1
He resisted twitter because the question at the time was what are you doing right now? Right, he said nobody cares, cares what. I have for lunch.

43:50
But then he realized I could say what am I thinking? And I wrote an op-ed after he and I had this conversation servant thinkmanship. Go beyond servant leadership to servant thinkmanship and let people know what you're thinking, what they should be thinking. You know, there's a verse in Psalms, or it's Proverbs, that says as a man thinketh, so is he One of my mentors, doug Coe, who ran the prayer breakfast. When we'd go around these circles, people would tell who they are, what they do. He would always. He wouldn't say who he was or what he did. He would say I grew up in Portland and I like baseball and girls. But you know he shared that verse. And then he'd say so let me tell you what I think about.

44:37 - Speaker 2
What I'm thinking.

44:38 - Speaker 1
And he talks about Jesus. And so it's interesting. Mr Coe and Billy Graham died on the same day, a year apart. Wow, they were partners in ministry, yeah. And Billy Graham died on the same day, a year apart Wow, they were partners in ministry, yeah. And within an hour of them both passing, the religion writer for Time Magazine called and asked if I would write an op-ed tribute to both men, which I was honored to do, and when I wrote the one about Doug Coe, he died first in 2018. I said I never understood Billy Graham until I met Doug Coe. I said I never understood Billy Graham until I met Doug Coe. I always thought Billy Graham was uniquely wired to preach the gospel faithfully in stadiums around the world and he took that very seriously.

45:21 - Speaker 2
He felt the eternal destiny of a stadium full of people In his autobiography he talked about. You know, it might even be something he'd preached before, but he would spend all day going back through his notes making sure he hadn't missed what God wanted to say that night.

45:37 - Speaker 1
You know what Often he would painstakingly do that all day, and when he'd step up the podium he'd set his notes aside and the Lord would give him another message, like on the way from his dressing room.

45:51 - Speaker 2
But anyway, I thought that was—.

45:52 - Speaker 1
But preparation is what allows you to do something like that To me. I thought it was an intuition of Mr Graham's, but Doug Coe helped me realize it was intentional. That was a deal they made. He said Billy, you're an evangelist, you take that message to the stadiums. You've got 20 minutes, you give them both barrels, but when we're with leaders, we're just going to love them. We're not going to—we're just going to love them. And that's what he did.

46:30 - Speaker 2
You know, that's interesting because when you look back on—and Rick Warren has done this and other men that you've been you go meet that guy Because his particularly presidents or a head of a nation, because he is anti-gospel or because his his personal life doesn't measure up and and he would resist people saying he would say, no, I want to go in and be a follower of Christ with that person. Right, it was very personal, it wasn't. It was very personal. It wasn't a um, it wasn't a pr thing. Exactly, it wasn't like yeah, you know, it's like I think of um, uh, the mary tyler moore show, and uh, there was the newscaster on it.

46:59
Yeah, and uh, ted baxter, remember ted baxter yeah and uh, I remember, uh, uh, maury was was looking at the, was looking at the photos on Ted Baxter's wall. He's a very kind of newscaster and he was looking at all the photos and he goes you know it's interesting, look at all these autographs, they all look the same. Wow, and how come there's nobody else in the photo. And you know it's that kind of thing. He airbrushed them and all that sort of stuff and put different people in there and he ushered them out. Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's good.

47:37 - Speaker 1
But you know, both of these men considered—they realized that Jesus died for all sinners. Yeah, and they included themselves in that group, themselves in that group and I think that, mr Graham, you know he preached a message that it's interesting. I work in the media and I've often shared with reporters that, not to take anything away from his preaching, but I think one of the distinctives of his ministry was his ability to make positive points for the gospel in any media situation.

48:13
The reason was three things. He was when other pastors or other Christian leaders were becoming political, he remained pastoral. Secondly, when others were becoming more activist in nature, getting involved in issues, he was an advocate for the Christian faith, showing how the Bible speaks to personal and societal problems.

48:35 - Speaker 2
Always shown the Bible the light of the word on situations.

48:38 - Speaker 1
Right, right. And then, thirdly, he approached media as ministry, not marketing. He saw it as a platform for his message not as a way to sell books or something, and so God honored his faithfulness.

48:50 - Speaker 2
You've been around many great men, leaders, men and women. You know thinking of Prime Minister, but you know this whole news cycle and this whole thing. The world's more divided than it's ever been. Everything's worse than it's ever been. The United States has never been in a more critical situation. You know what's your perspective on that, larry. I mean, here you are. You've probably seen more than most of us have, if not all of us that would be listening to you right now. You've seen more of the good. You, right now. You've seen more of the good and the bad. You've seen ups and downs. Do you have a sense of hope? Or is it like man? This thing's crashing.

49:33 - Speaker 1
You mean where the world is at or where the church is at US church? Yeah, oh, by all means. I think we're at a watershed point in history. We hear a lot of talk about how we're in a post-Christian world. There's a gentleman named Eric Locksmore. He's an apologist. I read one of his books a while back and I think I agree with him. He says we are actually in a pre-Christian culture. Agreed, we have the opportunity to act like the first century church, so that gives us opportunity to run towards people rather than away from them, to stop criticizing and start creating, and to partner with a generation that wants to restore things that are broken with a generation that wants to restore things that are broken, and I think that I was with the founder of Praycom last week at the prayer breakfast.

50:32
He was saying how church attendance is at an all-time low. That church attendance may be waning, but there's an increase in a search for purpose and meaning spirituality.

50:40 - Speaker 2
There you go.

50:41 - Speaker 1
And I think that people are hungry, for they want to connect in community and they're looking for excuse me authenticity, and I really believe that Christian leaders have an opportunity to get back to it's the churches that are preaching.

50:58 - Speaker 2
Okay when you say oh, yeah, that's true, and Christianity is still the fastest growing faith in the world. I'll give you an example Sophie Blackman, who works on our team. She lives in a neighborhood of about 750. I'm trying to remember what the number was. It was 750 homes, is that right? Yeah, 750 homes in this neighborhood that she lives in.

51:20
And somebody said to her hey, you know, we should probably do a Bible study in this area. It's kind of a little enclave of homes. And so she went on the little home you know thing that everybody writes to each other on and she puts out a word and says, hey, we're going to start a Bible study. And this just happened yesterday and between the morning and the evening they had over 100 ladies in women's Bible study that came to this Bible study. Most of them don't go to a church. They just wanted more of what's happening, what's going on with the world, and how do I find faith? And where's Jesus, where's God in all this? I guess would be the starting point. Where do you think we miss that as the church in communicating that properly?

52:05 - Speaker 1
Well, I think that for a while, you know, there was this mega church movement. We mentioned Rick Warren. He does an outstanding job and just has satellite campuses and all, and yet he built his church not around his personality. And yet he built his church not around his personality he is a very gregarious individual but around the purpose, the five purposes, and I think some of the churches that have been built around a personality without accountability, there's not an elder or a deacon board. They maybe have a small group of their friends, other megachurch pastors. Right, right right.

52:40
They fly in from out of town Once a year. Yeah, I've got covering, I'm covered, and so I think there needs to be an accountability.

52:48 - Speaker 2
And none of them ask that guy hey, how are you Right?

52:51 - Speaker 1
No, seriously, how are you? Because here's the thing, Paul and my wife. For 12 years was chairman of a counseling center for burned out pastors, and there's burnout, there's isolation. And the Bible says be holy because I am holy, not act holy so that others may come to Christ. And the problem is we're all human, we all have feet of clay.

53:15 - Speaker 2
Where does a pastor who's struggling pick an issue pornography, whatever it is, whatever it might be there, any kind of addiction, anything that would turn your heart.

53:23 - Speaker 1
Yeah, distraction that pulls them away from their first love and what they've been called to do. Where do they go? And so they can't talk to people in their church or whatever. So it leads to the imposter syndrome and posers what?

53:37 - Speaker 2
is that what's the imposter syndrome?

53:40 - Speaker 1
Well, we're—i'll give you an example. So back in 87, you and I talked, before we went on air, about kind of the Jim Baker and the televangelists so-called televangelist scandals. And I remember—I'll never forget it Our oldest son, who was 1988, had just been born. My mother-in-law came and stayed with us for two weeks. We were watching. Excuse me, let me back up. Monday morning. Dr Graham called me 1988. He said did you read the Atlanta Journal Constitution this morning?

54:14 - Speaker 2
Of course you did.

54:16 - Speaker 1
No internet for you younger listeners out there, you know he read six newspapers a day. No, I didn't read it but anyway.

54:24
He said there was a story about Jimmy Swigert had a three-day crusade in Nicaragua over the weekend. 30,000 people a night came to faith. Praise God, jimmy Swigert. Okay, he said. You know, they originally asked me to go and I couldn't go, so they must have invited Brother Swigert. That was Monday morning. Friday night we're watching television with my mother-in-law and a news break broke in and said Jimmy Swigert and a prostitute film at 11.

54:50
So in five days we went from Mr Graham commenting about how wonderful it was to this thing that was exposed and the quivering lip on Sunday. And again we're dating ourselves a little bit. But the point is this God honors the faithful preaching of his word and even someone who is dealing with that privately was still faithful in what they've been called to do and God honors that preaching of the word. So there can be a little bit of an imposter thing there where they're dying on the inside, but there's still results.

55:24 - Speaker 2
Speaking the word yeah.

55:25 - Speaker 1
Yeah, and so again it gets back to ending well, Okay.

55:31 - Speaker 2
Let me do this. That's personal, then, isn't it? In other words, so often our identity is in our definition, is in the task or the job we do. We're human beings, not human beings.

55:44
And what you're saying, right what you're saying, that centered or grounded Dr Graham was that he was first who he was in Christ before he was a pulpit guy, Right exactly Before he did. I mean, he started, he and Dick Ross, they started the movie thing. They did all these amazing movies with Walter Bennett. They went on TV things that you were all part of that were cutting edge, that nobody had ever done before, even thought you could do, and he had all these different entities and things and the cove that he built and all this stuff. But first of all what he did was he was a follower of Christ, he and his wife.

56:23 - Speaker 1
And his character was honed on the farm out of the spotlight and God he went to Bible school and God really he wrestled with at Forest Home out on the West Coast. A famous story is I'm going to take this as your word and I'm going to take it by faith, and that I'm going to, I'm going to preach that faithfully, and so I do think that it's that personal accountability. But he also the Modesto manifesto that his team Explain that, because that's that's huge.

56:52 - Speaker 2
That is something that friends of mine, those of us who are in the ministry, to men in particular. You know some of the guys that are involved in this, brett Clemmer and others. We've talked about that often.

57:07 - Speaker 1
The Modesto Manifesto yeah, it's in Modesto, California. Their team came together and they said, OK, we're going to have a lot of temptations, money, women.

57:17 - Speaker 2
Somewhere in the early 50s, yes, 54, 55, something like that Late 40s right around 1950, when they incorporated the ministry in 1950. And the singer George Beverly Shea there were some associate evangelists, some other guys involved.

57:29 - Speaker 1
Right, and you know there's been a lot of—the news media doesn't understand it, but he made a commitment that he would never be alone with a woman not his wife and so they were very committed to these personal responsibility practices that served them well through the years. And they we we were always would downplay statistics. We didn't, we didn't amplify the numbers for crusades, and they would try to have integrity in everything that they do.

57:59 - Speaker 2
You know what I thought was awesome about Dr Graham, and we're talking about Dr Billy Graham talking with Larry Ross. Who? How many years did you work with Dr Graham?

58:07 - Speaker 1
34.

58:07 - Speaker 2
34 years. And what I loved about his ministry and I still think it's something I desire in my life is those men that he did that Modesto Manifesto with. The majority of them, let's say 1950 or whatever, stayed friends in ministry their whole lives and many of them lived right there next to him in Asheville. North.

58:31
Carolina. They did life together, right. I mean, it's an amazing thing and I think we miss a lot of that because we really are. You know, this whole uh. You know we're really driven by what's. You know Instagram or whatever and all these different things and being on enough outlets and doing all these different things, and we're really driven by that and and if we're not careful, we get caught up in all of this.

58:58
Who saw this and who was part of that and who was with this guy and who was? And, dude, I'm telling you, man, we have missed brotherhood. We have missed the beauty of brotherhood, of hanging with some guys. I'd rather, you know, phil Pringle's my pastor, and Phil said this recently because he's built quite a large group of churches, but he had a goal of it being larger at one point in his life and he said I want to do this, and then it's here. But he says you know, I'm really happy about that. You know why I'm still hanging with the same guys I started with. I still got some of the same friends. He said I'm really blessed to live in the brotherhood with these guys.

59:40
And they've spoken into each other's lives. Wow, I think, I think brotherhood, I think, may be one of those things, larry, that we just have missed so much of.

59:49 - Speaker 1
Well, and you know, I don't think many churches know how to do men's ministry. Yeah.

59:55 - Speaker 3
And I that's unfortunate.

59:56 - Speaker 1
The women are they're. They're covered Um the pastor, they're covered. Men's ministry is often a redheaded stepchild in the church, and that's why. I'm so grateful for what Christian Men's Network is doing through your retreats, your resources, your conferences, and you've got a network, a global network of men around the world. That thank you for your leadership on that and, of course, your dad kind of.

01:00:21 - Speaker 2
Dad. Just you know he had that thing, but even when it started he was prophetic. He was prophetic, he had this you know 40, would have been almost 50 years now and he had this prophetic word. But what it's become is really what's going to carry. This is not the ability to get it in front of enough people or write enough books. It really is about having friends and brothers and being connected and knowing each other and being known, and I would rather have a group of a few guys that know each other well than a stadium of men who, just when they leave, who hold hands and sing Kumbaya.

01:01:04
Yeah, and then they all just leave, yeah, and they go off on their own deal.

01:01:09 - Speaker 1
I want to affirm you on one thing, Paul. So John 5, the story about the paralytic at the pool of Bethsaida. If you don't know the story, look it up, there's a man, you're talking to me, look it up.

01:01:21 - Speaker 2
No, no, I mean it's the average, okay, anybody listening, okay, okay.

01:01:25 - Speaker 1
So there's a man who's laying by this pool for 38 years and what the Bible doesn't tell us. He's the George Hamilton of the New Testament. He's got the best suntan in the Bible, Okay.

01:01:43
Laying by and he's waiting for someone when the waters stir, they're healing waters to help him. So finally, after 38 years, he gets healed. What did he do? It's the saddest story in the Bible Because when he got healed he took off. He didn't stick around and hang around by the pool. But, paul, you grew up in this, your dad and you could have easily had an attitude, said man, I share my dad with the world, I'm done, I'm out of here, but you've been hanging around by the pool. For the next generation of men, yeah, and I hope your sons. One of them picks up the mantle and the baton and keeps it going. So thanks for hanging around by the pool.

01:02:16 - Speaker 2
Yeah, they're awesome. All my children are awesome and they do have an anointing on their lives and are awesome, and they do have an anointing on their lives. And there is a group of men. The last thing my dad and you know this, we've talked about this, I wrote an article about it the last thing my dad said to me as he went to be with the Lord he raised his head up. We had just done communion, together with a number of others of us, and he grabbed my arm and raised his head up and looked at me and then he said are you gonna keep it going? And I said yeah. He said it won't just be me, though.

01:02:47
It's gonna be brothers and it's gonna be friends we're gonna do it as a team I said but yeah we're gonna keep it going. And he, his head, went back down in the pillow, he closed his eyes. Our last conversation wow, wow. And he said, good, wow, that was it. And two days later he was gone, or three.

01:03:09 - Speaker 1
Oh, I'm so glad you had that moment with him.

01:03:11 - Speaker 2
Yeah, it was pretty amazing, but you know you, minister, in a different time. That's really what it is, yeah.

01:03:18 - Speaker 1
Your dad was the man for his generation. You're the man for your generation.

01:03:22
I had a conversation with a colleague last week in DC. We had a two-hour breakfast together. He does youth ministry. His passion is training young men and women in the principles of Jesus to go out into the marketplace or wherever God calls them. And he gave me a definition of man I'd never heard before. He said the definition of a man is someone who is under authority. Think about that. My mentor, doug Coe, once asked a friend of mine. He said have you ever asked anybody to follow you? He said no. He said I challenge you. He taught a Bible study every week at Saddleback with 30 men. He said I challenge you. Next week, get up and ask the men how many of you will be willing to follow me. Now, what he means is follow me as I follow.

01:04:16
Jesus, it's kind of arrogant 18 guys raised their hand and he thought oh man, now what do I do? Well, it's just in time learning. But he is a man under authority and being a man is someone under authority. But he said, as I work with this generation now, they don't understand authority. They authority. Institutions have let them down. They're wired to resist authority. They're not going to sign up for that and, wow, I never considered that. Have you dealt with that in your ministry?

01:04:48 - Speaker 2
Well, I dealt with that in the 60s.

01:04:51 - Speaker 1
Really. So now we're coming full circle.

01:04:53 - Speaker 2
In the sense that we threw off authority, and I think that's what every single generation does. What every single generation does is desire to throw off authority and to create our own place. So, for me, the role of a father, the role of a good father, is not to raise a great son. The role of a good father is to raise another good father. And so when we pass it on, you know, what you do in life becomes history, what you put into motion becomes your legacy. So you're sitting in this studio. This is not about me. This is about the next 30 years of this ministry. You know that will outlive me.

01:05:34
Why?

01:05:34
Because I believe God raised it up, not just so that we could say, hey, this name went on, but that so that fathers, there's more dads, so that we raise up a hundred million fathers who love their children, so that fathers, there's more dads, so that we raise up a hundred million fathers who love their children, so that we change the future of the world, so that when jesus, when christ, comes back, he comes back for a robust, strong, powerful church, that that raises up his and lifts his name, and that is, that has wholeness and health. And we, we're, you know all these things. We are so easily distracted, larry, there's these things so easily distract us and that's why, uh, I appreciate you and Larry Ross communications, because you have helped men keep their hand, if you will steady on the plow rather than, hey, I'll get this great idea, I got this thing, and and you're the master of the question, because what you'll do, and I knowing you for all these years, you'll say, well, what if this or what would that look like if we actually went all that direction? Or what if, perhaps that passion kind of moved here, and you've helped men do that with your life. And so, thanks for being on, brave Men.

01:06:49 - Speaker 1
Before we go, can I say two things you asked about the future.

01:06:52 - Speaker 2
You can say three things.

01:06:53 - Speaker 1
Well, just as I've been noodling on things, we're in election year right now. Maybe that's dating this podcast. That's fine. Getting back to my conversation with Governor Huckabee on things, we're in election year right now, maybe that's dating this podcast.

01:07:03
But again back to my conversation with Governor Huckabee. He shared an interesting thought I'd never considered. He said everybody's focused on the continuum between left and right liberal, conservative, democrat, republican. He said it's not a horizontal continuum, it's vertical. We're now in a battle between good and evil, and Daryl Bach, who now runs the Hendricks Center at Dallas Seminary, was a longtime New Testament chair. We had breakfast together a while back and he has a four-part series on what he calls the so-called culture wars, why the church is losing the culture war. And he said we're losing the culture war because we've approached it as a battle to be won.

01:07:47 - Speaker 3
In reality.

01:07:48 - Speaker 1
we are now in a guerrilla warfare and our job as believers, as the church, is to go behind enemy lines and rescue someone who has no idea they need to be rescued.

01:07:59 - Speaker 2
So good.

01:08:00 - Speaker 1
They may be marching for their right to whatever abortion or whatever it is, but we go behind enemies and love them into the kingdom. We rescue them. And you know, I'm in a weekly conversation with a fellow called the Gospel Challenge. It's a pay it forward thing. We read seven chapters a week and he runs, walks me through the gospels and then I do the same thing with someone. So we were in Luke 3, and you know the passage where Jesus gets up in the synagogue in his hometown of Nazareth, where he grew up. If you've been to Nazareth, it overlooks the plain of Megiddo where the final battle took place Armageddon.

01:08:39
And he stands up and it's the reading for that day and he opens the scroll and he reads about himself I've come to set the captives free. You know the passage is quoting Isaiah, right yeah.

01:08:52
So he, my, my friend, was walking me through this and he said and then, and then he's, then he closes, he closes the scroll and he says today you've this, this is today, you've experienced in your hearing. He's talking about himself and they ran him out of town, they tried to kill him. But he said let's go back to Isaiah. And when you compare the two they're different. The one in Isaiah has a comma at the end of what Jesus read in the New Testament and it goes on to say and to proclaim the day of the Lord. And my friend said had Jesus said proclaim the day of the Lord, there in Nazareth himself, trumpets would have sounded game over, be done. We wouldn't be here talking. So when people ask and get despondent, why does God allow evil?

01:09:44
Why does God allow October 7th and all the evil we see in the world? We're living in the comma. So someone who thinks, well, I can do whatever I want, I can be whatever sex I want to be, whatever it is. Well, we're living in the comma dude. And so, as Tony Campala used to say, it's Friday, but Sunday's coming and we just have to be faithful. God doesn't call us as Christian leaders to be successful, he calls us to be faithful.

01:10:14 - Speaker 2
My professor of my doctoral program, Dr Leonard Sweet, said Jesus is neither left or right, he's forward.

01:10:24 - Speaker 1
Oh, that's awesome.

01:10:25 - Speaker 2
I love that and I believe that's where we're living, yeah Is we move forward in love and we take ground in love. But love always is not only giving, but it's also protecting. That's right. So you're protecting those you love as well as giving. Protecting, that's right. So you're protecting those you love as well as giving. And so it's a powerful thing to see what you've done, larry, with A Larry Ross Communications Pretty amazing. I mean, if we sat, we could probably sit and talk for hours about the different people that have come across your life and some of the guys that we've all met together, and from the great philosophers to heads of leadership, whatever, but it's pretty amazing to sit and talk to you and listen to what you're doing.

01:11:10 - Speaker 1
Paul, thank you for your faithfulness, for your friendship. Yeah. And I thank God. There's a time we just have to all be careful that we're doing God's will, not our will, in God's name asking him to bless what we do, rather than going and doing what he's blessing we haven't had a chance to talk about prayer. Maybe we could come back on another podcast. I've been learning a lot about prayer lately and we don't do that on this podcast.

01:11:44 - Speaker 2
I had you for two seconds, maybe a half a second, millisecond. No, no, that'd be fantastic. Yeah, because, uh, for some of us, as men, prayer is sort of mysterious, you know, because we don't know all the right words, and so let's do that for the fathers out there.

01:12:02 - Speaker 1
Can I just give one little tidbit that really spoke to my wife and me. I got to know the founding drummer of the rock group Kansas. Again, I'm dating myself. Remember Kansas. Dust in the Wind and Phil Ehart is his name. He's from south of Atlanta and we became good friends. Had him in the office a couple times. He shared with me. He said in 35 years of big-time rock and roll, no one ever offered him a beer, a joint, nothing. He always thought that it was because his bandmates knew where he stood.

01:12:40
Somebody told him he had a faith in God and he didn't wear it on his sleeve, but they knew where he stood.

01:12:43
Somebody told him he had a faith in God and he didn't wear it on his sleeve. But they knew where he stood. But one day he was home visiting his mom South of Atlanta. He was out in the backyard talking with a friend and she said you know, I've never worried about Phil. He's a good boy. He said I knew that God would protect him. But she said I worried about his friends, the guys he hung out with, all these guys in the band. So for 35 years I've been praying for Phil's friends and my wife and I thought our kids were small then and I thought we pray for our kids but we need to start.

01:13:18 - Speaker 4
In some ways they spend more time with their friends than they do with us. Of course, they're being parented by their friends.

01:13:24 - Speaker 1
And so that's just anybody young parents out there that might be.

01:13:28 - Speaker 2
Yeah, what a great comment.

01:13:30 - Speaker 1
Another thing, just one other thing. Doug Coe, my mentor, he told me about prayer one time he said his oldest daughter, becky, had six kids. His oldest daughter Becky, when she was six, he was praying that she would ask Jesus into her heart. And then he was reading in the scriptures, in the Gospels one day where it said the fields are white unto harvest. Pray for laborers, he said wait a minute.

01:13:54
I just need to trust Jesus, believe that Becky is going to ask the Lord into her heart, but I need to start praying for the person who's going to lead her there.

01:14:05 - Speaker 2
Yeah, that person who will come across her path it might be a Sunday school teacher.

01:14:08 - Speaker 3
It might be a classmate. It might be my wife.

01:14:11 - Speaker 1
I'm going to start praying for the person I'm going to believe she's going to do that. Pray for the person that's going to be bold enough to make that happen, wow.

01:14:20 - Speaker 2
Brilliant stuff.

01:14:24 - Speaker 3
Thanks, Larry. Thanks for being on Brave Men. God bless you, brother. Brave Men is a production of Christian Men's Network, a global movement of men committed to passionately following Jesus on the ground in over a hundred nations worldwide. You can receive the Brave Men motivational email, find books and resources for discipleship and parenting at cmn.men. That's cmn.men. Your host has been Paul Louis Cole, president of Christian Men's Network, and if you haven't yet, please make sure you subscribe to the Brave Men podcast wherever you find podcasts or download it. Thanks for hanging with us today. We'll see you next time on Brave Men.