Today…….I am asking all my prayer warriors to say a prayer that may help others. So many people are hurting right now. Many are struggling with finances and need jobs. Some are facing foreclosure and don’t even know how they are going to make it from week to week..

Many are lonely. . Many are heartbroken. . Many are facing sickness and health is fading. . Some are dealing with difficult family members. Many have lost HOPE.. Tonight, let us put our prayers and faith together decree and declare breakthrough over our families. Financial miracles WILL take place. Jobs WILL be found. Our Bodies WILL be made whole & sickness WILL flee. Marriages and relationships WILL be restored. Family members WILL find Jesus. Heartbreaks WILL be healed. JOY WILL be restored and HOPE WILL be found. In Jesus Name. Amen!!!!!! Keep God First…….

So I would like to begin our conversation talking about parenting.
But before I talk about what a good dad you are and have been my whole life.
I think it’s important for people to know a little bit about your background because um you grew up without your father.
So can you catch people up on just your growing up years?
And then I wanna talk a little bit about what a great dad you were and how in the world did you ever figure that out?
So you grew, you were born in dry for Virgin Virginia.
My father died when I was nine months of age. So my mother had to go to work.
And so then I got shifted around from one person to the other, keeping me while she worked.
And that went on for a number of years.
And then of course, starting the school, I was uh very shy and um I think how did I ever get through grammar school?
Because in, in some cases, I remember these stories as a, as a kid.
Um You know, when I thought I had it hard, you would talk about getting yourself up in the morning, fixing your own breakfast because your mom had already gone to work at the mill.
Well, it was difficult but, uh, you know, my mom taught me how to fry an egg or scramble an egg and toast.
And, uh, then of course, after a while I learned that well enough so I can just fix me maybe some other things.
But, uh, she taught me to be able to do whatever I need to do and to trust God that he would help me.
And that’s the thing that I kept hearing her just trust the Lord just do what you know is right and trust the Lord.
So she drilled that into my head and that I could do whatever I need to do if I would trust him.
Well, um, so one of the, the mysteries to me that as a kid growing up I didn’t appreciate.
But now that I’m a dad, um I’ve appreciated so much because so, so much of what I’ve done as a father I learned from you, but you didn’t have a father to learn from.
So, you know, how in the world did you figure this out?
Because I’m gonna tell, tell, tell some stories in a few minutes about the kinds of things you did.
But I mean, you know, when, when I was born, when Becky was born, uh you didn’t have a role model.
What, how did you figure this out?
Well, my mom taught me several things that just drilled them in my head.
She to obey, to obey the Lord to read the scripture every day.
Even though I didn’t understand it to read the scripture every day and to do what I knew was the right thing to do.
She, so she didn’t take the Bible and say, well, memorize this verse of that verse.
And the only time I remember her giving me a verse to remember is before I preached my first sermon, but I just saw her reading the Bible.
I watch, I listened to her pray and I watched how she related to people.
So I had a great respect for my mom being a godly woman.
So then when you became a dad, where, how did you figure out the dad part?
I mean, you’d, you’d seen your mom be a good mom, but you were such a great dad.
How did you, how did you figure that out? Well?
I treated you all the way I wanted to be treated.
I think that says it all to me because not having a father and thinking what, what I would like for my father to have done.
So when I think of all the places we went and I never worried about spending money on you all.
Just have a good time. In other words, um it, it just came natural for me because I knew that’s what a good, that’s what a good dad would do.
Well, I want to talk about a few things that you’ve taught me.
I’m not even sure I’ve shared some of these with you.
Um, but one of the, the most important things you taught me was how to make good decisions.
And the way he taught me how to make good decisions was my dad refused to make decisions for me.
In fact, there were so many incidents and this, this began really young.
I would say, dad, what do you think I should do in this situation?
And he would say, well, what would you do if I wasn’t here to tell you?
And I would say, but you are here to tell me and I need you to tell me.
But that habit or that, that tendency you had.
And again, I don’t know where you figured that out, forced me to do two things.
It forced me to learn how to make good decisions, um, early on.
Um, and then the second thing was you were, you did such a great job allowing Becky and I to face the consequences of our decisions, you never bailed us out.
And I guess because growing up there wasn’t anybody to bail you out.
When you made a bad decision, you had to face the consequences yourself. Right. Right.
And I realized all of that would drive you to God and I wanted you to point yourself to Him.
What would you gotta have me to do when my dad’s not here.
What would you got to have me to do? Because my father died when I was nine months of age.
I thought, you know, God can take me off the scene.
But I wanna be sure whenever he did, you knew what to do.
Well, early on, maybe too early you just consistently said, what would you do? Or how would you handle that?
Or how would you fix that if I wasn’t here? I remember my first traffic ticket.
I’d like to say it was my one and only traffic ticket. But I remember my first traffic ticket.
I did had not had my driver’s license very long. I got pulled over leaving school.
Um, I got home and of course I was scared to death like any teenager. Oh, no.
What’s my dad gonna do? Is he gonna take away the car? Is he gonna take away my license?
And you probably don’t even remember this?
So I came in and, you know, apologetically, dad, I, I got pulled over by the police.
He gave me a traffic ticket and you didn’t get mad. You said, well, you’ll have to handle that.
And I’m like, well, what do I do? And you said, well, just turn the ticket over.
It has all the instructions in the back and then you just left the room and suddenly, instead of punishing me, you basically said, if you’re, you know, if you’re responsible enough to have a driver’s license, you’re responsible enough to figure out what to do with a traffic ticket.
And you, you didn’t punish me. You let the law punish me.
And then again, you just put all the decision making right back in my lap.
I don’t even know if you remember that. Well, so you kept loving me instead of the policeman.
Well, see this is another really important principle because instead of inserting yourself into the equation, you took my position or you took my side to say, you know what Andy, I think you’re smart enough to figure this out.
I think you’ll figure out how to pay for the traffic ticket.
It’s right there on the back of the ticket, you know, good luck.
And again, here I am all these years later, I can remember where we were standing in our house in Tucker.
So early on just putting the decision making pressure, the appropriate pressure on us was extraordinary.
And I do think it was an overflow of the fact that you knew, you remember growing up, hey, you, you had to learn those things early and then one other thing and you just alluded to it.
Um You did a great job uh in intentionally um taking, you know, reminding my sister and I, Becky and I, that ultimately, we weren’t accountable to you anyway, that ultimately we were accountable to God.
And the way, the way you taught us that again, we would ask you a question or not advice, but a decision, you know, we had to make.
And you would say, have you prayed about it? Have you prayed about it?
And that was so frustrating because I’m like, I, I don’t need to pray about it.
I just need you to help me make the decision.
But you consistently said, ask God and um you know, whatever you feel like the Lord wants you to do, do you remember um one particular occasion when you told me to pray about it?
And God told me the opposite of what God had told you, you know what incident I’m talking about was the only one.
No, there were actually several, but I was 16.
And um my favorite recording artist, it was coming to town, it was a concert.
Um Back then, there weren’t many concerts.
You did not particularly love my choice of music at the time that yeah, you remember that part?
And so uh this band was coming to Atlanta and the concert was on Sunday night. Remember this?
Yes, I do. And um we had Sunday night church and on Sunday night, we went to church.
And so I’m saying, dad, I wanna go to a concert.
You didn’t really want me to go to the concert anyway.
But now I’m gonna go on Sunday night, people will find out, you know, the preacher’s kids, you know, went to the concert instead of going to church.
And you said, well, why don’t you pray about it? You remember that?
And I remember mom was like, no, no, no, no, don’t let him pray about it.
You just need, we just need to tell him not to go and you were so consistent.
It was nope, if you think that’s ok, you know, you pray about it.
So I did 16 years old and I didn’t hear a voice. So I figured it was ok. Remember that?
And you, you took a little bit of pressure at church, you know, you know, how can you let your son?
You’re, he’s being a bad example.
And so I went to that concert and do you remember what you and mom prayed while I was at the concert?
You told me later that you prayed that we would have a miserable time.
Do you remember that you pray that we would have a miserable time and we’d never want to go back.
And um God didn’t answer that prayer either.
I grew up wanting to, you know, be a rock star.
So anyway, but, but the point being even though, um you know, when you put that much responsibility in a child’s hands, you are wise enough to leave it there.
You didn’t take it back. You didn’t say well, God didn’t answer your prayer the way I wanted him to, I’m gonna withdraw that.
Um So those, those lessons um were so instrumental and it’s just always curious to me growing up without a father that intuitively, you figured some of those things out.
Well, I would, I would usually say, Lord now in this given situation, what’s the wisest thing to do?
And I knew that if I made all the decisions and gave you all the answers, you never have to do it yourself.
And at some point and remember this growing up, I had nobody to ask and I was for my mom, but a lot of situations she wouldn’t have had the answer for.
So I figured if I trusted God to give you wisdom, then I believe that you would listen to him and do what he said.
Do and look at you. Now, you’re not a rock star.
You much, much more important than a rock star.
Well, look at me now, but there was, you know, it wasn’t a straight line.
In fact, I’ve heard you say before publicly that you, I don’t, these are my words, not yours.
So you can correct me something like I never went to bed worrying about you and Becky or what you and Becky were up to.
You just placed us in the hands of our capable Heavenly Father.
And well, I knew that I had taught you the right thing to do in every situation that I knew about and that I would trust God to make them, make you successful at that or make you so miserable.
You wouldn’t wanna do it again.
And it worked it did ultimately work and I’ve tried to do the same thing with my three kids.
So I appreciate that. Um, the other thing that you taught me that became, again, you appreciate it when you’re young, but you really appreciate it when you’re older.
You never prioritize work over family.
Now, that is challenging for, for any one, but it seems to be especially challenging for pastors, so many pastors, um love the church and serve the church.
And we’ve seen this happen right with, with pastors, especially men who just for whatever reason, neglect their kids.
And, um, you, I never felt like I was competing with work or specifically, I never felt like I was competing with the church.
Um, again, how do you remember your thought process and all of that? Because, um, we, we took long vacations.
In fact, one time, I can’t even imagine this.
We had an 18 ft travel trailer, 18 ft travel trailer. We went out west for five weeks. Ok.
I love my Children. I can, I can’t imagine a five week vacation in an eight to pull in an 18 ft travel travel trailer.
But that’s the way you prioritize us. So, what was your thinking and all of that?
Well, first of all, I wanted to go and second, that might have had something to do.
Yeah, I did. And secondly, I wanted to share what I love the outdoors and the woods and the forest and the glaciers and everything.
I want to share that with you all.
And so as far as the church was concerned, it was more important to me for us to be together regardless of what people thought.
And so I enjoyed it. And what I tried to do is to give you all the experiences that I wish I’d had when I had a father and to go to all the places we went.
And if you think of all the things that we did and the one thing I loved about the traveling trailer was we were all together.
We were very close together. I was just, but remember this, when we went to Naples, we had the whole beach that’s before they got built up.
Police would drive up and down the beach about once a day.
We had that whole beach to ourselves travel trailer, we cook outside and we had a fantastic time.
I loved every minute of it and I think y’all would never forget it.
And we happened to be there at the season that the, that the uh came in and we were picking up very small ones, large ones.
And those are times in my life that I enjoyed them just as much as you all did.
And at that point, I didn’t, I didn’t care what people thought that you, well, you should have done this, you should have done that.
You know what? You only have one life.
These kids are only gonna be yours at this age, we’re gonna live it up in order to enjoy one another and you have not forgotten it.
No. And again, those kinds of things left an impression in terms of priorities and values and obviously it wasn’t a dig at church or, um, something to undermine our faith.
It just showed the priority that you gave. Um, but your priorities were where they needed to be.
Um, well, I wanted you all to feel like you had me, not me in the church, you had me for 30 days or whatever, it might be five weeks.
And, uh I just wanted it to be unforgettable times.
So that one of these days you can look back as you are and say what a awesome time we had not calling this, for example, if they would call me from church, sometimes I would call him back.
Sometimes I would know we didn’t have cell phones then.
So I could say, well, you call me, there was no way to get really when we would travel.
When we would camp. We again, sometimes we went to trailer parks, you know, but a lot of time we would literally back then we would just find a spot in the woods or on the beach and we were completely unplugged.
Um, one other incident and you alluded to this principle.
Um, when Louis Giglio and I we Giglio, many of, you know, how we grew up together he grew up at my dad’s church.
In fact, his family was at first Baptist Atlanta before we got there.
And so, um, Louie and I became close friends through middle school and high school and we used to skip church quite frequently.
We would go to Sunday school because that’s where the girls were.
And then instead of going to church, we would walk down the street and there was a big restaurant at the Varsity if you’ve ever been to Atlanta.
And, um, my dad was on live television on channel five, I believe.
And, um, so we would literally stand up on a chair, change the channel to find the sermon and then we would just talk and eat hot dogs and listen to just enough of the sermon so that I could get in the car after church and say, you know, they had the story about the dog or the thing I, you know, so he would think I had been in church very deceitful.
Um, so on one occasion you, I know you remember this, somebody went to your, we call them secretaries back then to your administrative assistant and said she had seen me and Louie heading down to the Varsity to skip church.
Do you remember this incident? So, um, here’s how it happened. So I’m in the back seat.
There’s just the two of us we’re driving home after church. And, um, so I can’t see his face.
I’m, I’m sitting right behind him. I remember this.
And you said, um, Andy, uh, someone saw you and Louie leaving the church property and looked like you were headed toward the Varsity instead of coming to church.
So, of course I’m thinking, oh, no. You know, it’s like the traffic ticket thing.
Oh, no, I’m in big trouble. But you didn’t punish me.
You didn’t expect more of me than other parents expected of their kids.
But again, here I am all these years later because it said to me that I was a priority and that you, again, you weren’t, you, you didn’t feel like your reputation as a pastor hinged on my behavior or on Becky’s behavior.
And that’s a good thing because there were some, there were some rough years for, for some of us anyway.
So again, just so grateful for the way that you were a father, even though you didn’t have a father to learn from.
And that is a guiding principle for all the single parents out there who wonder because you turned out great, by the way.
So, so for all the single parents, um, it’s, it’s challenging and when Sandra and I talk to parents, the first thing we say is, um, even though, you know, we’re gonna talk about parenting from the standpoint of a two parent home, neither my father nor Sandra’s father grew up with their biological father in the home and yet they turned out to be fabulous fathers So, um in that way, you’re such a great example for even more people than maybe you might have imagined.
Now, I wanna change the subject if that’s ok.
Um You grew up poor, I think, I think that’s a fair statement.
Um But you have always been generous.
I mean, some of the earliest lessons you taught us had to do with money.
So how in the world is someone who is raised with Very, very, very little.
In fact, some of the my favorite stories that you told me growing up about growing up were just how little you had.
How you uh Christmas stories. I mean, birthday stories were, you know, it was kind of heartbreaking honestly and yet your whole life you’ve been generous.
How did you learn to be generous?
Having grown up with so little because so many people, they go the opposite direction.
I think I’d have to give my mother credit for that.
For example, every once in a while back in those days, some little boy, uh uh a couple of little kids would come up and ask uh and knock on the door and ask, do you all have the bread?
My mom always gave them something and sometimes I’d look and I’d say, well, we’re not gonna have any left.
I don’t think she said no, we go, we’re gonna give them this.
My mom taught me to be generous, to be kind and I knew she made $9.10 a week for 40 hours in the cotton mill.
And she was always generous. She didn’t give much.
But there’s, there was something about her, she had to give something.
And so I think I, I saw that in her.
So when it came time to talk about in the, I never had a problem with that.
And I have been blessed and blessed and blessed and blessed and blessed.
And I would have to say, watching her give a little bit of what we didn’t have much of said something to me deep down inside because I noticed that afterwards, we always seem to have enough.
And again, this was her faith and action in terms of just trusting God to provide for the two of you, right?
Yeah. Um So what, what’s, what’s the connection between your generosity and the local church?
Because that’s always been a passion for you, right?
So I just realized that pretty early, I could not give God no much how, how much I gave, what the motivation was.
I could not give him. He always blessed me over and over and over again.
So I wanted to help other people and I wanted to be, I want to be sure when I stood up and preached other people, been given that I knew in my heart, I gave it the best God wanted me to give ever how much it was.
So, uh you know, it’s not been hard for me to give it.
Giving is just part of me who I am. And I think about how God’s blessed me.
He said giving, it should be given to you. Good measure, pressed down, shaken together. I believe that.
And I can look back up all these years and realize he’s blessed me far more than I deserve that phrase that you just said, I, I grew up here in my whole life.
You can’t out give God, you can’t out give God, you can’t out give God.
I remember I’m not gonna go into detail because it’s so personal.
But I remember an incident, I was a freshman in college when um there was an incident and um you basically had a choice and this is, this happened two or three times to where you could give what you felt.
God had impressed on your heart to give. But it was gonna, it was gonna be actual a sacrificial gift.
And this is one of the great things about you as well. You would talk about this with the family.
You would say this, I feel like God wants us to do this for this organization or um you know, something that’s going on at church.
And if we, if we give this much money, here’s what we’re gonna have to do as a family and you, we would pray about those things.
And, you know, I can remember as a college freshman thinking that’s a lot of money.
And you know, what’s that? Again, you led through your generosity and again, you can’t out give God, you can’t out give God.
And so you taught me to tithe and like you giving the first dime of every dollar I’ve ever made.
My whole life has been easy and it has been easy for me to stand up in front of our church and to teach percentage giving because you taught me that as a child.
And because um I, again, it was a habit we formed so early, like you say, you never miss the money that you give and you never regret what you’ve done with the money that you give.
Um So switching gears again, unless there’s something else you wanna say about it. It’s funny.
Um growing up, uh you know, you would lay down with us at night and we would always want you to tell us stories about growing up.
And so, um I would like to ask you to share two specific stories and then I’m gonna share um share a story.
So let me think the first story I want you to talk about this kind of relates to money, talk a little bit about your paper route.
Um because people kid about oh in the old days, you know, I had to walk so many miles in the snow uphill both ways.
But you literally that, that, that was a literal story for you. So your, your mom is having to work.
She’s making about $10 a week. So you had to go to work early.
So, I think the story of how you developed your paper route is fascinating and we don’t really have, uh, paper boys anymore like we used to.
But that was a talk a little bit about that because that’s part of what transitioned you to the next season of your life.
Well, we had two newspapers. One of them was just on Monday morning since we didn’t have a regular paper on Monday morning.
And, uh, one of them was on Thursday.
And so I kept praying for God to show me something to do.
And so I made some money. So I found out I could, uh, possibly get a paper route.
I only made about four, so, $4 or something like that.
But that was the two days a week and it was a long route and I had a lot of papers but I said, ok, God, I, I, this is what I’ll do and then I kept that for a year and I watched this fella, uh, who, uh, had the large paper morning and evening every day except Sunday afternoon and Monday morning and you were walking, right?
Yeah, I’m walking and it just so happened that all the streets I had were all downhill.
And, um, but it, it was ok.
So, uh, I saw this fellow who had the paper out and made about $20 a week or about 16 to 20 something a week a week.
And so I said, well, if you ever gave up your paper out, I’d like to have it.
So he said, oh, what do you want to give me for it?
And that was not the proper you didn’t buy to sell house, right?
So, he said, well, I’ll sell it to you for 100 and $25.
So I figured that 100 and $25 I’d make it back for too long.
But my stepfather went to the bank with me and I borrowed 100 and $25.
The only time I ever borrowed the money. And, um, so I bought the route.
I started delivering newspapers. I had one long street.
You, I remember you driving me down the street when we would go visit my grandmother and you say it was downhill.
Uh, there was nothing flat in Danville, Virginia. Everything was a hill.
But anyway, anyway, so, and so first thing I did is make sure I tithed how much money I made.
And, um, so I took papers for about, well, till I went to college.
And, um, I saw how God had prospered me and helped me and I could buy some of my own clothes for a change.
And, uh, I had a extra money.
So then of course, I came to the whole situation of how am I gonna go to college or making $16 a week.
I wouldn’t get you in college that I watch. God always provide in ways that I couldn’t figure out.
In other words, I could never have figured out how to go to college, making that kind of money.
And so, um, and this was the second story I wanted you to tell about how you got to college because the, the point of this is your, your confidence in God and your faith in God was not passive.
And this is one of the things you taught me.
You don’t sit back and ask God to do something and then just wait, you, your work ethic has always been extraordinary at the same time carving out the right amount of time for family somehow.
You figured all that out on your own.
Um So you have always modeled, you work as hard as you can possibly work and then you trust God to honor your hard work.
And so once again, this is what happened with the paper route. And then that leads us to this.
Uh this next story is you’re trying to figure out how in the world you’re gonna go to college.
So, right, because I look at 16 to $20 a week.
And I think God, I can’t even get to Richmond, Virginia, let alone go to college.
And so one night, my friend and I were standing on the street kind of just talking.
And um the pastor of the Baptist church came by and I only, I only been member of that church probably a year and he didn’t know me very well.
And so he was coming down the street.
Uh My friend Julian said Mr Hamlet, come over here in just a moment.
And so he told him what I was doing and when I go to school and the Lord, he called me to preach and I didn’t have any money.
Could you help me? And he didn’t know me.
I’ve been going to church but not very long at that particular church.
So he said, come by to see me.
So I went by to see him and we talked for probably an hour or so to make a long story short, I got a four year scholarship to the University of Richmond with no explanation.
I could I know it. Well, he made a few calls and got you into college right on that scholarship.
But again, there it is. Again, you, you do what you know to do.
Um God brings the right person along and then here and when I hear you tell that story, I’ve heard it so many times.
Little. Did he know little?
Did he know that he was the connector between, you know this kid, you know, who has a paper route, who just finished high school, who didn’t have any money.
He was the connector between that unknown kid.
And if I can just you know, brag a bit, Doctor Charles S Stanley who’s preached the gospel all over the world.
And at some points, years ago you were through uh short wave radio, radio and television, you were in every single, um, major city in the world, every single day of the week.
And when I think about what hung in the balance, potentially of his decision to look at this kid.
And apparently there was some sort of internal prompting.
I mean, how many kids in, in Danville, Virginia needed a scholarship to college a lot? Right.
And yet for some reason, he took the time to give you the time.
And then after that conversation leveraged his connections to give you that opportunity and what an extraordinary role he played in your life.
And he had, he had no idea.
And I have seen you do that for so many people through the years again, you can’t do everything for everybody.
But as I say, you know, do for one what you wish you could do for everyone and he did for one what I’m sure he wished he could do for everyone and you have done that as well.
And it always makes me stop and think when somebody asks for something specific or something, I don’t really have the time or the resources to do.
I think we have no idea who God brings into our lives.
But to be sensitive to that still small voice and to do for one. What?
Of course, we can’t do for everyone. OK. Now I want to tell a story.
Um This is my, maybe my favorite um story about my dad and it was such a defining, really a defining moment for me.
So, um you were, had been nominated to be the president of the Southern Baptist Convention.
This was your for the first year.
And there were um some people who did not want you to be the president of the Southern Baptist convention.
49% didn’t, yeah, 49% of about 40,000 delegates. I think that showed up that year.
And so, um we were at a particular school and the president of that school was one of the people who really did not want my dad.
He didn’t, didn’t think my dad was qualified to lead the Southern Baptist convention.
So they had a press conference and uh we were in a big boardroom.
There were, it was packed full of the press. I mean, this was like a big deal.
We were in um Fort Worth and um I snuck in the back and stood against the wall because I lived in Dallas and I had driven over and you were on one side of the table and he, this gentleman was on the other side of the table and he lit into you.
I mean, it was hard for me to not want to come across the table, you know, and, and wring his neck.
He was so critical of you.
Um It was cruel and there’s all these microphones and you know, people leaning in and I remember standing there thinking I was, I could, I was across where I could see your face and your face was so passive.
You were so calm. I remember thinking is he even listening?
Because this guy was literally red in the face and you were just standing there sitting there just I mean, it was amazing.
So when he finished Peggy Way Meyer, I still remember her name Channel Eight News in Dallas leaned across the table with a microphone and she asked this question because the election was the next day I believe.
She said, Dr Stanley, do you think you will win tomorrow?
And you said, and it’s still emotional with this extraordinary peaceful look on your face.
You said, if I win, I win and if I lose, I win because my responsibility is to obey God and to trust Him with the consequences.
And you could have heard a pin drop.
And of course, your opponent had no response to that because you had entrusted yourself as you have done your entire life into the hands of your heavenly Father.
If I win tomorrow, I win.
But if I lose, I still win because the reason I’m running is because I feel like this is what God has called me to do.
You wanna comment on that a little bit because I know you remember that moment.
Well, it was a tumultuous convention and largest convention in history.
And these, all the newspapers, the Baptist papers were writing and, and the secular press, they were all into it.
And, um, they found that I had been a Pentecostal, had always been a Southern Baptist and on and on and on.
They went and I wouldn’t answer anybody the criticism, but I just kept quiet.
And uh so I took AAA four by six car and I folded it and um I wrote on it, wait, you had it with you in that meeting.
I just said that in front of me on the table so that whatever they ask me, don’t give them a quick answer.
Just wait. And so they were just giving me a hard time telling me why I couldn’t be the president.
Well, the truth is I didn’t want to be. Well, that’s the other part of the story.
He really didn’t want to be. I mean, this was, this was just gonna be a big hassle.
You had a big church, you had a lot going on.
And um yeah, this was not your, this wasn’t something you had an ambition to.
So, um I put on their weight so that whatever they ask me, don’t give them a quick answer.
Just wait. And so they asked me, you know, I suppose you lose.
I said I can’t lose. Well, they laughed and she shoved each other, you know.
And, uh, so they asked, oh, what do you mean? You can’t lose?
I said, well, if I win, I win and if I lose, I still win because my goal is to obey God not to be the president.
That was it. That was the moment.
And again, as a, I was in graduate school and again, I’d heard you say those things, teach those things, but to watch you apply it with all of that pressure and with all the energy in the room, it really was, it was just, it was really, was a defining moment I think for me in my faith and just in terms of how I’ve chosen to lead.
So, um that was, and I did and you did win and they were not happy, they were happy.
But it didn’t matter to me because I had on one goal, obey God, they all the consequences to him.
And that leads us to another topic. I wanna talk a little bit about your grandfather.
So you, your father died when you were nine months old.
Uh your grandfather lived in Siler City, North Carolina and you had an opportunity to spend some time with him.
He was also a pastor or preacher. And um he had a tremendous influence on you.
Can you talk a little bit about that, that time with him?
Because again, it’s one of those defining moments that we don’t know is happening.
But he sensed something in you and decided to invest in you.
Those were some interesting conversations you had with him.
I had only seen him twice before I was getting ready to go to college and I thought I’m gonna, I’m gonna go see my granddad.
He’s been a pastor all these years.
So he and I would sit in, sit, sit on his back porch, screened in back porch in a swing and we just, and I just want to hear him talk.
He talked about the Bible and the characters in the Bible and the sermons and on and on the event.
And, um, one of the things he said was, we were talking about being obedient to God.
And he said, um, if God tells you to run your head through a brick wall, when you get there, God will make a hole for it, which is his way of saying He, he didn’t interpret that.
But the way I understood was, well, God assume responsibility for whatever I do that’s obedient to him.
So I walked away and I remember riding all, riding on those old trail buses home and thinking in my mind obey God.
And, uh, you know, I had all kind of thoughts, you know, obey God and leave all the consequences to him.
I thought, well, you can’t lose that way. Obey God. Leave all the consequences to him.
And so I would have to say that is the statement that has given to my life have been perfect.
Of course, given to my life all these years on big decisions, little decisions, obey him, leave the consequences to him.
You can’t lose. Right. That is the win.
It’s the, this is what you taught me to be able to go to bed at night and look up at the ceiling with a clear conscience and to know that things are good between me and my heavenly father.
That’s the win. That’s the goal because we can’t control outcomes anyway.
And every time we try to control outcomes, we just mess it up and make things more complicated.
So, um and again, here, here is the gentleman who in that, you know, just a few days, I think you, you were about 17 years old, you told me when this happened, you had four or five days with him and he left his fingerprints all over your life.
His name, you’re gonna think I’m making this up. But I have a witness.
His name was George Washington Stanley, right? So my, your grandfather’s George Washington Stanley.
And little did he know that that little bit of investment um in his grandson’s life.
Here, we are all these years later telling these stories and quoting him.
So again, we never know who God’s gonna bring along.
And when there’s that internal nudge to give this person a little extra attention to give this person some of your time again, we never know how God’s gonna use that.
And uh once again, so um switching gears a couple more times, I want to talk about perseverance.
Uh This has been one of the themes in your life, not because you chose it, but because you didn’t have, well, you did have a choice, but you were oftentimes left with two options.
Give up or persevere. Um You’ve been through church splits, um betrayal. Um You’ve had some health challenges.
Um And as you know, I’ve had a front row seat to all of this, going all the way back to Miami, you know, to moving to Barto Florida where we lived for 18 months.
Um The challenge of coming to Atlanta when my dad came to the first Baptist Church of Atlanta, he came as the associate pastor, not the pastor and see if I get this right.
And when they showed him his office, you sat down and you went to open the drawer to the desk and all the drawers were locked and all the drawers were locked, no key.
And it’s like, hey, welcome to the church.
And so there was so there, you know, there’s so many stories related to that difficult transition, but you’ve always persevered, you’ve always gotten back up.
You’ve always leaned in and just kept putting one ft in front of the other through extraordinary challenges that we don’t even have time to talk about.
And in some cases, they’re really nobody’s business but talk just a little bit about perseverance because there are people watching people listening, who, especially in this season are going through some really, really difficult times and you just feel like, hey, you know, I never get a break.
It never goes my way. What’s the point in praying God’s not listening? What’s the point in remaining faithful?
God is not responding to my faith? What do you say to that person?
And where did you find the energy or the confidence to just keep getting back up and moving forward?
Well, because I believed with all my heart, if I obeyed God, he’d help me through whatever that was and I won’t get into all those stories.
But time after time after time, I watch God answer my prayer sometime, I thought Lord, you’re late, you’re getting late.
But he always came through at the right time no matter what the situation was.
And I’ve got lots of those illustrations.
But, and one thing also that helped me was I was excited to see what God was going to do next.
And even in the downtime, in the downtime, I think, OK, Lord, I’ve come this far.
I’ve done what you told me to do.
It doesn’t look very good, but I’m gonna trust you and I’m gonna see what happens.
And without fail, God always brought me through every difficult situation. Some of them looked absolutely impossible.
But I thought God, you who you say you are, I’m gonna trust you to prove it. Wow.
Can you or will you tell the story?
And this is a little bit off subject um about the Easter message that you didn’t have the night before Easter.
Um Now, for some of you, this isn’t gonna be very relevant.
But for those of us in ministry, this is a terrifying um story.
And the, the uh the context was you, I guess you had just begun a media ministry in touch had just launched.
And um you know, broadcast ministry is very expensive and there were multiple people doing broadcast ministries and they spent a good portion of their time on the air asking for money.
And so uh in touch, it began to grow and you were at that place where OK, we, we need resources if this is gonna work and then it was Easter.
Easter coming. Well, usually by Thursday, I’ll have an outline for the following Sunday.
So the Thursday came and I didn’t have anything.
It’s like you got to shut up everything and this was Easter Sunday, Easter Sunday.
This is the Super Bowl for us, right? And Fri Friday, no sermon Saturday morning, no sermon, Lord.
Now what he involved, I’m stumbling around trying to figure out what, what, what am I gonna do next?
And Saturday morning, Saturday afternoon, Saturday night, I’m on my face on the floor saying God, I’m gonna be horribly embarrassed.
I don’t, I and you know that I, I could fill up an old sermon, but you won’t let me do that.
So, finally I got on the floor and stretched it and I said, God, ok.
I don’t know what you’re saying, but please say it quick, quick.
And I wasn’t even thinking about this is like the Lord said to me, you must never ask but one penny on the television or radio at all, you must never, never spend any time asking for money.
You trust me and I’ll determine how far this ministry goes.
So, I struggled with that a little bit and I thought, ok, God, you’ve always answered my prayers in some fashion.
I commit myself right now. Never to ask for a penny. And I’ll just see what you do.
Well, I’ve never asked for a penny. Yeah. Yeah.
I don’t have to tell anybody how far is gone. Yeah.
But the pastors who are watching this are thinking. Yeah. But what happened, Easter?
So, what happened after you made that decision? And the next morning I was all fired up. Wow.
Ok. Um, we’re about to wrap this up.
I wanna just talk about something fun for a moment.
You have a hobby that you are so passionate about that.
I think at times it rivals your love for ministry.
So, talk a little bit about the hobby that God has used to fuel you and to energize you re energize you and allow you to see the world.
Well, it has allowed me to see the world. Uh, photography is my hobby.
And I think one of the primary reasons is I’m always looking through the camera lens and seeing what God’s done.
I, I’ve been places from the South Pole, you name it.
And I’m always looking through the lens and I’m always thinking, wow, God, whether it’s fall leaves or snow covered mountains or beautiful creeks and rivers and all the places I’ve been, what it’s done.
It has given me the breaks that I needed.
And when I go somewhere to take a break, I don’t look back.
I don’t think about, I wonder what’s happening here, there and so forth.
So I’m very, very grateful to God that he’s made that a part of my life.
And it’s, it’s just been, it’s been like nourishment to my soul.
I see God and no, it isn’t photography over here and preaching over here.
I just see God in all of that.
And so I couldn’t be more grateful for all the places I’ve been things I’ve seen and you’re really, really good at it.
And, and many people have seen some of your photography, but if you’ve ever visited in touch, um where he has some of his uh favorite photograph displayed, they’re spectacular and of course you’ve done the, the calendar year after year after year.
Um And it really is intimidating.
I, I, you know, it’s, you’re so good at it and every once in a while.
He’d say, hey, let’s, I wanna take you on a photography trip. We’ll go on a short 1, 10 days.
I’m like, wait, you’re, you’re, you’re the five week vacation, dad.
It’s a short, it’s 10 days isn’t a short trip.
But, um, it, it’s been amazing and we have your pictures, you know, hanging around in our home and so many other people do as well.
So, it’s, it’s just great that you’ve had that.
And, um, it really has not, not, not just been an outlet, but it really has become part of the ministry as you’ve been able to share those pictures and talk about some of the, the stories behind some of those pictures.
And she is really not separate because here’s a sermon over here that God’s given and here’s a view of something that people would pass by and never see that I see.
So it’s all part of the same story. All right. Let’s wrap up with this.
One of the other statements I grew up with is this Andy, the most important thing in the world.
The most important thing in the world is your personal relationship with Jesus Christ.
Andy, no matter what else happens, no matter what else is going on, you know, good or bad.
The most important thing in the world, the most important thing in your life is your personal relationship with Jesus Christ.
Now, many people, when they hear that they think about a moment in time that they put their faith in Christ and became a Christian.
But that’s not what you’re talking about.
You’re talking about this ongoing intimacy with God, that it is the most important thing in our lives.
So as we wrap up, would you talk just a little, a little bit about that?
And I think your story, your story growing up uh gives us context for why that’s always been important to you.
But what do you, what do you say to the person who they don’t think in terms of a relationship with God or intimacy with Christ?
What do you mean? When you say the most important thing in your life is your personal relationship with Jesus Christ?
I mean exactly what that says that is we all have relationships with different people and having a personal relationship with God means I’m connected 24 hours a day to the creator, to the savior, to the Lord, the mass of the one who walks with me provides my needs, gives me joy, gives me strength to deal with issues in life.
In other words, a personal relationship with Him isn’t something that comes and goes.
When you go to church, you wake up with Him, you go to sleep with him, talking to him.
You wake up talking to him all during the day.
You see Him in this, see Him in that you, you’re, you’re interpreting life from the viewpoint that God has taught you to look at things and that view point is gonna be always scriptural.
He’ll never tell you to do something that’s unscripted.
So what that does, it makes it possible for you to be happy in difficult times and feeling uh confident and bold and whatever’s going on, you’re gonna make it, you, you’ll, you’ll get through with it.
So it, it provides the foundation for my happiness, my joy. And I am a happy man.
I am a joyous person. And so I just see all that as a part of God building something in me teaching me how to understand Him better and, and, and I, I come home excited about something.
I’m going to show you that God’s made that God has done. So I’m happy.
Yeah, it’s the most important thing in your life is your personal relationship with Jesus Christ.
Well, that as we close, um I would love for you to pray for us.
And um I got, I received so many things from you.
One of the things I didn’t get is your voice. People love your voice and I love your voice.
And so, um I would love for you to close by using that fabulous voice to close us in prayer.
Would you do that? Well, thank you for giving me this time with you and with all the folks that are in touch and thank you for growing up being who you are and I couldn’t be more proud of you and beck and how God has used up both of you in the most wonderful way.
And so when I look back and think, well, lord, I must have made a lot of mistakes, but you must have overlooked Him, Lord, because look what you’ve done.
So I wanna say thank you for being Andy. Well, I appreciate that. It’s, it’s my honor.
I don’t know who else to be what you pray for.
Yeah, father, how grateful we are that you never change awesome God that you are everything your word promises you are.
You demonstrated day after day after day. Would you bless this time that we’ve had together?
May it be an awesome encouragement to parents and people Lord who have raised their kids in difficult situations and people who are just trying to decide Lord, what kind of God you are.
I pray that all that we’ve talked about will help them to be able to realize you’re an awesome God gracious, good loving God.
Willing to take us through difficulty, hardship and pain, willing to always bring us through blessed, blessed by your graciousness and kindness to us.
Thank you father for this time together in Jesus name.
Amen.