In light of the Billy Graham crusade taking place this weekend in New York City, I had to go back into the archives and find this article I wrote back in October, 2004 and re-address the question:

Is The Days of Mass Evangelism Crusades Over?

As I look back on that post written last October, my feelings are still the same. I believe the era of mass crusades are probably over but there will be some men like Greg Laurie and Luis Palau that will continue on with their crusades and the ever popular tent meetings that continue to be popular in rural America.

What will the end of the mass crusade do to American Christianity? Very simple, I feel that the end of the mass crusade will eventually force the church to go back to being more evangelistic in nature. Yes, the church and the people will eventually be forced to go back to fulfilling a Great Commission. In order to effectively do this, we must realize that there is a huge difference between evangelistic and evangelical. Evangelistic refers to a Great Commission lifestyle. Evangelical refers to a theo-political mindset of feminized, butterfly kissing, republican dad of six homeschooled children in the oversanitized home.

Evangelism will force the church to do something that it has attempted for many years to pass on to the government or pass on to the visiting evangelist. That something is called ‘outreach’. Instead on overfocusing on ‘inreach’, it is now time for the church to refocus on ‘outreach’. Outreach can be done effectively in numerous ways. The personal one-on-one method of interacting with relationship via discipleship where people want authenticity and want to see the Christian lifestyle at work in people’s lives is one way. The church going out to feed the poor, shelter the homeless, protect the widowed, and father the orphans is another way.

When Billy Graham finally passes away, the Christian church does not need to worry who will be ‘the next Billy Graham’. Some televangelist does not need to proclaim himself as ‘the next Billy Graham’. The church needs to respect, honor, and be thankful for the things God did in Graham’s life. However, the life work of Graham must never be idolized and molded into a Nehustan or used in a mode of repentance of ‘we need another Billy Graham’ for the nation and church to be great again. Billy Graham is Billy Graham and can only be the best Billy Graham that God has called him to be. The Christian church does not need to give up and state that a dark night is coming upon America and the solution is to vote in more Republicans every November or discovering our forty days of purpose.

The Christian church needs to take up their cross and start evangelizing once again. The Christian church needs to:

• Retain our respect as the social institution that is honest and upfront instead of reverting back to the techniques of Elmer Gantry.
• Shape our culture through actions and deeds, not harsh words and theo-politics.
• Get back to basic, core, and foundational doctrine instead of a formula based Christianity.
• Let’s be beautiful Christians who are American, not ugly obnoxious American Christians.

Graham taught us so much about the character, redemption, providence, and grace of God. The real litmus test will be if we learned character, redemption, providence, and grace or will we idolize the next ’self-proclaimed messiah’ moments after the casket containing Graham’s body is laid to rest and the funeral procession is over.