Over the last seven years I've spent alot of time at Liberty University. For those who don't know, this is the University that Jerry founded in 1971 in Lynchburg, VA. Before 1999 I had not even heard of this University. I came to the quick realization this was the biggest Christian University in the whole world. I also liked what I saw when I visited this campus. So did my son.
It all started in 1999 when my son was looking for a good Christian University. I barely knew who Falwell was. I mean I knew he was into the political scene, but most of the particulars escaped me while I was busy raising my kids and not really paying much attention. He didn't impress me much is what I remember most........ what little I did know about him that is.
While my eldest was there he started telling me the true stories about Jerry. The stuff the media doesn't report, like the time Jerry saw a kid with no shoes so he took his own and gave it to him or the lady that worked with my other son at Applebee's in Lynchburg and was approaching her thirties but never could afford college. Someday she was going to go. Jerry gave her a full scholarship right there and then while she was waiting on him. My son called me when this happened. Or the time a young boy threw a baseball into Jerry's yard by accident. Jerry tracked him down, signed the ball with the inscription that the ball was worth a full four year paid education when this boy was ready to go to college whether Jerry was dead or alive.
My son would tell me how much these kids loved Jerry. How Jerry was seen often tooling around in his big black SUV sometimes pretending to try to run them over until they had to hop a curb to get away from that menacing black SUV while they walked around campus. In fact it did happen to my son. He would see how the media would distort by cutting and pasting Jerry's comments to fit their agenda about him.
When my son graduated in 2005, Jerry was in poor health. He was advised not to give out the diplomas as he had done every year. He did it anyway. He sat on a stool and wouldn't you know had his picture taken with every single student. We're talking roughly 2500-3000 students. When Jerry came down the aisle the silly string came out. He loved it. I'm not sure but I think he had a can himself under his robe. My son's picture with Jerry is sitting on top of my TV unit even now.
He wasn't some cold son-of-a-gun never to be seen hidden away in some lofty office on campus somewhere. No, he was out and about loving to be around the college kids and always available for them. He was very approachable. He was everywhere. From what I understand he was a very busy man always in the thick of things.
I saw this stuff up close and personal. The ones bitching about him I would dearly love to ask a question. Have you ever met or seen him in person or are you letting the very poor sound bites of the media sway your opinion of this great man of vision?
I have a friend, now in her 50's, who was at Liberty in 1973, two years after it was first founded. She said they had nothing then. Nothing. The students were scrubbing walls and floors and helping this college get a start. Jerry had a vision. He would get up there and tell these very few students back then, that someday they would have a big University on Liberty Mountain for their own kids to come to. Someday they would own the mountain. He would go on to describe his dream. He outlined his plan. Thirty five years later this dream is a reality.
She called me today and said people have no idea the vision he had back then. He had a dream to have children come from all over the world to get a good Christian education for as cheap as they can afford to give it. He made them promises that he kept. He never went back on his promises. He was a man of his word. My friend's granddaughter and grandson are headed to Liberty this coming fall. She hasn't seen it since she was there in the 70's and said to me "I can't wait. I am so excited to be stepping onto Liberty Mountain to visibly see Dr. Falwell's dream for all of us."
I was sitting in the new Thomas Road Baptist Church two weeks ago. I was fortunate to see one of his last two sermons. I sat right near the front. It's funny but his sermon was about being indestructable as a Christian. He spoke about the myth that his pulpit was bullet proof. He laughed as he assured us it most certainly was not. Even though he's had many death threats against him thru the years he knew God was with him. When God was ready, he'd take him home. Well God allowed him see the 50th anniversary of Thomas Road and the moving into this brand new church right there on Liberty Mountain next to his beloved University last July.
I was able to go up to the stage afterwards and stand near him but never did get a chance to talk with him as he was busy with another. So I turned and left. I wanted to thank him for following his vision and the word of God. He truly was a man of deep conviction and love for God. He was doing what God had put him there to do. I mean, how many famous people of his stature can you literally go up and shake his hand and talk to? He was very approachable and friendly. To me he looked big and strong, a bit pale but he always looks pale to me. He was cheerful and encouraging. He baptized many babies that day. The parents and grandparents lined up out the door for the chance for this man to put his hand on their babies and pray over each and every one of them. I did notice he referred to his impending death more than once tho. I wondered if he knew how close it was? He spoke about how his wife was all set so she wouldn't have to marry the next fella that came down the pike. Weird.
Sure he made some dumb statements over the years. Who doesn't make mistakes or say the wrong thing once in a while? He was a man that spoke up, stood up and acted on what he believed was right. Sometimes he did so by speaking without thinking. He took a stand. The left hated him because he was a man of action. This action, mostly directed at them, infuriated them whether it be by churning out strong Christian believers that would someday do battle against them or by diviing into the political arena by creating venues such as the Moral Majority to help take them down. He had their number and they knew it. They hated him because he exposed their lies and hypocricy.
This last trip to Liberty, two weeks ago, I spent in awe as I walked the campus. I had seen many changes over these last seven years. I likened the metarmorphosis of this great place to our great country. Just as I'm in awe of how far we've come in just these last two hundred years comparing our country to countries of old, so too was I in awe of what is still a very young University. Sean Hannity echoed my same thoughts today on his radio program. He just returned from Liberty as well and compared this great campus to the likes of Notre Dame even. I have no idea. I've never been to Notre Dame.
I know Jerry is celebrating now. He gave his life and his all for the God he loved. Because of him many young people are able to go to a great University and worship their God with other students and be educated simultaneously. I love that each class is started with prayer. I love to see the young people, thousands of them at Campus Church with heads bowed and arms around each other as they pray together or with their arms held high as they sing praises to God.
Most of all, I love the fine young men that my sons have turned out to be, and I credit Liberty University as helping to undo what the public schools had tried so hard to do. I , along with many parents of thousands of students, and post grads are secretly thanking God tonight for this man who dared to swim upstream and follow his God in the face of much adversity.
"You choose whom you shall serve, but as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord"-Joshua.
"With the world on the brink of pandemonium, it is our responsibility to point people – no matter their heritage, ethnicity or religion – to the one and only solution, Jesus Christ."
-- The Rev. Dr. Jerry Falwell, May 12, 2007
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