Charles E. Fuller: America’s Radio Preacher by Chris White

  Charles E. Fuller (1887-1968) was born and raised in Los Angeles California.  Today, Los Angeles is the 2^nd largest city in America attracting an ethnically diverse population so great that one sociologist has dubbed it the capitol city of the Third World.  But the L.A. Charles Fuller grew up in was far more rural, mostly white, and was known for fruit-growing and oil production.  The entertainment industry and glamour of Hollywood was a long ways in the future and local residents were more concerned with expanding the water supply and excited about the recent discovery of the La Brea tar pits. 

  After working several years in the citrus growing business, Charles Fuller sensed a call to Christian ministry and began studies at the Bible Institute of Los Angeles ( known as Biola University today).  Biola as an institution was only 10 years old when Fuller began attending.  It was founded by the former president of Moody Bible Institute Reuben Andrew Torrey along with the help of two oil tycoons who were strong Christians.  During his years there, Fuller studied theology under R.A. Torrey and was greatly influenced by him.  

  Upon completion of his studies at Biola,  Fuller was ordained and began pastoring a  Baptist church in 1925.  A few years later he started a small radio show in 1929 that aired locally in Los Angeles.  Every time letters of support exceeded expenses he would add yet another station and soon was broadcasting his program over several states.  The original name of the show was the Heart to Heart Revival hour.  Over time he gradually bought time through the Mutual Broadcasting System until the show reached coast to coast.

  After several years of being a national broadcast, his show faced cancellation because a national tobacco company was willing to buy the entire network during his time slot.  This pressed Charles Fuller to take a step of faith.  He bought full use of the network even though he didn’t have any of the finances in reserve.  He had no denominational or institutional support, but he did have a loyal audience who through the Great Depression kept this show on the air with nickel, dime, and dollar donations sent through the mail.

  With the expansion of the program it was renamed “the Old Fashioned Revival Hour” (OFRH) and it ran from 1937 until Fuller’s death in 1968.  The program began on the Mutual Broadcasting System but eventually migrated to ABC where at its peak was aired on 650 stations.

The show was originally produced in a studio, but during WWII and until 1958, was done live at Long Beach Municipal auditorium.  While the show was live, during the war years, it was also recorded on LP records and aired all over the world for the benefit of our soldiers and other Americans serving abroad.

  Because this was such a widely listened to radio program and because so many of our G.I.’s were sent to the Pacific theatre through Long Beach, the OFRH became a huge Southern California attraction for soldiers on their way to the war who wanted to be part of the huge studio audience.  Other out of state listeners often planned their vacations around being in the studio audience hoping when Charles had them call out where they were from, their family and friends back home would hear them on the show.

  George Barna, the pollster and researcher, credits Fuller with introducing the phrase “personal savior” in reference to Jesus into the evangelical lexicon from his constant use of the phrase in his broadcasts.  Although the program went into decline during the 1960’s as television began overtaking radio, it was by every measurement a great success during its entire history.

  Fuller said his philosophy of broadcasting was to speak to individuals not crowds.  Always when he spoke on the program he had in his mind’s eye people sitting in lonely places listening to their radios for good company and a comforting word.  He was so effective at this that during the program’s hey-day he garnered a weekly audience of about 20 million people.  Every week thousands of letters were received from these listeners, some of them leading quite dissolute lives, but nevertheless loved the program and thought of it as their church.

  Part of the success of the program was Charles Fuller’s sound gift of preaching, but equal to that was its music.  More than half of the program was music which was performed by very talented musicians who worked for the show.  Many who wrote in to the program said they initially didn’t care to hear any preaching but ended up listening to the sermon because they enjoyed the music so much.   Another feature that set the program apart was that Mrs. Grace Fuller would read some of their listener’s letters over the air.  Her calm and reassuring voice was a personal touch that connected with a lot of people.  In fact, if she was not on the program for some reason, many would write in out of great concern.

  Some have suggested that one of the largest factors that helped the OFRH was that it was located in Southern California.  There were several other religious shows on at the time of similar format and length but never as successful.  The fact that Los Angeles California was known as the entertainment capital of America and the world meant Charles Fuller had access to many of the most talented singers, musicians, and producers in the nation.  His show quickly became the one that others imitated.

  Jerry Falwell claims to have been greatly influenced in his conversion by this show when he was a teenager in the 1950’s.  When he was later to rise to prominence in the media, his television show the Old Time Gospel Hour, was greatly influenced by the OFRH.

  In the 1960s the program’s audience went into sharp decline, but so did all radio audiences as well as movie audiences, as television emerged as the leading form of popular family entertainment.  But by every measurement, OFRH remained a successful program until its final broadcast which coincided with Fuller’s death in 1968.  Reruns of the program still continue on the radio today and now there is an online library where you can listen 24 hours a day.

Listen to a program online now. 

America's Evangelists and How They Shaped the Church in America by Chris White

George Whitefield (1714-1770) is arguably America’s first media star.  In Colonial America, when Whitefield came to town, people came as far away as 100 miles to hear him!  Why so? Well, first of all America was in a period of spiritual revival which meant that the Holy Spirit was drawing many and many more had a renewed hunger for the Word of God.  But certainly not far behind this was the extraordinary speaking powers of Whitefield himself.  He spoke extemporaneously and had such a keen sense of timing and presence that people were utterly spellbound by him.  Our favorite founder Ben Franklin, a lapsed Christian of sorts, was actually Whitefield’s literary agent and promoter.  He once said that just to hear Whitefield say the word “Mesopotamia” would bring tears to his eyes.  Apart from his ministry of evangelism, Whitefield changed forever in America the way parishioners related to their pastors.  Prior to this, the town pastor was the spiritual authority and he corrected the wayward as a means of keeping the spiritual temperature of the community where it should be.  Whitefield proclaimed that the sorry state of affairs in Christian living was not the people’s fault but because their pastors were not in tune with the spirit and unfaithful to preach the word.  The solution to the problem is to reform the pastors and make sure they are preaching and teaching faithfully.  This was to be done by congregations voting with their feet.  In some cases this was a true problem, in many others it wasn’t, but the idea gained traction and while it caused a lot of controversy and hard feelings at the time, it did stick.  Although it would be inaccurate to suggest Whitefield alone set the trend of America’s more egalitarian and independent churches, he was definitely one of the strong trendsetters in that direction.

Dwight Lyman (D.L.) Moody (1837-1899) was the great crusade evangelist of America’s “Gilded Age” preaching to the masses in the large cities of America and Great Britain.  Moody was not a clergyman but a lay minister who came from a business background.  He was converted as a teenager but as a young man he had set his sights on making a fortune.  This brought him to Chicago, which at the time was a place of growing opportunities for the young .  In the midst of his pursuits, he had a spiritual encounter with the Lord and shortly thereafter became a man dedicated to Kingdom business.  Moody started with a Sunday School class that reached out to poor immigrant children and their parents and this soon exploded into many other outreaches and enterprises.  Eventually Moody met a musician named Ira Sankey and the two paired their ministries to great effect to do mass evangelism.  Moody, dressed not as a preacher but as a business man and preached not with soaring rhetoric but as a common man to the common man and Sankey, setting the mood of the crusade with memorable and easy to sing melodies played on a portable organ.  Moody was a great success in this enterprise and by his death he is said to have preached to more people than anyone else in history prior to the invention of the microphone.  But Moody also shaped the American church in a very profound way.  His example and his energies were devoted to developing the Christian personal worker.  This was not to denigrate in any way the pastoral profession, but Moody and many others who were like minded, knew that the reach and scope of an army of lay ministers and evangelists were what was needed if the Kingdom of God is to expand.  Moody is known for starting the Moody Bible Institute (although it was not so-called until after his death) which was not a seminary, but a lay training center for men and women seeking greater effectiveness in service to the Lord.  This idea worked and inspired many others throughout America and even around the world to do the same.  Since this time, the values and efforts of the lay minister have been prominent especially in the evangelical Bible churches of our nation.

Little needs to be said about William Franklin “Billy” Graham (b. 1918) as his story is well-known and is still in progress (Graham is now in his mid-nineties).  Graham is the model of the modern evangelist using every means of mass communication to amplify his message preached live before stadiums of people.  Graham’s honesty, character, and frankly his modesty have made many respect him and the Gospel of Christ even if they don’t necessarily agree with it.  The book, Preacher and the Presidents, highlights his relationship with every American president since Harry Truman.  I found it fascinating how Billy had access to this power and sometimes used it and most of the time was used by it, but really never was corrupted by it.  Few ministers can come into contact with the corrosive effect of that much power unscathed which is a tribute to the greatness of God and the keeping power of the Holy Spirit.  When I think of the Graham legacy on the American church, I think of the words cooperative effort.  Few people realize that all along Billy Graham never sought to be the star player, but to train others in any way he could to be soul winners.  Graham not only taught evangelists, but sponsored retreats and camps for pastors to encourage Biblical and gospel preaching in America’s pulpits.  Not only this, but the Billy Graham association has been at the forefront of world missions bringing together some of the largest gatherings of evangelists from around the world to cooperate to finish the Great Commission.  And at a time when most Bible-believing churches would hardly talk to one another much less cooperate, Billy Graham, was at the forefront including all Christian denominations in his crusades and encouraging them to come together for the sake of reaching the lost.  Several years ago I had the privilege of visiting the Billy Graham Center at Wheaton College (Billy’s Alma Mater) and the marvelous museum dedicated to his work.  What was telling about the museum was that while it certainly did tell the story of his life and work, it featured in equal portions quite a bit of information of all the great people that came before him in this task and then ended with an admonition that the work of sharing Christ is all our work.  As America is clearly moving in the direction of being a post-Christian nation, the church in America must stand together like never before.  In that, Billy Graham, has set the pace by encouraging us to set aside the things that don't need to divide us and come together to give testimony to the living Christ.