Making a Difference

Yesterday was the funeral for Oral Roberts. Having graduated from Oral Roberts University in 1976 (yes, I know how old that makes me!), I had an opportunity to see him from a much closer perspective than most. So I appreciated the honesty of his children as they shared that he wasn't perfect and wasn't always there for them. They talked about how driven he was. There is no doubt that Oral was not perfect. He may have pushed too much in some of his projects. But he tried to obey God whenever he felt God was telling him to do something. And the results were stupendous, and will probably only be appreciated by future historians. He founded the first Pentecostal University. He was instrumental in founding the Full Gospel Businessmen. He preached to hundreds of millions around the world. He had the top rated religious program in the country. He was not afraid to preach Christ wherever he went. So often we find that being close to those we have admired from afar leads to a lessened respect for them. The opposite was true of Oral. The more I saw of him, the more I respected him. Just one story from my time at the University: One night at work, I and several of the other waiters at the restaurant who were ORU students were concerned because one of the busboys who was from ORU, and who was always on time, was not there. It was about a half hour after he was supposed to get there. When he did arrive, he told us that he had been running on the indoor track about two hours earlier when he tripped and fell and broke his ankle so bad that the bones were actually puncturing the skin. Oral happened to be running at the same time, and he came over and laid hands on our friend. He had gone to the school nurse to have it looked at, but he knew that immediately he had been healed. After all, he could no longer see the broken bones and he could once again walk. He was late because the nurse had to verify. But he had been healed right there! I don't know if I was more amazed that Oral had prayed for him and he had been healed, or that Oral was on the track running and took the time to check out what had happened. God truly worked through Oral. May I obey God's voice as completely as Oral did!

Pastor Ken