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"...he being dead yet speaketh." |
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Dr. Jerry Falwell
The following biography was
originally published on the website of Jerry Falwell
Ministries at
Falwell.com:
At the age of 22, having
just graduated from college in June of 1956, Jerry
Falwell returned to his hometown of Lynchburg, Virginia
and started Thomas Road Baptist Church with 35 members.
The offering that first Sunday totaled $135. Falwell
often says about the first collection, “we thought we
had conquered the world”. Today Thomas Road Church has
24,000 members and the total annual revenues of all the
Jerry Falwell ministries total over $200 million.
Within weeks of founding
his new church in 1956, Falwell began the Old-Time
Gospel Hour, a daily local radio ministry and a weekly
local television ministry. Nearly five decades later,
this Old-Time Gospel Hour is now seen and heard in every
American home and on every continent except Antarctica.
Through the years, over three million persons have
communicated to the Falwell ministries that they
received Christ as Lord and Savior as a result of this
radio and television ministry.
In 1967, Falwell
implemented his vision to build a Christian educational
system for evangelical youth. He began with the creation
of Lynchburg Christian Academy, a Christ-centered,
academically excellent, fully accredited Christian day
school providing kindergarten, elementary and high
school. In 1971, Liberty University was founded. Today,
over 21,500 students from 50 states and 80 nations
attend this accredited, liberal arts Christian
university. Falwell’s dream has become a reality. A
pre-school child can now enter the school system at age
3, and 20 or more years later, leave the same campus
with a Ph.D., without ever sitting in a classroom where
the teacher was not a committed follower of Jesus
Christ.
Falwell is also publisher
of the National Liberty Journal, a monthly newspaper
which is read by over 200,000 pastors and Christian
workers, and the Falwell Confidential, a weekly e-mail
newsletter to over 500,000 pastors and Christian
activists.
In June 1979, Falwell
organized the Moral Majority, a conservative political
lobbying movement which the press soon dubbed the
"Religious Right." During the first two years of its
existence, the Moral Majority attracted over 100,000
pastors, priests, and rabbis and nearly seven million
religious conservatives who mobilized as a pro-life,
pro-family, pro-Israel, and pro-strong national defense
lobbying organization. The Moral Majority chose
California Governor Ronald Reagan as "their candidate"
for President in 1980, registered millions of new
voters, and set about to inform and activate a sleeping
giant - 80 million Americans committed to faith, family,
and Judeo-Christian values.
With the impetus of the
newly organized Moral Majority, millions of people of
faith voted for the first time in 1980 and helped elect
Ronald Reagan and many conservative congressmen and
senators. Since 1979, about 30% of the American
electorate has been identified by media polls as the
"Religious Right". Most recent major media surveys have
acknowledged that these "faith and values" voters
re-elected George W. Bush in November 2004.
Though perhaps better known
outside Lynchburg for political activism, Jerry
Falwell's personal schedule confirms his passion for
being a pastor and a Christian educator. He often states
that his heartbeat is for training young people for
every walk of life.
Jerry Laymon Falwell, Sr.
HONORARY DEGREES
VOCATIONS AND POSTS
Named the Most Influential
Central Virginian of the 20th Century in a survey
conducted by the News and Advance in Lynchburg,
Virginia, Dec. 1999
Featured on the covers of
Newsweek and Time, and on countless print and broadcast
outlets
Met privately numerous
times with Presidents George Bush, Ronald Reagan, Gerald
Ford, and Richard Nixon. Met with world leaders such as
Egyptian President Anwar Sadat, South African President
F.W. DeKlerk, Jordan's King Hussein, and Israeli Prime
Ministers Begin, Shamir, Rabin, Peres, Netanyahu and
Sharon.
BOOKS
FAMILY
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