Latest / Andy Stanley Sermons / Andy Stanley - Life Love Legacy A Conversation with Dr Charles Stanley Part 2

Transcript

Andy Stanley - Life Love Legacy A Conversation with Dr Charles Stanley Part 2 · Andy Stanley Sermons

0:00
Speaker 1: Hi, everybody, Welcome back, and if this is your first
0:02
time joining us, we certainly hope it's not the last time.
0:05
If you were with us last week, you know that
0:07
Today is the second part of a two part interview
0:09
with my dad, doctor Charles Stanley. Dad recently stepped down
0:12
as the senior pastor of First Baptist Church of Atlanta,
0:15
where he served for fifty years, and he just celebrated
0:19
his eighty eighth birthday. So it seemed like a good
0:22
time to sit down and capture some of the stories
0:24
and memories that well, I've heard throughout my entire life,
0:27
and I wanted to share some of those stories with you.
0:29
So today we're headed back down to the In Touch
0:32
studio to wrap up this two part conversation. Before we
0:35
do that, though I know that some of you are
0:37
familiar with my dad's ministry, many of you are familiar
0:41
with his amazing voice. What you may not be familiar
0:44
with is his goal in life. From the very beginning,
0:47
his goal has been to get the Gospel of Jesus
0:50
Christ to as many people as possible, as quickly as possible,
0:53
as simply as possible, and through the years, as we're
0:56
about to discover. He has faced just about every kind
0:59
of challenge you can imagine, and he's going to share
1:02
some of.
1:02
Speaker 2: Those stories today.
1:03
Speaker 1: But throughout all of that, he has never taken his
1:06
eye off the one thing he's felt God has called
1:09
him to do. It has been his north star from
1:11
the very beginning and it continues to be his north
1:14
star to this very day. So here's part two of
1:17
my interview with my dad, doctor Charles Stanley. This is
1:28
my maybe my favorite story about my dad, and it
1:32
was such a defining, really a defining moment for me.
1:35
So you were had been nominated to be the president
1:39
of the Southern Baptist Convention. This was your for the
1:42
first year, and there were some people who did not
1:47
want you to be the president of the Southern Baptist Convention. Yeah,
1:51
forty nine percent of about forty thousand delegates, I think
1:55
that showed up that year.
1:57
Speaker 2: And so.
1:59
Speaker 1: We were at a particular school and the president of
2:02
that school was one of the people who really.
2:04
Speaker 3: Did not want my dad.
2:06
Speaker 1: He doesn't didn't think my dad was qualified to lead
2:08
the Southern Baptist Convention.
2:10
Speaker 3: So they had a press conference and.
2:12
Speaker 1: We were in a big boardroom there were it was
2:15
packed full of the press.
2:16
Speaker 2: I mean, this was like a big deal.
2:17
Speaker 1: We were in Fort Worth and I snuck in the
2:20
back and stood against the wall because I lived in
2:23
Dallas and I had driven over, and you were on
2:25
one side of the table and this gentleman was on
2:27
the other side of the table and he lit into you.
2:32
I mean, it was hard for me to not want
2:34
to come across the table, you know, and ring his neck.
2:37
Speaker 3: He was so critical of you, it was cruel.
2:40
Speaker 1: And there's all these microphones and you know, people leaning
2:43
in and I remember standing there thinking I could I
2:47
was across the where I could see your face, and
2:50
your face was so passive. You were so calm. I
2:53
remember thinking is he even listening? Because this guy was
2:57
literally red in the face and you were just standing there,
3:00
are sitting there.
3:03
Speaker 2: Just I mean, it was amazing.
3:05
Speaker 1: So when he finished, Peggy Waymeyer I still remember her name,
3:09
Channel eight News in Dallas leaned across the table with
3:12
a microphone and she asked this question because the election
3:16
was the next day, I believe. She said, doctor Stanley,
3:19
do you think you will win tomorrow? And you said,
3:26
and it's still emotional, with this extraordinary peaceful look on
3:31
your face. You said, if I win, I win, and
3:34
if I lose, I win, because my responsibility is to
3:39
obey God and to trust him with the consequences. And
3:45
you could have heard a pin drop, And of course
3:48
your opponent had no response to that, because you had
3:53
entrusted yourself, as you have done your entire life, into
3:57
the hands of your heavenly Father. If I win tomorrow,
4:00
I win. But if I lose, I still win because
4:02
the reason I'm running is because I feel like this
4:04
is what God has called me to do. I want
4:08
to comment on that a little bit, because I know
4:09
you remember that moment right well.
4:11
Speaker 4: It was a tumultus time in the convention, and largest
4:15
convention in history, and these all the newspapers, the Baptist
4:21
papers for writing, and.
4:23
Speaker 3: The secular press, they were all into it.
4:26
Speaker 4: And they found that I had been a Pentecostal, had
4:31
not always been a Southern Baptist.
4:33
Speaker 2: And on and on and on they went.
4:35
Speaker 4: And I wouldn't answer anybody it's criticism, but I just
4:38
kept quiet. And so I took a four x six
4:44
card and I folded it and I wrote on it, Wait.
4:50
Speaker 2: You had it with you in that meeting. Yeah, I
4:52
heard it. I just said that in front of.
4:54
Speaker 3: Me on the table.
4:55
Speaker 4: Yeah, so that whatever they asked me, don't give them
4:58
a quick answer, just wait. And so they were just
5:03
giving me a hard time, telling me why I couldn't
5:05
be the president.
5:06
Speaker 1: Well, the truth is I didn't want to be. Well,
5:08
that's the other part of the story. He really didn't
5:11
want to be. I mean, this was just going to
5:13
be a big hassle. You had a big church, you
5:15
had a lot going on, and yeah, this was not
5:18
your this wasn't something you had an ambition toward.
5:22
Speaker 4: So I put on their weight so that whenever they
5:26
asked me, don't give them a quick answer, just weight.
5:31
And so they asked me, you know, suppose you lose.
5:33
I said, I can't lose. Well they laughed and she
5:37
shoved each other, you know, And so they asked, well,
5:42
what do you mean you can't lose. I said, well,
5:45
if I win, I win, and if I lose, I
5:48
still win, because my goal is to obey God, not.
5:51
Speaker 2: To be the president. Yeah. Did so, Yeah, that was it.
5:55
That was the moment.
5:56
Speaker 1: And again as a I was in graduate school, and
6:00
again I'd heard you say those things, teach those things,
6:04
But to watch you apply it with all of that
6:07
pressure and with all the energy in the room. It
6:09
really was it was just it really was a defining
6:12
moment I think for me in my faith and just
6:14
in terms of how I've chosen to lead.
6:17
Speaker 3: So that was me and I did when and you
6:19
did win. And they were not happy.
6:21
Speaker 4: No, they weren't happy. Now it didn't matter to me
6:24
because I had on one goal obey God, leave all
6:28
that consequence to see him.
6:29
Speaker 2: Yep.
6:31
Speaker 1: And that leads us to another topic. I want to
6:33
talk a little bit about your grandfather. So your father
6:37
died when you were nine months old. Your grandfather lived
6:41
in Siler City, North Carolina, and you had an opportunity
6:44
to spend some time with him. He was also a
6:47
pastor or preacher, and he had a tremendous influence on you.
6:52
Can you talk a little bit about that time with him,
6:55
because again, it's one of those defining moments that we
6:57
don't know is happening, but he sensed something in you
7:01
and decided to invest in you.
7:03
Speaker 3: Those were some interesting conversations you had with him.
7:06
Speaker 4: I had only seen him twice before. I was getting
7:09
hey to go to college, and I thought I'm going
7:13
to go see my granddad who's been a pastor all
7:15
these years. So he and I would sit in sit
7:20
on his back porch, screened in back porch in a swing,
7:25
and we just and I just wanted to hear him talk.
7:27
He talked about the Bible and characters in the Bible
7:29
and the sermons, and on and on they went. And
7:35
one of the things he said was we were talking
7:40
about being obedient to God. And he said, if God
7:45
tells you to run your head through a brick wall,
7:48
when you get there, God will make a hole for it,
7:51
which is his way of saying. He didn't interpret that,
7:55
but Douey I understood was well, godlessue responsibility, but whatever
8:00
I do, that's obedient to him. So I walked away,
8:03
and I remember riding riding on those whole trailway buses
8:07
home and thinking in my mind, obey God. And you know,
8:13
I had all kinds of thoughts, you know, obey God
8:17
and leave all the consequences to him. I thought, well,
8:20
you can't lose that way. Obey God, leave all the
8:23
consequences to him. And so I would have to say
8:27
that is the statement that has governed in my life.
8:31
Have been perfect, of course, given to my life all
8:35
these years, some big decisions, and the decisions obey him,
8:39
leave the consequences him.
8:41
Speaker 2: You can't lose, right, That is the wind. This is
8:46
what you taught me.
8:46
Speaker 1: To be able to go to bed at night and
8:48
look up at the ceiling with a clear conscience and
8:51
to know that things are good between me and my
8:54
heavenly father. That's the win, that's the goal, because we
8:58
can't control outcomes anyway, and every time and we try
9:00
to control outcomes, we just mess it up and make
9:03
things more complicated. So and again, here here is the
9:06
gentleman who in that you know just a few days.
9:09
I think you were about seventeen years old. You told
9:11
me when this happened, you had four or five days
9:13
with him, and he left his fingerprints, yes, all over
9:17
your life. His name, You're going to think I'm making
9:20
this up, but I have a witness. His name was
9:22
George Washington Stanley. Right, So your grandfather's George Washington Stanley.
9:27
And little did he know that that little bit of
9:30
investment in his grandson's life. Here we are, all these
9:34
years later, telling these stories and quoting him. So again,
9:37
we never know who God's going to bring along and
9:40
when there's that internal nudge to give this person a
9:43
little extra attention, to give this person some of your time. Again,
9:46
we never know how God's going to use that switching
9:49
gears a couple more times. I want to talk about perseverance.
9:53
This has been one of the themes in your life,
9:55
not because you chose it, but because you didn't have Well,
10:00
you did have a choice, but you were oftentimes left
10:02
with two options, give up or persevere.
10:06
Speaker 2: You've been through.
10:07
Speaker 1: Church splits, betrayal, You've had some health challenges, and as
10:12
you know, I've had a front row seat to all
10:14
of this, going all the way back to Miami, you know,
10:16
to moving to Bartow, Florida, where we lived for eighteen months,
10:20
the challenge of coming to Atlanta. When my dad came
10:23
to the first Baptist Church of Atlanta, he came as
10:25
the associate pastor, not the pastor.
10:28
Speaker 3: And see if I get this right.
10:29
Speaker 1: And when they showed him his office, you sat down
10:33
and you went to open the drawer to the desk.
10:35
Speaker 2: And all the drums were locked and no key.
10:39
Speaker 1: All the drawers were locked, no key, and it's like, hey,
10:42
welcome to the church. And so there was so there,
10:45
you know, there's so many stories related to that difficult transition.
10:48
Speaker 3: But you've always persevered, You've always.
10:51
Speaker 1: Gotten back up, You've always leaned in and just kept
10:53
putting one foot in front of the other through extraordinary
10:57
challenges that we don't even have time to talk about,
10:59
and in some cases they're really nobody's business. But talk
11:02
just a little bit about perseverance, because there are people watching,
11:05
people listening, who, especially in this season, are going through
11:08
some really, really difficult times and you just feel like, hey,
11:13
you know, I never get a break, It never goes
11:15
my way. What's the point in praying God's not listening,
11:18
What's the point in remaining faithful?
11:20
Speaker 3: God's not responding to my faith? What do you say
11:23
to that person?
11:24
Speaker 1: And where did you find the energy or the confidence
11:27
to just keep getting back up and moving forward?
11:31
Speaker 4: Well, because I believed with all my heart if I
11:34
obeyed God, he'd help me through whatever that was. And
11:38
I won't get into all those stories, but time ups
11:42
the time after time I watch God answer my prayer.
11:45
Sometime I thought, Lord, you're late, you're getting late. But
11:49
He always came through at the right time, no matter
11:51
what the situation was. And I've got lots of those illustrations.
11:55
But and one thing also that helped me. I was
12:01
excited to see what God.
12:03
Speaker 3: Was going to do next, even in the downtimes.
12:06
Speaker 4: In the downtimes, I think, Okay, Lord, I've come this far.
12:10
I've done what you told me to do. It doesn't
12:13
look very good, but I'm gonna trust you and I'm
12:15
going to see what happens.
12:16
Speaker 2: And with that failed.
12:17
Speaker 4: God always brought me through every difficult situation. Some of
12:22
them looked absolutely impossible, but I thought, God, you who
12:28
you say you are. I'm going to trust you.
12:30
Speaker 2: To prove it. Wow, can you or will you? Tell
12:34
the story?
12:35
Speaker 1: And this is a little bit off subject about the
12:38
Easter message that you didn't have the night before Easter. Now,
12:44
for some of you this isn't going to be very relevant,
12:46
but for those of us in ministry, this is.
12:48
Speaker 3: A terrifying story.
12:51
Speaker 1: And the context was you, I guess you had just
12:55
begun a media ministry. In Touch had just launched, and
13:00
you know, broadcast ministry is very expensive, and there were
13:03
multiple people doing broadcast ministries and they spent a good
13:07
portion of their time on the air asking for money.
13:10
And so in Touch began to grow and you were
13:13
at that place where, okay, we need resources if this.
13:17
Speaker 2: Is going to work. And then it was Easter Easter coming. Well,
13:22
usually by Thursday I'll have.
13:24
Speaker 3: An outline for the following Sunday.
13:26
Speaker 2: Yeah, So the Thursday came and I didn't have anything.
13:30
It's like, God, shut up everything.
13:32
Speaker 1: And this was Easter Sunday, Sunday, this is the super
13:35
Bowl for us, right, yeah?
13:36
Speaker 2: And Friday, no sermon, Saturday morning, no sermon. Lord.
13:42
Speaker 4: Now having the FOD, I'm stumbling around trying to figure
13:46
out what am I going to do next? And Saturday morning, Saturday,
13:51
Then Saturday night.
13:54
Speaker 2: I'm on my.
13:55
Speaker 4: Face on the floor saying, God, I'm going to be
13:59
horribly emburied. Yes, and you know that I could fill
14:02
up an old sermon, but you won't let me do that.
14:06
So finally I got on the floor and stretched it
14:08
and I said, God, Okay, I don't know what you're.
14:11
Speaker 2: Saying, but please say it quick quick. And I wasn't
14:16
even thinking about this.
14:17
Speaker 4: Just like the Lord said to me, you must never
14:19
ask for one penny on the television al radio at all.
14:26
You must never never spend any time asking for money.
14:30
You trust me, and I'll determine how far this ministry goes.
14:34
So I struggled with that a little bit, and I thought, Okay, God,
14:38
you've always answered my prayers in some fashion. I commit
14:42
myself right now never to ask for a penny, and
14:45
I'll just see what you do. Well, I've never asked
14:50
for a penny. Yeah, I don't have to tell anybody
14:53
half far in Wad's gone.
14:55
Speaker 1: Yeah, but the pastors who are watching this are thinking, yeah,
14:58
but what happened Easter?
14:59
Speaker 3: So what happened after you made that decision?
15:02
Speaker 2: And the next morning I was all fired out?
15:04
Speaker 1: Wow, Okay, we're about to wrap this up. I want
15:10
to just talk about something fun for a moment. You
15:13
have a hobby that you are so passionate about that
15:17
I think at times it rivals your love for ministry.
15:20
So talk a little bit about the hobby that God
15:22
has used to fuel you and to energize you, re
15:25
energize you and allow you to see the world.
15:28
Speaker 2: Well, it has allowed me to see the world.
15:31
Speaker 4: Photography is my hobby, and I think one of the
15:34
primary reasons is I'm always looking through the camera lens
15:39
and seeing what God's done. I've been places from the South, Old,
15:45
you name it, and I'm always looking through the lens.
15:48
I'm always thinking, Wow, God, whether it's fall leaves or
15:53
snow covered mountains or beautiful creeks and rivers, and all
15:59
the places I've been, what it's done. It has given
16:02
me the breaks that I needed. And when I go
16:04
somewhere to take a break, I don't look back. I
16:07
don't think about wonder what's happening here then and so forth.
16:11
So I'm very very grateful to God that He's made
16:16
that a part of my life. And it's just been
16:19
it's been like nourishment to my soul. I see God
16:22
and know it's It isn't photography over here and preaching
16:25
over here.
16:27
Speaker 2: I just see God in all of that.
16:29
Speaker 4: And so I couldn't be more grateful for all the
16:32
places I've been, things I've seen.
16:37
Speaker 3: And you're really really good at it.
16:39
Speaker 1: And many people have seen some of your photography, but
16:42
if you've ever visited in Touch where he has some
16:45
of his favorite photograph displayed, they're spectacular.
16:49
Speaker 3: And of course you've done the calendar year after year
16:52
after year, and.
16:53
Speaker 1: It really is intimidating. I you know, you're so good
16:57
at it, And every once in a while he'd say, hey,
16:59
let's I want to take you in a photography trip.
17:01
We'll go on a short one ten days. I'm like, wait,
17:04
you're the five week vacation. Dat, it's a short ten days.
17:07
Isn't a short trip. But it's been amazing And we
17:11
have your pictures hanging around in our home, and so
17:14
many other people do as well.
17:16
Speaker 3: So it's just great that you've had that.
17:19
Speaker 1: And it really has not just been an outlet, but
17:21
it really has become part of the ministry as you've
17:24
been able to share those pictures and talk about some
17:26
of the stories behind some of those pictures.
17:28
Speaker 4: You see, it's really not separate because here's a sermon
17:31
over here that God's given and here's a view of
17:36
something that people would passed by and never see that
17:38
I see. So it's all part of the same story.
17:43
Speaker 3: All right, let's wrap up with this.
17:46
Speaker 1: One of the other statements I grew up with is this, Andy,
17:49
The most important thing in the world. The most important
17:53
thing in the world is your personal relationship with Jesus Christ.
17:56
Speaker 2: Andy, no matter what else.
17:58
Speaker 1: Happens, no matter what else is going on, you know,
18:00
good or bad, the most important thing in the world,
18:03
the most important thing in your life is your personal
18:05
relationship with Jesus Christ. Now, many people when they hear that,
18:10
they think about a moment in time that they put
18:12
their faith in Christ and became a Christian. But that's
18:14
not what you're talking about. You're talking about this ongoing
18:18
intimacy with God, that it is the most important thing
18:22
in our life. So as we wrap up, would you
18:23
talk just a little bit about that? And I think
18:25
your story, your story growing up, gives us context for
18:29
why that's always been important to you. But what do
18:33
you say to the person who they don't think in
18:36
terms of a relationship with God or intimacy with Christ.
18:39
What do you mean when you say the most important
18:41
thing in your life is your personal relationship with Jesus Christ.
18:44
Speaker 2: I mean exactly what that says.
18:46
Speaker 4: That is, we all have relationships with different people, and
18:50
having a personal relationship with God means I'm connected twenty
18:55
four hours a day to the Creata, to the Savior,
18:59
to the Lord. The mass of the one who walks
19:01
with me provides my needs, gives me joy, gives me
19:06
strength to deal with issues in life. In other words,
19:09
a personal relationship with Him isn't something that comes and
19:13
goes when you go to church, you wake up with him,
19:16
You go to sleep with him talking to him, you
19:18
wake up talking to him all during the day.
19:20
Speaker 2: You see him in this, see him in that.
19:23
Speaker 4: You're interpreting life from the viewpoint that God has taught
19:28
you to look at things, and that viewpoint is going
19:32
to be always scriptural. He'll never tell you to do
19:35
something that's unscriptural. So what that does It makes it
19:40
possible for you to be happy in difficult times and
19:44
feeling confident and bold and whatever's going on, you're going
19:49
to make it, You'll get through with it. So it
19:52
provides the foundation for my happiness, my joy. And I
19:59
am a happy man. I am a joyous person. And
20:02
so I just see all that as a part of
20:05
God building something in me, teaching me how to understand
20:11
Embetta and I come home excited about something. I'm going
20:15
to show you that God's made that God has done.
20:18
So I'm happy.
20:20
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's the most important thing in your life.
20:23
Speaker 2: This is your personal relationship with Jesusus Christ.
20:27
Speaker 3: Well, that is we close.
20:30
Speaker 1: I would love for you to pray for us, and
20:34
I got I received so many things from you.
20:37
Speaker 2: One of the things I didn't get.
20:39
Speaker 1: Is your voice people love your voice, and I love
20:45
your voice, and so I would love for you to
20:48
close by using that fabulous voice to close us in prayer.
20:51
Speaker 2: Would you do that? Well?
20:53
Speaker 4: Thank you for giving me this time with you, and
20:55
thank you for growing up being who you are. And
20:58
I couldn't be well proud of you and Beck and
21:01
how God has used both of you in the most
21:04
wonderful way. And so when I look back and think, well, Lord,
21:07
I must have made a lot of mistakes, but you
21:10
must have overlooked them, Lord, because look what you've done.
21:13
Speaker 2: So I want to say thank you for being Andy. Well.
21:16
I appreciate that. It's my honor.
21:18
Speaker 3: I don't know who else to be.
21:20
Speaker 2: Would you pray for you? Yeah?
21:21
Speaker 4: Father, how grateful we are that you never change. Awesome God,
21:26
that you are everything your word promises you are, you
21:31
demonstrated day after day after day. Would you bless this
21:35
time that we've had together. May it be an awesome
21:38
encouragement to parents and people Lord, who have raised their
21:42
kids in difficult situations, and people who are just trying
21:46
to decide, Lord, what kind of God you are. I
21:49
pray that all that we've talked about will help them
21:52
to be able to realize you're an awesome God, gracious, good,
21:58
loving God, willing to take us through difficulty, hardship and pain,
22:03
willing to always bring us through blessed, blessed by your
22:09
graciousness and kindness. Told us, thank you Father for this
22:13
time together. In Jesus' name. Amen.
22:17
Speaker 1: So yeah, imagine going to bed every night and having
22:20
that voice praying over you as you fell asleep. You know,
22:23
growing up, it wasn't uncommon for people to ask me, Hey, Andy,
22:26
what was it like to have Charles Stanley as your dad?
22:29
And I would always say the same thing. I would say,
22:31
I don't know, because he's the only dad.
22:32
Speaker 2: I've ever had.
22:34
Speaker 1: But now that I am a dad, I have so
22:35
much more perspective, and of course I have so much gratitude,
22:40
as he just illustrated. You know, every challenge we face
22:43
in life is eventually just a story that we tell,
22:46
And one of the things I learned from my dad
22:48
is to make sure that I'm.
22:49
Speaker 3: Writing a story worth telling. He certainly has.
22:52
Speaker 1: And the other thing he taught me by way of example,
22:55
is that our current chapter or your current chapter is
22:58
not the final chapter.
22:59
Speaker 3: It's not the whole story, So don't give up keep going.
23:02
Speaker 1: God always has a plan and as my dad would say,
23:04
his ways are best.
23:07
Speaker 3: So what was it like to grow up with my
23:09
dad as my dad?
23:10
Speaker 2: It was amazing And I hope someday.
23:12
Speaker 1: My kids will say the same thing about me, And
23:14
if you have kids, I hope your kids will say
23:16
the same thing about you. That's it for this week.
23:19
As always, thank you so much for joining us. We
23:21
will see you right back here next time, and in
23:23
the meantime, write a story that you'll be proud to tell.