Billy Graham, who is arguably one of the world’s most famous evangelists, turned 93 on Monday. The preacher has enjoyed a career spanning six decades, and recently admitted he fought against the idea of growing older.
"I fought growing old in every way," Graham wrote in his latest book "Nearing Home," a book filled with advice on the dealing with the changes of life caused by age. "I faithfully exercised and was careful to pace myself as I began to feel the grasp of Old Man Time. This was not a transition that I welcomed, and I began to dread what I knew would follow."
Graham is world-renowned for the massive crusades he led as a younger man where whole sports stadiums would be booked out to hear him preach. While Graham has always been associated with the evangelical movement, he is immensely respected by people from all sorts of different faith backgrounds.
"It's his influence on the broader public that's intriguing," Grant Wacker, a professor at the Duke University Divinity School, who's working on a biography of the evangelist told the Huffingtonpost. "There are a lot of people who are not evangelicals who really admire him."
Wacker believes the respect that Graham has gained across the spectrum is partly because his longevity, partly because of a well-earned reputation for integrity and trustworthiness, but also because he has shown the ability to evolve in his belief systems. Wacker cited Graham’s movement from a strident anti-communist early on to a position advocating nuclear arms control in the 1970s as an example of this.
"He's acquired first a national and then an international vision over the years," Wacker said. "Whether or not they like his theology, people admire anybody who can grow into a wider vision."