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The Last Crusade?


M Adrian Young,


JD, MBA, CAP®, CFP®, Executive Vice President


arvel or DC? Your Friendly Neighborhood Webslinger or Te Caped Crusader? No matter where your allegiances lie, the genre of superhero-dom has been entertaining and influencing us since the middle of the 20th century. Although many of the heroes that attract comic book fanatics and moviegoers exemplify an “ideal,” almost godly archetype, some of the most revered by both fans and character creators are those that embody the flaws of our fallen humanity.


In 1962, comic icon Stan Lee introduced Peter Parker and his alter ego Spider-Man to the world. Just a teenager, Parker’s fears of rejection, inadequacy and loneliness made him incredibly relatable to readers. Before Spider-Man’s crusade to help those in need, he wrestled with whether or not to use his extraordinary giftings to benefit anyone other than himself. Spider-Man, and readers, learned that “[w]ith great power, there must also come great responsibility.”


share his giftings with the world. William Franklin Graham, Jr., like all of us, was a flawed human. Unlike so many, however, Billy Graham was an extraordinarily gifted orator who did not let fear, pride or greed stop him from sharing those gifts (and the gospel), no matter the cost.


Graham’s ministry began in 1947 and touched more


than 2.5 billion people before his death in February.


As a registered Democrat and one that often distanced himself from the Religious Right and the “moral majority,” Graham’s cost regularly came in the courts of public and political opinion. Graham was vehement that Jesus doesn’t have a political party and that human freedom and social justice, often objects of “sins of omission,” must be viewed as critically as the more obvious “sins of commission.” Perhaps some of Graham’s most heroic efforts, especially as a “son of the South,” came during the US Civil Rights movement. Not only did Graham’s maturing faith cause him to tear down ropes meant to segregate audiences in the


south, but he also chastised white audiences and Ku Klux Klan members with the notion that “the ground at the foot of the cross is level.”


Te gospel of Luke also reminds us that “[f]rom everyone who has been given much, much will be demanded” (Luke 12:48). In 1962, another crusade (one of nine that year) was being directed by a Southern preacher who, when a young man, also struggled with whether or not to


Graham’s ministry began in 1947 and touched more than 2.5 billion people before his death in February. Reverend Graham educated and influenced those in need with the presence of a superhero, but the humbleness of a broken vessel whose successes and failures continued to drive him to be a better version of himself and a model for the rest of us.


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