Nearly 60 years ago, Billy Graham’s first visit to Oklahoma City stirred the hearts of several local leaders.
As their faith grew through studying the Bible and learning from one another, they were instrumental in shaping their city. The 1956 Crusade event, attended by more than 400,000 people, was a turning point that led to years of spiritual renewal for the area.
Now, two generations later, Oklahoma City is in need of revival again, and it looks like the Oklahoma City Good News Festival with Franklin Graham (August 22-23) is coming to town at just the right time.
Joe Rainbolt, leader of the Festival steering committee, is one resident who strongly sensed the need for revival and got the ball rolling on bringing the Gospel to his city.
As a man who worked in the trenches of local ministry for decades, Rainbolt has sensed a growing apathy in area churches in recent years.
“We (he and his wife) felt like apathy was the rule—not the exception—for churches,” he explained. “God continued to impress this thought upon us: Churches need to wake up. They need to be more alert and awake, and more passionate about following Christ.”
What was also alarming to him was the realization that the apathy was being passed down to the younger generation. But in the summer of 2010, as he was in the throes of leading a teen small group, Rainbolt had to step down from his role to deal with some health issues.
But that didn’t get him off the hook.
“By the end of that year, the Lord was tugging at my heart to still be involved in bringing millennials to Him. And that’s when I really became burdened about young people falling away from the church in college and not coming back,” Rainbolt said.
He began to pray fervently about what he was supposed to do. It didn’t take long for God to answer him.
In January 2011, Billy Graham Evangelistic Association’s Rock the River events got his attention: “Our downtown—which sits right by the Oklahoma River—had just undergone a revitalization project. I thought it would be great to bring Rock the River to Oklahoma City, to revitalize our churches as well.”
Rainbolt reached out to his friend, former Oklahoma City mayor Kirk Humphreys, who happened to have a contact at BGEA.
When he got in touch with someone from about the possibility of bringing a Rock the River event to Oklahoma City, he was told there were no more plans for those specific events. However, there was still the possibility of bringing a Festival to the capital of the Sooner State.
“I was asked to gather at least 25 other interested parties. God took it from there and built it. We had 50 pastors show up at that first interest meeting,” Rainbolt said. “It became clear from that first meeting that God’s timing and blessing were all over this.”
As of the last pastor’s meeting, nearly 400 were present—a sign that anticipation for the Festival is growing, and the need is urgent.
One of the interesting parts to this story, Rainbolt added, is the majority of churches involved in the Festival effort are the smaller churches: “This process has very much been a grass roots effort. The larger churches are certainly glad this is happening, but the smaller churches in the area are the ones working in the trenches for this particular event.”
His vision to see many—particularly in the younger generation—come to Christ is matched by his desire for follow-up, discipleship and mentor relationships to happen long after the Festival has passed…much like what happened in 1956 when Billy Graham helped light up the city with the Gospel.
“I hope to see an overall rebuilding of the churches in this city through the people who come to the Lord as a result of this event. I want to see them counseled, mentored and asked to participate in Bible studies,” Rainbolt said.
“I don’t want to see the excitement about what has happened last for only a few weeks or a few months and then die away. I want it to continue and be the forefront of a new movement.”
