Greg Laurie
speaker
159 appearances
1 recordings
1 series
first heard Nov 2024
last heard Nov 2024
Greg Laurie’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.
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Appearances
Problem was, I thought it was kind of cool. I kind of missed the memo. But he was a father figure. So even though I never, because I was not planned. My mom had a one night stand in Long Beach and I was conceived. And I found that out like 30 years later. But because he treated me as a father should treat a son, I've always thought of him and spoken of him as my dad. So here's the cool thing.
Even if you're raised in a broken home and you don't have a biological father, I think a man can step in and be a father figure.
It could be a pastor. It could be a coach. It could be an uncle. It could be a friend. But a man can step in and show a young man or a young woman, because young women obviously need dads too. He can step in and be that father figure for them. And Oscar did that. And then later after I became a Christian, there was a pastor named Chuck Smith.
who was kind of that father figure for a lot of us so it kind of helped me and a lot of other young men find our way and i i think that needs to and like i was saying to you earlier um i watched a film about you and in uh the rise of jordan anderson and and i saw these young men coming up to you and it was so interesting to me because they're very young
And they're reading what you've written, and they've found you on YouTube. One young man said, I was extremely depressed and even suicidal, and you helped me. And I just thought, you're doing that in your way, being a father figure to a generation that is seeking. And I think that's fantastic.
Well, I'm over in this category here. You know, I was the one, like my cousin older than me named Wayne, he is a psychologist, preparing to become a psychologist. And so he did a study on me as a young man. And he said, clearly you're headed in the wrong direction. And I was always getting in trouble at school, always creating chaos. And I think I was just looking for attention.
I was looking for purpose. And so for me, I didn't have any religious hypocrisy to rebel against because I didn't know any religious people. All I knew were basically hedonists, adult hedonists. Right, right. Who didn't give me anything even remotely close to an example worth emulating or following. So all I knew in life at that stage at 17 was like a process of elimination.
I hadn't found what I was looking for, but I knew it wasn't here and it wasn't there. Right. So where was it?
Yeah, if anywhere. But there was something in me that said, it's going to get better.
I think that, I think God, you know, the Bible says that God has put eternity in our heart. And I think that deep inside of us, we're pre-wired to know God. I think that there's a longing, you know, it was C.S. Lewis that called it the inconsolable longing. Something that won't be satisfied by anything. But the right thing. But the right thing. And so that was in me.
And I became an artist, a little cartoonist, and I drew these little cartoon adventures. And I created my own characters because it was a private world I could retreat to. And it was also where I developed a slightly warped sense of humor. It's very sarcastic. Like I was more drawn to reading. I don't know if you've ever seen these Mad Magazine.
instead of normal comic books, because I liked things that were subversive and sarcastic and somewhat irreverent. And I still have that sense of humor today. It's changed somewhat as a Christian, but it's still there. You know, I see the absurdity in situations. I think I see facades maybe a little more quickly. But at the same time, there was a longing for something good and pure.
So when I met my wife-to-be, Kathy.
I was, let's see, I would have been probably 18 years old. And we got married, and we just celebrated 50 years of marriage. We're still together. We're still celebrating, but she's here in the room with us. So to be able to come from a home where my mom was married and divorced seven times with a bunch of boyfriends in between, with a life that was on the wrong trajectory, going the wrong way,
And then to have everything changed, that can't be explained to me.
You know, I've never been to see a psychologist or a psychiatrist, but I feel this is my first time in your life.
Okay, here's what it came down to. This guy who was preaching, his name was Lonnie Frisbee. He said, come up here and I'll lead you in a prayer. And I walked up there and I thought, this isn't gonna work. Where were you? I'm high school, high school. It's high school at lunchtime and Newport Harbor High School in Southern California. and Newport Beach, California. So it's lunchtime.
I've walked forward in this public meeting that I was kind of attending. I was far enough away where I wouldn't be looked like I was a part of it, but close enough where I could kind of eavesdrop. No one invited me. Normally people become Christians because someone invites them to church or they share the gospel with them. No one did that for me.
But I walked over to this evangelist and other kids were praying. He said, pray this prayer with me. And you know, Jordan, this is a prayer that I've led people in for over 50 years. And I've seen their lives changed. And there's nothing magical in this prayer. It's just a prayer based on biblical principles. But all prayer is, is it's communicating with God.
And I don't think it has to be sophisticated. I think it needs to be genuine and from the heart. And the prayer went something along the lines of, God, I know I'm a sinner, but I know Jesus Christ is a savior who died on the cross for my sin and rose again from the dead. And I asked Jesus to come into my life. I didn't know what I was doing, But I believed it.
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