(Photo courtesy of Oral Roberts Ministries)There has been an outpouring of love for Oral Roberts since his passing earlier today.
I went to Oral Roberts University in Tulsa. It's where I met Brian. We were deeply enmeshed in the culture of ORU, serving as RAs (both of us), chaplains (Brian), Head RA (me), Vice President of Student Services (Brian) among many other pursuits. We fell in love on that campus, made out in the baseball field after curfew and it was where I ran, to see my friends, when we got engaged when we had just turned 21(!). My best friends were there. My sister and I were roommates. I loved my girlfriends and my profs. I loved my studies and I loved my independence. I came into myself at ORU. It was the end of one chapter of my life and the opening of many new paths for me.
I've been conflicted about ORU, even during my time there. I hold no illusions. I wonder/ed about many aspects of it, not the least of which is the "bubble" that you live in there and the theology held by its more extreme staff and students. I was there during the Pastor Schuller years and at the height of the "Money cometh!" debacle. I cringed over the mismanagement of the university over the years.
But I love it. I love it because it is like family. And Oral is, in a way, like family.
Whatever you can say about his life - and much has been and will be said - he was obedient to what he believed God had told him. Even if it cost him dearly. Sometimes he was spectacularly wrong.
But here's the thing: he did it.
He couldn't conceive of mincing steps; he stepped out in faith with a leap and whoop, in front of millions. His vision for the City of Faith is one of the greatest visions from a Christian leader in the 20th century.
I loved Oral's bigness. There was nothing small about the man. He was huge - even his ears were enormous. His voice was big, his sermons were bigger. He boomed "Something GOOOOOOOD is going to happen to you!" and he'd swing his arm like a fighter going in for the uppercross. His faith was enormous and an easy target. When he experienced tragedy - within his family or through his decisions - it was on a grand scale. But when he experienced heights, joy and success, it was big.
In his later years, I remember hearing him preach that his one piece of advice was to "obey God." Whatever else you do, just obey God.
He had guts. He didn't live in a world of "cover-your-ass." He stuck his neck out.
In chapel, we were surrounded by words written on the walls. The words that Oral felt God speak to him about the founding of the university (most of us can still recite it):
"Raise up your students to hear My voice,To go where My light is dim,My voice is heard small,And My healing power not known,even to the uttermost bounds of the earth.Their work will exceed yoursand in this, I am well pleased."
I am happy for Oral. I am happy that he is with his "darling wife, Evelyn" (as he never failed to refer to her) at last. I am happy that he is, I believe, resting in the arms of Jesus, hearing the words "Well done, my good and faithful servant." I am thankful he lived to see his university become strong again, headed towards a bright future. I am thankful for his every act of obedience, for starting ORU and reminding us every day that it was "forged in the fires of healing evangelism." For his leadership, his guts and his love. I am thankful for his three hour long sermons, right over lunchtime. I am thankful for his memoirs, his big ears, his "expect a miracle!" and "something good is going to happen to you"s. I am grateful for his life. His legacy lives on in millions of us, all over the world.
Also, I am grateful for how uncomfortable he makes me. For how he makes me wonder if my plans and dreams are too small, how he makes me wonder if I am putting God in a box, how he challenges me to open wide my expectations, my heart and my obedience to all that God is and has and does.
Expect a miracle.
