A Lifetime Love Affair

My lover is mine, and I am his.

Song of Songs 2:16

He has preached in person to more people around the world than any other preacher in history. More than 2.5 million people have stepped forward at his crusades to accept Jesus Christ as their personal Savior. Of course, you already know we’re talking about Billy Graham.

Have you ever heard of the Billy Graham Rule? As a guard against even the appearance of wrongdoing, the great evangelist had a policy that he would never be alone with a woman, other than his wife Ruth. Perhaps it’s one of the reasons their marriage thrived for more than sixty years.

Billy met Ruth at Wheaton College. “I saw her walking down the road towards me and I couldn’t help but stare at her as she walked. She looked at me and our eyes met and I felt that she was definitely the woman I wanted to marry.” Ruth thought that he “wanted to please God more than any man I’d ever met.”^a

Billy and Ruth married on August 13, 1943. To close observers, Graham was like a schoolkid with his beloved wife right to the end of her life. “Though she’s been gone three years,” says Graham biographer Jerry Jenkins, “he still speaks dreamily of her.”

Jenkins recalls a luncheon several years ago that he and his wife, Dianna, were scheduled to have with the Grahams. It was close to Billy and Ruth’s sixtieth wedding anniversary, but because of failing health, Ruth was unable to join her husband and friends for the meal. Billy, who held his wife’s hand in public and talked lovingly about her often, didn’t allow Ruth’s absence to pass unremarked. The great evangelist, himself on a cane, told his companions, “We’ve learned at this stage of our lives, we can maintain our lifetime love affair with our eyes.”

For six decades, together or apart, in sickness and in health, the Grahams enjoyed a lifetime love affair. Can you think of a couple that you know whose marriage you admire? Let them know what a blessing their relationship is to you and consider inviting them to share from their rich experiences as marriage mentors for the two of you. And while you’re at it, don’t underestimate the encouraging power you two have as a couple to be an inspiration in the lives of another married couple who might benefit from your own marriage wisdom.

A good marriage is made up of two good forgivers.

—Gigi Graham Tchividjian

^a 88

From the book