Charismatic Evangelist & Educator Oral Roberts Has Died at Age 91… Rest in Peace (video)
Posted By Vicki McClure Davidson on December 16, 2009
Religious leader and charismatic TV evangelist Oral Roberts has passed away at age 91... rest in peace
Oral Roberts — at one time, the undisputed giant among religious leaders who preached on television to millions of viewers — has passed away at age 91. While he was often a controversial figure, he inspired and brought faith and hope to millions.
Rest in peace, Rev. Roberts.
CBS News: Oral Roberts Dead at 91
From Tulsa NewsChannel 8: Oral Roberts Dies At Age 91:
The World is mourning the passing of pastor, healer, innovator and religious icon Oral Roberts, who died Tuesday in Newport Beach, California at the age of 91.
Roberts died Tuesday from complications of pneumonia a day after he was hospitalized following a fall at his home in California.
“Oral Roberts was the greatest man of God I’ve ever known,” said Oral’s son, Richard Roberts. “A modern-day apostle of the healing ministry, an author, educator, evangelist, prophet, and innovator, he was the only man of his generation to build a worldwide ministry, an accredited university, and a medical school.”
Roberts founded Oral Roberts University in 1963 and served as the school’s president until 1993.
In May, the Oklahoma Legislature honored Roberts with a resolution honoring his life. He spoke to lawmakers of his mission and his legacy.
“I’ll soon be going home to my heavenly father,” Roberts said. “I look forward to that with great peace and joy. Leaving behind my legacy to bless people.”
From New York Times, Oral Roberts, Fiery Preacher, Dies at 91:
Oral Roberts, the charismatic Pentecostal evangelist whose televised ministry attracted millions of followers worldwide and made him one of the most recognizable and controversial religious leaders of the 20th century, died Tuesday in Newport Beach, Calif. He was 91. The cause was complications of pneumonia, said Melany Ethridge, a spokeswoman for Mr.
Roberts.At the height of his influence, Mr. Roberts sat at the head of a religious, educational and communications enterprise based in Tulsa, Okla., that managed a university, conducted healing “crusades” on five continents, preached the gospel on prime-time national television and published dozens of books and magazines.
From Associated Press: Evangelist Oral Roberts leaves a complex legacy:
Revered by millions who heard his message of God’s healing power, ridiculed by others for tying his own mortality to a fundraising need, Oral Roberts was a towering figure in 20th century American Christianity.
Roberts, who died Tuesday at 91, was largely out of the public’s consciousness in his later years. His most visible legacy predated his death by 45-plus years: his namesake university in Tulsa, Okla., the first Pentecostal university in the world, built by a man who never finished college.
But Roberts also is credited with being at the forefront of taking the Christian message to television, helping make Pentecostal Christianity mainstream before it exploded across the globe, bringing greater acceptance of divine healing and laying the foundation for the oft-criticized “prosperity gospel.”
“He was a quite significant figure,” said retired Harvard University theologian Harvey Cox, who has studied Pentecostalism, the fiery branch of Christianity that Roberts embraced. “He was controversial, he was ridiculed now and then. But he more than survived. He turned out to be quite a big success.”
Roberts was hospitalized after a fall over the weekend. He died of complications from pneumonia Tuesday in Newport Beach, Calif., a spokesman said.
The following excerpt is from a February 7, 1972 article published about Rev. Roberts in Time magazine:
…Roberts’ Easter show, taped last week for airing during Holy Week, is expected to draw even more than the 25 million viewers who watched his Christmas special. Once one of the country’s most flamboyant and most criticized faith healers, Roberts, at 54, has come a long way from the days when his first big tent sat 3,000 on metal folding chairs and he shouted at petitioners who did not respond to his healing. The fast-paced, free-spending ambience of his television tapings, his casual, almost paternal confidence with his guest stars, his natty pinstripes and carefully barbered sideburns are only a few of the signs that the country boy from Pontotoc County, Okla.—who knocked down his last tent in 1968—has left the sawdust trail for good.
Though himself a college dropout, he is president of Oral Roberts University, a $30 million. 500-acre campus in Tulsa, Okla., which in only six years of existence has won full accreditation from the North Central Association of Colleges and Secondary Schools. Though for two decades he conducted his crusades as a minister of the Pentecostal Holiness Church, Roberts was accepted as a United Methodist minister in 1968. This week he will be one of the guest speakers at a Catskill Mountain retreat for Methodist clergymen from New York.
About the author
Oral Roberts spawned a dozen sound-alike ministries that have extracted the cash from Christian pockets for forty or fifty years. They will have to answer to God for their extragance and promises of multiple return of “seed faith money” that put God on the spot to provide those who were trying to “exercise” their faith. i taught there at ORU and he was unreachable for input. When academicians would leave disillusioned, the college (university) will fill their spots with non-higher level trained substitutes. His claims were always bizarre and assured him of some newspaper coverage as a result. I think the most damaging teaching he gave students there and visitors to his center was this aspect of having immediate interpretation of tongues that one had just prayed himself/herself. He said he prayed in tongues forty times a day. That is a lot of time spent not knowing what you ae trying to tell God. His solution was unscriptural; he said you can have your own interpretation. It would be weak prophecy that was less specific than that day’s horriscope. I gave a lot of cash to him; I’m glad he’s gone.
sorry about the few typos in the above comment. I thought there would be some editing allowed. Also, I wouldn’t have had my name appear as the writer as although I try to be truthful, others may now take offense with me personally.