David Wilkerson

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David Ray Wilkerson (May 19, 1931 – April 27, 2011<ref name=cbn20110428>Template:Cite news</ref>) was an American Christian evangelist, best known for his book The Cross and the Switchblade. He was the founder of the addiction recovery program Teen Challenge and the global missionary organization World Challenge, and founding pastor of the interdenominational Times Square Church in New York City.

Wilkerson emphasized such Christian beliefs as God's holiness and righteousness, God's love toward humans and especially Christian views of Jesus. Wilkerson tried to avoid categorizing Christians into distinct groups according to the denomination to which they belong.

Early years

David Wilkerson was born in 1931 in Indiana. He was the second son of a family of Pentecostal Christian preachers, and he was raised in Barnesboro, Pennsylvania, in a house "full of Bibles". His paternal grandfather and his father, Kenneth, were ministers. According to Wilkerson's own testimony, he was baptized with the Holy Spirit at the age of eight.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

The young Wilkerson began to preach when he was about fourteen. After high school, he entered the Central Bible College in Springfield, Missouri. The school was affiliated with the Assemblies of God. In 1952, he was ordained as a minister.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

Life and Ministry

New York gangs and Teen Challenge

Wilkerson married Gwendolyn Rose "Gwen" Carosso in 1953. He served as a pastor in small churches in Scottdale and Philipsburg in Pennsylvania, until he saw a photograph in Life Magazine in early 1958 of seven teenagers who were members of gangs in New York known as "Egyptian Kings" and the "Dragons" which had merged into a single gang called the "Egyptian Dragons".<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref name="NYT">Template:Cite news</ref><ref name="wilkersonpublications">Template:Cite web</ref> He felt a calling from God to minister to those gangs. He later wrote that he felt the Holy Spirit move him with compassion and was drawn to go to New York in order to preach to them. On his arrival, Wilkerson went to the court in which teenagers were being prosecuted. He entered the room and asked the judge for permission to tell them something, but the judge ejected him.<ref name="NYT"/> Upon leaving, someone took a photo of Wilkerson, who then became known as the Bible preacher "who had interrupted the gang trial".<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Soon after this, he began a street ministry to young drug addicts and gang members, which he continued into the 1960s.<ref>Randall Herbert Balmer, Encyclopedia of Evangelicalism: Revised and expanded edition, Baylor University Press, USA, 2004, p. 677</ref><ref name="wilkersonpublications" />

He founded Teen Challenge in 1958,<ref name="TChistory">Template:Cite web</ref> an evangelical Christian addiction recovery program in Brooklyn with a network of Christian social and evangelizing work centers.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> This would expand to "Global Teen Challenge" by 1995. In 2019, GTC reported activity in 140 different nations.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

The Cross and the Switchblade

Wilkerson gained national recognition after he co-authored the book The Cross and the Switchblade in 1962 with John and Elizabeth Sherrill about his street ministry. A joint autobiography, The Cross and the Switchblade sold over 15 million copies in over thirty languages,<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> and was included in a 2006 issue of Christianity Today listing the "Top 50 Books That Have Shaped Evangelicals".<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> In the book, Wilkerson tells of the conversion of gang member Nicky Cruz, who later became an evangelist himself and wrote the autobiographical Run Baby Run. Nicky had been the leader of the "Mau Maus" gang, and he and his friend Israel Narvaez converted to Christianity after hearing Wilkerson preach.

The 1970 film The Cross and the Switchblade, starring Pat Boone as Wilkerson and Erik Estrada as Cruz, is an adaptation of the 1962 book. It was directed by Don Murray.

Goodniks and World Challenge

Template:Distinguish In 1967, Wilkerson began Youth Crusades, an evangelistic ministry aimed at teenagers whom Wilkerson called "goodniks"—middle-class youth who were restless and bored. His goal was to prevent them from becoming heavily involved with drugs, alcohol, or violence. Through this ministry, the CURE Corps (Collegiate Urban Renewal Effort) was founded. In 1971, Wilkerson moved his ministry headquarters to Lindale, Texas. On September 22, he founded World Challenge, a non-profit organization that aims to evangelize globally. Today, World Challenge states it "shares the message of the gospel and serves orphans and widows". The organization is currently led by Wilkerson's son Gary.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

Times Square Church

Having been splitting time between Texas and New York, Wilkerson oft recounted an experience that persuaded him to stay and work in New York. In 1986, while walking down 42nd street late at night, Wilkerson said

"My heart broke over what I saw. At that time, Times Square was populated mainly by prostitutes and pimps, runaways, drug addicts and hustlers, along with live peep shows and X-rated movie houses. I cried out for God to do something—anything—to help the physically destitute and spiritually dead people I saw."

Wilkerson claimed the Holy Spirit called him to return to New York City and to raise up a ministry in Times Square,

"I wept and prayed, ‘God, you’ve got to raise up a testimony in this hellish place. The answer was not what I wanted to hear: ‘Well, you know the city. You’ve been here. You do it.’”.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

This led to his founding of Times Square Church,<ref name="cbn20110428" /> which opened its doors in October 1987 with Wilkerson as pastor. The church first occupied rented auditoriums in Times Square (Town Hall and the Nederlander Theater), before moving to the historic Mark Hellinger Theatre in 1989, from which it has operated since.

Wilkerson did not preach in the name of any specific denomination. Instead, he focused on biblical preaching with the aim of encouraging people to seek God through a personal and deeper knowledge of Jesus Christ<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> and the experience of the Holy Spirit. He said:

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Throughout his ministry, Wilkerson had contact with many other prominent Christian ministers, including Leonard Ravenhill, who was his friend, and Ray Comfort, whom Wilkerson met in 1992 after listening to a message called Hell's Best Kept Secret.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

Through the 1990s, Wilkerson focused on building up his ministry and expanding its associated organizations and their goals.

Wilkerson and his wife Gwen moved to New York City at the inception of Times Square Church in 1987, and in 2006 began splitting their time between New York and Texas. They had four children and eleven grandchildren.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>

Death

On the afternoon of April 27, 2011, less than a month from his 80th birthday, Wilkerson died in a traffic accident. He had a head-on collision with an 18-wheeler in East Texas.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> It is not known what caused Wilkerson to veer to the other side of the road, but the Texas Department of Public Safety reported he was not wearing a seatbelt.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> He was pronounced dead at the scene; his wife Gwendolyn and the truck driver were injured.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>

Gwendolyn Wilkerson died a year later, on July 5, 2012, from cancer, at the age of 81.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

Bibliography

References

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