INTRODUCTION

billy graham center archives
2007 annual report

After the miracles when Jesus fed the crowds of five thousand and four thousand, there were an abundance of fragments left over and the disciples gathered them up in baskets. The Bible does not say what happened to these fragments. Surely they were not wasted, but instead put to a good use. Archivists, too, in their way deal with remnants, that is to say documents - the letters, photos, recordings and much else that people create individually or in groups. Like the baskets full of bread and fish, archival documents testify both to the physical events of the past and their deeper meaning. They are some of the links that tie the past generations to the present and future.

The BGC Archives is collecting materials that tell a small part of the story of Christian witness - people testifying to others about the Good News of Jesus Christ. It is a story of spiritual goods in earthen vessels, eternal salvation announced through fallen people, inept as well as inspiring, bad as well as good, struggling as well as triumphant. Our collections cannot hope to convey the whole story, since all of people’s lives, not to mention the movements of God, are not recorded on bits of paper, tape, film and electrons. Only a small fraction of what is so recorded is ever preserved. And anyway, the main way that the human past is preserved in the human present is not by artifacts but by the continued unfolding of the impact of past actions and words on people today and, through them, people tomorrow. But archives are also useful. At the BGC Archives we intend to be useful servants to the church and the community at large. We seek to preserve what is true and significant, not what is comfortable, a real reflection of what happened. This, of course, involves selection that is shaped by a commitment to the value of truth and a faith in God's working through humanity.

The themes that tie together our fragmented world (including our archives of remnants) lead to and from Jesus the Anointed One. The disciples had a hard time understanding Jesus' miracles. As we read in the Gospel of Mark, Jesus asked them how many baskets of fragments were left over, and they told Him. He asked, "How is it you do not understand?" The pattern of our fragments in the Archives is also not always clear and can be part of many different stories. As Paul wrote to the Corinthians, now we see as through a glass darkly and understand only in part. But we archivists gather our baskets of remnants in the belief that they can still be means of enlightenment and grace to teach, encourage and warn.

Paul and Bob produced the newest online exhibit, A Sign Unto You: Selected Evangelism Posters from the Collections of the Billy Graham Center Archives and Museum, featuring thirty-nine evangelism posters (see many of the posters spread out in the photo above).

Additional storage was added on the 4th floor to make possible the continued collection of documents about evangelism and missions.

Staff arranged and described 16 collections, some opened for the first time to researchers, while others were expanded by adding more material. Among these were the newly opened the papers of Billy Graham's colleague and musician-evangelist Cliff Barrows, the papers of Harold Renfrow about his service on the executive committee of Billy Graham's 1974 evangelistic campaign in Rio De Janeiro, and the papers of Lois Vashti Gregory, Methodist evangelist and teacher. Additions were made to the Mission Aviation Fellowship records, the Paul Rader collection, and the records of the Kathryn Kuhlman Foundation. Archivists indexed oral interviews with medical missionary William Barnett, Brazilian missionary to Mozambique Jarbas Da Silva, and Zambian Lawrence Temfwe about his prison ministry. They also transcribed 10.8 hours of oral interviews with six individuals, adding these to the Archives' always-growing Web site resources.

Staff welcomed and served 492 researchers to use the Archives collections in the Reading Room, gave presentations or led on-site orientation sessions for twenty-two classes, responded to 1,144 information requests about the collection (74% by e-mail and 46 requests from the BGEA), and provided information, highlighted documents and exhibits through our Web site to over 488,000 individuals in their 1.1 million visits.

Bob drew on recently received materials in his presentation, "Well, the Zamzam has been a long time in sinking!” The Tale of An Uncompleted Voyage," to 150 alumni and others during the commencement weekend Treasures of Wheaton session.

Researchers were given the option to use the photocopier in the Manuscript Reading Room to scan and e-mail images or documents to themselves instead of making paper copies.

The Archives received more than $7,900 in fees and over $8,700 in gifts, with special thanks to the Kathryn Kuhlman Foundation and Carlton & Miriam Ericksen.

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