"The Rest of the Story"

Our nation lost one of its most trusted and respected broadcast voices with the passing of Paul Harvey on Saturday. The amazing thing about this radio legend was that in just a few minutes of daily airtime, he made millions of Americans feel like they knew him. He wasn’t just on the radio. He was a friend. I’ll personally miss that easily-recognizable voice telling an incredible story, then punctuating it with “And now you know ... the rest of the story.”

A great friend of Billy Graham’s and a true conservative voice, I thought it appropriate to include a prayer Paul Harvey aired on his program several times. Though attributed to Billy and others, it was actually authored by my good friend Bob Russell. Bob is the retired pastor of one of the great churches in the country, Southeast Christian Church in Louisville, Ky.

Heavenly Father, we come before you today to ask your forgiveness and to seek your direction and guidance. We know Your Word says, "Woe to those who call evil good” but that is exactly what we have done. We have lost our spiritual equilibrium and reversed our values. We have exploited the poor and called it the lottery. We have rewarded laziness and called it welfare. We have killed our unborn and called it choice. We have shot abortionists and called it justifiable. We have neglected to discipline our children and called it building self esteem. We have abused power and called it politics. We have coveted our neighbor’s possessions and called it ambition. We have polluted the air with profanity and pornography and called it freedom of expression. We have ridiculed the time-honored values of our forefathers and called it enlightenment. Search us, oh God, and know our hearts today; cleanse us from every sin and set us free. Amen!