Gordon Robertson

Sid: My guest by way of telephone at his office in Virginia Beach is Gordon Robertson host of 700 Club. In 1994 he had a dream and he was in heaven with Jesus and he saw a dark gulf between heaven and a large number of Asian people. What did you hear about all of those people Gordon?

Gordon:   Each one of them came to the rocky point and pointed up to me and said “If you would have come I would have believed.” Then they would turn sorrowfully and walk down into the darkness each one. “If you would come I would have believed.”

Sid: So you went home, what did you do with your law partnership and your family?

Gordon: Well two days after that dream I quit my law partnership. (Laughing) Because I realized for the first time that I was not going to be able to enjoy heaven if there are going to be people excluded from heaven because I wasn’t willing to lay down my life. And little did I know that the more that you lay down your life with Jesus the more life you get. I didn’t know the reality of that at that time, but I couldn’t enjoy heaven so on April’s Fools day I went into my managing partner and I quit my law practice. April 2nd I got on another plane because by this time my wife and her family had thought I had sort of lost my mind. And I just needed to get away and so I knew that there was something in the Philippines and so just on an inspiration went there.

Sid: Sounds to me like history was repeating itself, I’m reminded we started this week with your dad giving away everything because he read in the scripture. The only problem was that he didn’t tell your mom and she comes home and the apartment was empty. You were almost in that position.

Gordon: Yeah, I got to the level where my wife knew and didn’t know. I was kind of guarded with what it was we were going to be doing. Just because I didn’t want to be talked out of it I wanted to obey what I’d heard and what I’d seen in that dream. And the dream really got me, I didn’t want to be in heaven with people saying “If you would have come I would have believed.” And I just got on the next plane and went. And I had yet another dream in the Philippines and this time about Pilipino missionaries going out and preaching the gospel to Asia. So without my wife even knowing even where the Philippines was geographically we sold everything and sold our cars or got out of our house. Put some things in storage and with just a couple of suitcases got on an airplane and flue to Manila to live. Where I started a missionary training center called the Asian Center for Missions. And there are a whole series of miracles with that startup and a whole bunch of people that thought I was rather crazy and didn’t know and didn’t know the complexities of being a missionary. And certainly didn’t know the complexities of the various cultures we were trying to reach. But it was just a fire that burned in me, that’s the only word for it.

Sid: You actually got into television in Asia, tell me what it was like hosting your own show there.

Gordon: At the time I thought it was crazy and I actually at one point in my college years I had sworn that I would never go into ministry. And I certainly would not be a host of the 700 Club and there was an American prophet who came to town who didn’t know me at all and this big large meeting 2500 people in auditorium in Manila pointed to me out of the crowd; I was half way to the back of the room. So a friend point me out, the friend didn’t even see me and was miraculous but I guess I’m the only American in the crowd of Filipino’s I guess I was hard to pick out. But he said to me “You are going to be on television and you are going to preach the gospel on television around the world.” And usually when you get that kind of word you start looking for how to put it into practice. And in a very short period of time from that word to reality I think it was 3 months. A whole series of things came together where we were able to start producing a Filipino version of the 700 Club we called it the 700 Club Asia. Just a tremendous anointing on that and it’s from a TV production standpoint it was pretty rough, but from a miracle watching the hand of God move standpoint it was absolutely wonderful.

Sid: I want to jump you now, your dad asked you to be a guest host on the 700 Club. You do that did you know what transpired would happen when you did that?

Gordon: No, actually at that point in time I was so in love with the Philippians and Asia that I didn’t think I was ever going to move back to the United States. Every once in a while that thought would cross my mind, because I loved being in Asia so much I really didn’t want to come back to America. And part of that love was here in America you tend to have a callousness, or a better word a lack of hunger for spiritual things there’s so many other things that want to compete with time. You know its job, career, money, possessions, entertainment and there’s a lot to really breakthrough so that people see well you’re missing it if you’re going for the material side of things. There’s a whole spiritual dimension to life that requires more than lip service, it requires your total dedication. And in Asia they don’t have those distractions and so the real hunger for spiritual things, the real hunger for things of the Lord is much easier to breakthrough. At least it was for me, some absolutely dramatic moments that I pray one day that same hunger will come here.

Sid: Let me ask you a question, obviously you have it in that type of environment but here you come to good old USA you’re sitting almost in your father’s seat doing what he did, doing what you probably almost vowed you’d never do. Here you’re doing this, you’re trying to balance things with your family, you’re trying to be an executive with an international television ministry. How do you stay hot for Jesus?

Gordon: Well actually it’s something that I’ve been wrestling with recently that you can get so busy with the work of the ministry. And one of my favorite books and God just really impressed it upon me in my very first year in ministry in Manila. And it’s Charles Finney’s Revival of Religion. And it’s curious that we’re talking about this just this morning over breakfast table I said to my wife “I think I need revival.” His phrase, Charles Finney said “If at any point in your life you desire to read commentary of about scripture more than you desire to read scripture you have backslidden and you need to be revived.” And that really sort of in very practical terms outlines the hunger. Are you hungry for God?” And you know…

Sid: It’s a good litmus test to find out if your backslidden.

Gordon:   And it really struck home with me just this morning that you know “Am I really hungry for God, am I just going through the motions of ministry. Am I so busy with the work of the ministry that I’ve forgotten my first love and how important it is to feed on His word and to be constant in prayer and stay red hot for Him. So it’s something that is you know is He your first love, do you love Him with all of your heart, with all of your soul, with all of your strength, everything you have. And that’s a constant you’ve got to watch that because the cares or concerns of the world will come whether it’s even business in ministry and you’re doing so many things in so many different countries and places. Is your first love truly God?

Sid: You know something Gordon we could go on and on but I think that’s the point the Holy Spirit wants us end this interview. Thank you so much for being my guest.

Gordon: Thank you.

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