Keith Fordham was recognized for his 50 years of service as a vocational evangelist during a recent Georgia Baptist evangelism conference in Tifton.
Steve Foster, an evangelism consultant with the Georgia Baptist Mission Board, presented Fordham with the award on March 10. “Keith is uniquely gifted by God as a harvest evangelist,” he said. “He has preached the simple gospel in over 1500 revival meetings and evangelistic events and is the epitome of faithfulness in vocational evangelism.”
Fordham’s wife of 52 years, Shirley Alice Waldrop, has been a vital source of support for the Georgia evangelist. For more than 16 years, Shirley and their two children traveled with him — and she continues to do so most of the time.
Not an easy calling
It has not been an easy calling, due to constantly trekking across the nation, nights away from home, moments of loneliness and the occasional struggle to make ends meet during those first years as an evangelist. However, according to Fordham, those things pale into insignificance compared to the joy of seeing people receive Christ as their personal Savior.
Fordham recalled preaching at a revival in a church in North Georgia when a high school student who was a pitcher on the school’s baseball team began to feel convicted by the Lord. He was scheduled to pitch in the game the next night, and that afternoon he called his dad and said, “Dad, I’m not going to pitch in the game. I need to go to church tonight to profess my faith in Christ.”
Evangelists thrive on salvation stories like that one — and it has helped fuel Fordham’s passion to share the gospel even more.
Lives impacted for Christ
Fordham was preaching six years before incorporating his ministry as an evangelist. As a student at Samford University, he preached at youth rallies and student revivals. In one church, 70 people were saved, and 40 of them were baptized by the pastor before the meeting ended on Sunday night.
In 1971 and ‘72, Fordham was interim pastor of Bethel Baptist Church in Jonesboro, where 70 were saved within a two-month period and another 45 added to the church membership by letter. The church attendance increased from 145 to 240.
In 1972, while preaching in a meeting at Central Baptist Church in Decatur, Alabama, two high schools permitted Fordham to preach to an assembly of their students. There were 70 people saved at one of the schools and 60 professions of faith at the other one. Fordham was accompanied by 30 of the church’s laymen who were present to provide counseling to those who trusted Christ.
In the last eight weeks of his education at New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary, Fordham preached eight revivals and still graduated.
It was these experiences that helped confirm and authenticate Fordham’s call into vocational evangelism.
Not only did God validate Fordham’s call into the ministry, but during his 50 years as an evangelist he calculates between 150 and 200 individuals surrendered to full-time Christian service as a result of the revivals he has preached.
Foster describes Fordham’s impact, saying, “Keith has been a mentor to many men over the past 30 years who were praying about the call to vocational evangelism, and his book ‘The Worth and Work of the Evangelist’ has been a guide to help these men know the life and work of the traveling evangelist.”
On Easter weekend 2020, Texas evangelist Sammy Tippit invited Fordham and several other evangelists to join him in hosting the Conference of Southern Baptist Evangelists’ largest evangelistic event ever, which was held online.
The program included singing, gospel presentations and testimonies. According to Baptist Press the event “garnered nearly 400,000 views Easter weekend” with nearly 90,000 viewers watching the entire broadcast.
On the program, Fordham described his bout with a cancer diagnosis. “I know if God wants to cure me, He can cure me,” Fordham said. “If He wants me home, He’ll take me home. I’m ready either way because the Lord Jesus indwells me.”
He added, “I may have communicated my message to more people in those five minutes than I would be able to address in a decade.”
Other talents and travels
The Fordhams are graduates of the Maher School of Ventriloquism, and Keith is a member of the North American Association of Ventriloquists. He effectively uses Homer, his dummy, to teach Bible stories and present brief gospel messages, especially in reaching school age children and youth. Shirley conveys Bible lessons using her “pal,” Joy.
Fordham’s ministry has also had an international impact. He has preached in India on three different occasions where thousands responded to the gospel.
He has also preached in churches across the nation. Some years he has preached as many as 42–45 revivals. When asked if he could estimate how many professions of faith have been made under his preaching and witnessing, he replied, “Only heaven will be able to reveal that number.”
Falling number of evangelists, revivals
Today the number of evangelists has decreased precipitously, and fewer and fewer churches are having revivals.
Fordham suggested, “We have lost the synergy for revivals by having events rather than a series of services to reach the lost. Why not incorporate into our revivals a night for men including a wild game dinner, a night for women with a testimony from a lady who can capture the hearts of women, a youth night with pizza and a praise band, a children’s night with hot dogs and a special children’s feature, and a family night to bless and encourage families?”
To learn more about having an evangelist speak at your church or revival, go to www.sbcevangelists.org.
EDITOR’S NOTE — This story was written by J. Gerald Harris and originally published by the Christian Index.
