Faith Doesn’t Quit
In 1975, John had felt the Lord stir his heart to bring Christian television to Oklahoma. In truth, he’d never seen any Christian broadcasts, but he caught the vision. He and four other men filed an application for Channel 14 in Oklahoma City. Having done so, they realized they would need programming and researched who was doing it. They found three companies: PTL with Jim and Tammy Baker; CBN with Pat Robertson; and a third little outfit called TBN with Paul Crouch, which only had two stations. Opting for the third, they called Paul Crouch, who flew out to meet with them. Together, they formed Trinity Broadcasting Network of Oklahoma City in January 1976.
As soon as they filed for the station, several other companies filed on top of them. One was a large company listed on the New York Stock Exchange. Because of its size and resources, John was advised to pull his application and forget about it. He would have done so except for one thing.
“Faith doesn’t quit. It never gives up,” John said.
The FCC attorneys told them to give up, but John believed that it wasn’t the size of the corporation that would determine the outcome; it was his faith and the words of his mouth. Every day he confessed, “Thank You, Lord, for Trinity Broadcasting of Oklahoma City, broadcasting the full gospel of Jesus Christ 24 hours a day, seven days a week, to tens of thousands—even hundreds of thousands of people—who are being saved, healed, delivered and filled with the Holy Spirit; operating in the black, managed by the people of Your choosing, no more and no less.”
He made that confession every day for five years, until the large firm pulled their application and TBN of Oklahoma City got the station. Representing the company, John bought a studio and land for $650,000 and paid another $50,000 for equipment. A year later, he sold half the land for $350,000. On March 4, 1981, the station went on the air with Kenneth Copeland, and Paul and Jan Crouch in attendance.
New Journeys of Faith
“In 1985, Judith and I went to Switzerland,” John recalls. “While we were there we traveled to Campione, Italy, to visit our missionary friends Frank and Tommy Farnsworth. They asked me to speak to a group, and I thought it odd that the Lord impressed me to tell the story of how we believed God for Christian television in Oklahoma. I had no way of knowing that a man in the group, who’d just been born again under the Farnsworths’ ministry, owned a television station in Campione. After I spoke he said, ‘I’d like to sell my station to Paul Crouch and Trinity Broadcasting.’
“Paul flew in and bought the station, naming it TBN Europe as an act of faith,” John recalled. “One month after they closed the deal, the rules changed, forbidding outsiders from owning television stations in Europe. But because Paul already owned one, he was grandfathered in, which meant that TBN was able to expand all over Europe.”
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