Nearly four months since its opening, visitors from across the country have stepped through a cross entrance to experience the life journey of evangelist Billy Graham and his impact on millions.
The Billy Graham Library, which serves as the 88-year-old's ongoing evangelistic ministry, has attracted local residents, congregations, and travelers from the nearby Charlotte-Douglas International Airport, some of whom returned to experience what they heard decades ago at a past Graham crusade.
"I first heard Billy Graham preach in 1954," said one 91-year-old man from North Carolina, according to the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association. "It's a joy to see this. I've never seen anything like it."
"We came to Charlotte to find lost luggage," said one visitor from Florida. "We had some free time, so we came to the Billy Graham Library. I wasn't able to find my luggage ... but we found something far better."
Visitors are able to walk through multi-media exhibits, film presentations and artifacts that line the barn-shaped library – a 40,000-square-foot complex modeled after the dairy barn Graham grew up around – and also have the chance to tour Graham's childhood home, relocated from about four miles away.
"As the doors to the final gallery opened, one woman of small stature approached me and just threw her arms around my waist and began speaking in a language I did not understand," shared one of the library's counselors. "As she hugged me tightly, she was repeating the same thing over and over … smiling but with big tears in her eyes … Her son approached me and informed me that she was his mother from Seoul, South Korea. He told me, 'She is saying thank you, thank you, beautiful, beautiful, beautiful.'"
Library guests can also explore a prayer garden where Graham's wife Ruth Bell Graham was buried in June. Her grave marker states," Ruth Bell Graham/ June 10, 1920–June 14, 2007/ End of construction. Thank you for your patience." – which she felt was fitting for her gravestone when she saw the words on a construction sign.
She died at her home at Little Piney Cove, surrounded by her husband and all five of their children,,following a lengthy illness. Ruth Graham had been bedridden for months with degenerative osteoarthritis of the back and neck and underwent treatment for pneumonia two weeks before her death.
Billy Graham, who is recovering in his Montreat home after being hospitalized for intestinal bleeding last month, will also be laid to rest at library's prayer garden.
At the end of the Graham Library visit, guests are met by counselors who are available to those who want to make a decision for Christ.
As Billy Graham said at the dedication ceremony of the library in June, the library isn't about him but it's "an instrument."
"It's a tool for the Gospel. The primary thing is the Gospel of Christ," said the aged evangelist.
The library was not built as a memorial but as a ministry to spread the simple message that Graham had preached to more than 210 million people around the world – God's love through Jesus Christ.
"You know, my whole life has been to please the Lord and to honor Jesus, not to see me or to think of me," Graham has stressed.
The library is expected to draw up to 250,000 visitors a year. Admission is free of charge.