A Reformation & Revival Journal Interview with Dr. Timothy George -- By: Anonymous

Journal: Reformation and Revival
Volume: RAR 13:3 (Summer 2004)
Article: A Reformation & Revival Journal Interview with Dr. Timothy George
Author: Anonymous


A Reformation & Revival Journal Interview
with Dr. Timothy George

R R J—Tell us about your childhood, including the social, intellectual, and spiritual influences of your early formative years.

T G—I was born in Chattanooga, Tennessee, on January 9, 1950, in what we would today call a “dysfunctional family.” My father was an alcoholic and my mother, who is still living, had polio. My father died, in the local city jail, when I was only twelve years old, having been arrested for public drunkenness.

In my early years I was brought up by two great aunts, Aunt Mary and Aunt Hattie. Neither of these women could read or write. A lot of the formation I received in my early life came from them, as well as from a godly grandmother who loved me a great deal and took me to church. My aunts took me to what I would call a country church in the city. You understand what I have in mind here since you are a Southerner, too. We had a very emotional style of worship. We would shout “amen” and so forth. It was a wonderful, loving community. We were very poor, yet I remember in the winter when it got very cold these folks would send coal to our home

so we would have fuel to heat our house. They really demonstrated the fruit of the Spirit in their love to us. I have very good memories of church from my earliest days.

One of the pastors was a man named Ollie Linkous. He had a voice that was deeper than God’s, or so it seemed to me as a little boy. I would sit on the front row. Whenever he would say anything really good, which was a lot of the time, I would say “amen.”

R R J—How old were you?

T G—I was four or five, I think. Brother Ollie said I was his “little preacher boy.” I just came to assume that was the case so I started preaching at a very, very early age. I preached to birds, Coke bottles, you name it. I even did a bird’s funeral once. A friend and I buried this bird in a matchbox in the backyard. We put a carnation on it. Then we sang, “I’ll Fly Away,” which was one of the anthems from that wonderful little church. Those are very good memories. There is no doubt that the Lord used it all in a significant way.

But there came a time when I knew I had to make a personal commitment to Christ. As a very young boy I had twice read the Bible through completely by the time I was ten years old, but I had never made a personal commitment to Christ until one Sunday night when I was eleven years old. The pastor preached a sermon on Psalm 116. I remember it very vividly. We had the tradition of an invitation in this church. Peop...

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