Rev. David Wilkerson:
David Wilkerson, born in Hammond, Indiana on May 19, 1931, was married in 1953 to Gwen Carosso. The Wilkersons' two sons are ministers, and their two daughters are married to ministers. They have 11 grandchildren. The Wilkersons served small pastorates in Scottsdale and Philipsburg, Pennsylvania, until Reverend Wilkerson saw a photograph in Life magazine of several New York City teenagers charged with murder. Moved with compassion he was drawn to the city in February 1959. It was at that time he began his street ministry to what one writer called "desperate, bewildered, addicted, often violent youth."
In that year, Reverend Wilkerson founded Teen Challenge ministries in Brooklyn, New York, which has reached youth and adults with life-controlling problems worldwide through its 490 centers. The ministry's biblically based recovery program for drug addicts has been recognized as one of the most effective efforts of its kind. A study by the United States government's National Institute of Drug Abuse substantiated Teen Challenge's cure rate of 86 percent. Following God's leading, Reverend Wilkerson turned Teen Challenge over to the Home Missions Department of the Assemblies of God.
The David Wilkerson Youth Crusade originated in 1967. Thus began an evangelistic ministry characterized by Reverend Wilkerson's efforts to reach teenagers he called "goodniks" -- middle-class kids who were restless and bored -- to prevent them from being seduced into a life of bondage to drugs, alcohol, violence or lawlessness. Through this ministry, CURE Corps (Collegiate Urban Renewal Effort) was founded. CURE was an effort to harness the idealism and sacrificial zeal of many Christian young people who knew about the Peace Corps and Vista but wanted to give their lives to Christ-centered efforts.
In 1971, Reverend Wilkerson's ever-expanding ministry moved its headquarters to Texas, where he founded World Challenge, Inc. The ministry's mission is to promote and perpetuate the message of Christ through public teachings. As such, World Challenge, Inc. serves as a corporate umbrella for Reverend Wilkerson's crusades, ministers' conferences, book and tract publishing, video production, Bible schools, street evangelism, literature distribution, feeding programs, drug and alcohol rehab centers and other charitable outreaches. He remains president of World Challenge, Inc. which has a mailing list to hundreds of thousands of people who regularly receive copies of his sermons and ministry updates. He and the ministry's staff and board of directors regularly pray for the needs of those on his mailing list. Reverend Wilkerson personally reads as many letters as possible, and his wife, Gwen, reads thousands of them, interceding in prayer for those who write, rejoicing over testimonies of victory, weeping over expressed needs, and believing God to answer every prayer.
In 1986, while walking down 42nd Street at midnight, Reverend Wilkerson's heart broke yet again for God to raise up a ministry in Times Square. He cried out to God to do something, and at one o'clock that morning he sensed the Lord speaking to his heart, "You do something. You start a church. You know the city and you love it." At that moment, Times Square Church was birthed in Reverend Wilkerson's heart. The church opened its doors in October 1987 -- first in rented auditoriums in Times Square and eventually in the historic Mark Hellinger Theater, which the ministry purchased in 1989. Times Square Church is located in the heart of Manhattan's theater district. The beautiful theater stands in contrast to the poverty, wickedness, homelessness, drug traffic and overwhelming needs of the area. And the congregation of nearly 8,000 is a virtual microcosm of New York City's inhabitants: doctors, students, entertainers, teachers, attorneys, ex-convicts, Wall Street brokers, former drug pushers and addicts, CEO's, the homeless, the middle class and the very poor.
His story is told in The Cross and the Switchblade, a book he co-authored which became a best-seller. (The story has been read by over 50 million people in some thirty languages and 150 countries since 1963. In 1969, a motion picture of the same title was released.)
(posted April 2002)