“Call to Me, and I will answer you, and show you great and mighty things, which you do not know.” Jeremiah 33:3 NKJV
“Come now, you who say, ‘Today or tomorrow we will go to such and such a city, spend a year there, buy and sell, and make a profit’; Whereas you do not know what will happen tomorrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapor that appears for a little time and then vanishes away. Instead you ought to say, ‘If the Lord wills, we shall live and do this or that.’ But now you boast in your arrogance. All such boasting is evil.” James 1:13-16 NKJV
My life on earth began at 8 AM Saturday, August 29, 1931.
The month before I was born, C.T. Studd died in Africa. He was born in England, born again there, and served the Lord in China, India, and finally Africa. He left behind the poem: “Only one life, ’twill soon be past. Only what’s done for Christ will last.”
When I was two weeks old, my parents, Mildred and Lawson Dooms, began taking me to a Bible-believing church consistently. The pastor, Leroy “Preach” Blackburn, was a graduate of Moody Bible Institute.
Dwight L Moody was converted to Jesus Christ in a shoe store in Boston. He moved to Chicago to sell shoes, but soon begin sharing the Gospel with children on Chicago streets.
Through a series of providential connections, Mr. Moody developed a far-reaching evangelistic ministry in Chicago, which transpired across America and soon to England. There, Charles Studd attended evangelistic meetings conducted by Mr. Moody and Ira Sankey. Soon Studd’s sons, C.T. and his two brothers, each made the decision to personally “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ.”
Mr. Moody was also developing major ministries in his home area of Massachusetts, but he promised to return to Chicago. Every Saturday morning, a group of ladies prayed that Mr. Moody would establish a training center in Chicago.
Meanwhile, C.T. Studd, serving the Lord in China, received word that his father had gone to his heavenly reward and had left him a substantial inheritance. Receiving it, C.T. said he was going to invest it in “the bank of heaven.” Mr. Moody was notified that he was receiving 25%, and requested it be used in Chicago to help establish the Chicago Evangelization Society. Following Mr. Moody’s death, the ministry became Moody Bible Institute in 1900.
As I reflect on 94 years and counting, encounters with people and ministries that Mr. Moody began have impacted my family and me consistently and significantly, again and again.
Mr. Moody sent Kinny Studd to America to preach on college campuses, and there he won John R. Mott to Christ. In 1900, Mott wrote “The Evangelization of the World in this Generation.” This was well before the Wright brothers’ first flight December 17, 1903; and before radio became reality, Christmas Eve 1906.
Laying the groundwork for what would become TTT Christian Youth Ministries, I was privileged to be the guest of Leroy “Preach” Blackburn and his wife Audry in December 1962. He later gave me a copy of “A Man Spoke, a World Listened: The story of Walter A Meier and The Lutheran Hour.” As a student at Greenville College in January 1950, I was privileged to listen to the memorial service of Dr. Maier over KFUO in St. Louis, the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod’s radio station.
Providentially, at the Mid-America Crusade in Portland Oregon, the determination was made for “The Hour of Decision” radio program featuring the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association team, produced by Cliff Barrows, to begin broadcasting every Sunday, starting from the Atlanta Crusade November 5, 1950.
God willing, February 7, 2026, TTT Christian Youth Ministries will celebrate 60 years and counting: “Telling The TRUTH to/through teenagers” every Saturday consistently, and throughout every week between Saturdays.
Since March 14, 2020, TTT Saturday nights are also online, reaching across the United States and in nation after nation around the world, every Saturday at 7:27 PM via livestream and “on demand.”
“Together Toward Tomorrow” encompasses the continuing story of youth evangelism. It traces how God has used and is using communications breakthroughs – including movable type that Johann Gutenberg used to print the Bible; Samuel F.B. Morse’s invention of the telegraph; Lee de Forest’s innovation of the electron tube making radio possible, and enhancement after enhancement for technology making the Bible available to almost anyone, anywhere on smartphones and other devices.
“It shall come to pass that before they call, I will answer; and while they are still speaking, I will hear.” Isaiah 65:24 NKJV
Are you praying expectantly?