“Just this month, Billy brought up his memories of meeting
me when I was a little boy in Boston,” John told us, referring to
the recent visit he and his wife, Anne, had with Billy and Ruth in
their home. John described how all through his career, Billy had
kept up contact.
As a young man, Huffman was studying at Princeton Semi-
nary when Billy spoke there and reconnected with him, asking
him to write an article for Decisionmagazine. “During the Los
Angeles crusade of 1963, he invited me to bring a date to the
Actors’ Guild Benefit Fund Dinner at the Beverly Hilton.” At that
event, John was impressed with Billy’s ability to consistently com-
municate, no matter what the audience. “In front of some of the
most powerful people in Hollywood, he gave as gracious, as lov-
ing, and as faithful a presentation of the gospel as he had done
the previous day at the concluding meeting of 130,000 people at
the Los Angeles Coliseum.”
Billy’s approach to effectively staying on message, as well as
his respect for scholarship and his large vision, formed an essen-
tial model for Huffman. He continued throughout his career to
pursue his studies, pastored major Presbyterian churches in Pitts-
burgh, Miami, and Newport Beach. He currently serves on the
boards of Gordon-Conwell Seminary, CTI, and World Vision,
which he chaired for many years.
As we talked with John after a CTI committee meeting, he
pointed out the way Billy initiated engagement with multiple gen-
erations. His ability to learn from, lock arms with, and inspire
leaders who were older or younger or his peers, reveals a fasci-
nating rhythm of leadership effectiveness—starting with Billy’s
emergence as a young man with much to learn.
First of all, Billy learned from the generation ahead of him:
L. Nelson Bell, Wheaton College president V. Raymond Edman,
as well as President Eisenhower and Senator Frank Carlson. Sec-
ond, he maintained vital connections with those in his own gen-
eration: ministry leaders like Robert Evans of Greater Europe
Mission, as well as those in the national spotlight like Mark Hat-
field, and George H. W. Bush. In addition he was, in John’s words,
Igniting Other Leaders