In the fall of the next year, Graham invited the couple to join
him and others for six months of ministry in England. Cliff, with
his musical talents and excellent preaching ability, had a growing
ministry of his own, but he accepted the invitation.
It is said people bond when they live through crises or face
large challenges together. Those cold six months in an England
impoverished by the war challenged the Americans in many
ways. Opposition from clergy, an exhausting schedule, lack of
adequate money—these young men, still in their twenties, were
amazed, stretched, deepened, enriched—together. The chemistry
was right, and they were profoundly influenced by the breadth
and depth of the churchmen they worked with: Anglicans, Ply-
mouth Brethren, Methodists, Baptists, Presbyterians of various
folds. Grady Wilson said the trip “changed Billy’s life. It was the
beginning of the team of Cliff Barrows and Billy Graham.”
By the fall of 1947, Graham was ministering in a campaign in
Charlotte with his core team: Cliff Barrows, Grady Wilson, and
George Beverly Shea. It was Barrows who most matched up to
Billy in striking good looks, spiritual intensity, leadership, and
platform charisma. Later, Barrows and his wife, Billie, were
wrestling with the decision about their own trajectory. Billy had
invited them to join him full time.
William Martin explains the difficulty that presented:
For Cliff Barrows, becoming the second member of the
Graham/Barrows Campaign team meant the subordination
of his own ministry to Graham’s. Such a subordination was not
easy. When he and Billie were not traveling with Graham in
Europe, they were enjoying considerable success with their own
revivals, mostly on the West Coast. Cliff was a gifted preacher,
and he and Billie combined talent, enthusiasm, transparent sin-
cerity, and a remarkable lack of egotism into a highly winsome
package. They clearly had the option to remain in a leading role
with YFC or to establish their own independent evangelistic
ministry, or to get off the road and serve as a pastor.
When we talked to Cliff, we found that even after sixty years,
he vividly recalled the difficulties he then faced: “I struggled with
The Leadership Secrets of Billy Graham