the FaithDome on August 12, 2018.
Stanley O. Williford
Director of Publications
Evangelist Morris Cerullo will almost certainly live on in the hearts of millions around the world, although the elderly warrior passed from this life on July 10. Born in Passaic, New Jersey, in 1931, he may have been the most traveled evangelists of his or any other time.
“I’m 88 years of age, and my time on this earth may not be very long,” he was quoted as telling the San Diego Union-Tribune in December. “I wanted to leave something that would be of value and speak to the principles I’ve upheld for the past 70 years.”
Besides, his life of ministry, that something he wanted to leave, the newspaper indicated, is the massive new Morris Cerullo Legacy International Center in San Diego to “reflect his lifetime of service, both to his faith and to the millions of people his ministered to throughout his life.”
According to the newspaper, Cerullo “ran ministry programs in more than 150 nations on six continents . . . .” The organization he founded in San Diego was appropriately named Morris Cerullo World Evangelism.
It is well documented that Cerullo became an orphan at the age of 2 when his mother passed. Cerullo maintained that his father was a drunkard who deserted his five children. He was placed in a Jewish orphanage and became a Christian at 14. He began ministering at 15.
According to the Cerullo organization website, “At the age of 17, [Cerullo] received a scholarship to a Bible college in New York. By age 23, he was holding his first overseas crusade outreach in Greece.” And by the 1960s, he “was conducting mass overseas meetings with hundreds of thousands in attendance in a single service. Miracles would break out as the power of God would sweep over the crowd, and thousands would give their lives to Jesus.”
“He would often tell those in attendance,” says the ministry website, ‘God doesn’t need a white man from America to come here to reach your nation. God wants to use you!’ By the time of his passing, Dr. Cerullo had personally trained more than 5 million Christian ministers face to face.”
The $200 million Legacy Center was completed just a few months before his passing. He is also credited with authoring many books and devotionals, the site says.
The great evangelist, according to the Christian Post newspaper, authored more than 80 books, including his autobiography entitled, The Legend of Morris Cerullo: How God Used an Orphan to Change the World.
Cerullo and his wife Theresa were married more than 69 years.
