{"id":5046,"date":"2022-12-22T11:25:14","date_gmt":"2022-12-22T16:25:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/?p=5046"},"modified":"2022-12-22T11:25:14","modified_gmt":"2022-12-22T16:25:14","slug":"kathie-lee-gifford-recalls-the-first-time-she-met-jesus-at-12-years-old","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/2022\/12\/kathie-lee-gifford-recalls-the-first-time-she-met-jesus-at-12-years-old.html","title":{"rendered":"Kathie Lee Gifford Recalls the First Time She Met Jesus at 12 Years Old"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure id=\"attachment_5052\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-5052\" style=\"width: 484px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\" wp-image-5052\" src=\"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/409\/2022\/12\/kathie-lee-gifford-credit-wikimedia-commons-350x235.png\" alt=\"kathie lee gifford\" width=\"484\" height=\"324\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-5052\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Movieguide\/Wikimedia Commons<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Legendary TV host Kathie Lee Gifford has been a household name for decades. Still, despite her past successes in the media and entertainment industries, her central goal is to honor the Lord.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI\u2019m a woman who believes that, if I say \u2026 I believe in a God who\u2019s all love, I can\u2019t say I\u2019m a follower of Jesus if I don\u2019t try to love like Jesus loved,\u201d Gifford told CBN\u2019s \u201cFaith vs. Culture.\u201d \u201cAnd I fail at it, but that\u2019s my intention every day of my life \u2014 \u2018Jesus, let me see people the way you see them. Let me hear their words in the way You will, but let me have compassion for them.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The former \u201cLive with Regis and Kathie Lee\u201d and \u201cToday\u201d show host said she also asks God to help her see where others\u2019 hurt is coming from and offered a powerful message about her purpose.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI was not put on this earth to \u2026 get Grammy nominations and win Tonys or Emmys and all of that,\u201d Gifford said. \u201cIt\u2019s lovely when those kinds of things happen. That\u2019s just that\u2019s not why I\u2019m on this earth.\u201d She continued, \u201cI\u2019m on this earth to share the Good News that God loves you, whoever you are.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Gifford has spent her life and career seeking the Lord and has increasingly turned her attention to more overtly faith-based books and films. Her recent musical movie, \u201cThe Way,\u201d is now streaming on\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/pureflix.com\/\">Pure Flix<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p><iframe title=\"YouTube video player\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/RG3st_QGoIg\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>Gifford also shared her testimony, explaining her father was Jewish. And while her family believed in God, they didn\u2019t go to a church or synagogue. A natural entertainer, Gifford said she was always attracted to film, and it was a movie that genuinely introduced her to Jesus.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI found myself in a movie theater in Annapolis, Maryland, watching a movie that the Billy Graham Organization had just put out,\u201d she said. \u201cIt was called \u2018The Restless Ones.\u2019 It was a story of a young girl at the cusp of womanhood who had a choice to make.\u201d And that choice, whether to live her life in the world or for the Lord, resonated with Gifford.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI heard literally, maybe not audibly, but very, very powerfully, I heard Jesus [in] my little heart: \u2018Kathie, I love you, and if you\u2019ll trust Me, I\u2019ll make something beautiful out of your life.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Gifford said she got up fast and answered the altar call, embracing Jesus and never looking back. She noted how personal God is, as He met her not at a church or a Christian camp \u2014 but through entertainment, her passion.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI met Him where I already lived, where my dreams already lived and breathed \u2014 at a movie theater,\u201d Gifford said. \u201cAnd that\u2019s the kind of God I want to introduce people to.\u201d It\u2019s incredible that Kathie Lee Gifford remembers the moment she met Jesus. It\u2019s also amazing that she met Him at such a young age, 12 years old. Since that day, God has been moving in Kathie Lee\u2019s life to make her the icon she is today.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Legendary TV host Kathie Lee Gifford has been a household name for decades. Still, despite her past successes in the media and entertainment industries, her central goal is to honor the Lord. \u201cI\u2019m a woman who believes that, if I say \u2026 I believe in a God who\u2019s all love, I can\u2019t say I\u2019m a&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":657,"featured_media":5052,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fbia_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[8,549],"tags":[135,1548],"class_list":["post-5046","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-bible","category-miracle","tag-jesus-encounters","tag-kathie-lee-gifford"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Kathie Lee Gifford Recalls the First Time She Met Jesus at 12 Years Old<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Iconic TV host Kathie Lee Gifford says she met Jesus at 12 years old after watching a movie called &quot;The Restless Ones.&quot;\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/2022\/12\/kathie-lee-gifford-recalls-the-first-time-she-met-jesus-at-12-years-old.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Kathie Lee Gifford Recalls the First Time She Met Jesus at 12 Years Old\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Iconic TV host Kathie Lee Gifford says she met Jesus at 12 years old after watching a movie called &quot;The Restless Ones.&quot;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/2022\/12\/kathie-lee-gifford-recalls-the-first-time-she-met-jesus-at-12-years-old.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" 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