History of Teen Challenge

 

The Teen Challenge ministry was founded in 1958 by Rev. David Wilkerson a minister from a small country church in Pennsylvania.

Sitting in his study late one night, Wilkerson was casually thumbing through a Life magazine. An article about a trial taking place in New York, a city to which he had never been, attracted his attention. In particular, an artist's pencil drawing of one of the gang youth on trial gripped him. The artist had caught such a look of bewilderment, hatred, and despair in the boy's features that Wilkerson began to weep.

Here he was 350 miles away from the scene of the trial crying for a member of a youth gang - The Dragons - who took part in the brutal attack and slaying of a 15-year-old paralytic in a New York park. He read the entire magazine article. It revolted him. His secure Christian world was far removed from such senseless violence.

Unexpectedly, an impression, a thought: Go to New York City and help those boys. He recoiled at the very idea, but it came again: Go to New York City and help those boys.

This late-night experience began to define the fundamental principles on which Teen Challenge would be established.

David Wilkerson had made the eight-hour drive from his quiet mountain village to downtown Manhattan for a simple reason: to speak to the seven accused gang members about their salvation. In a grave attempt to share the love of God, Wilkerson had rushed to the front of the courtroom at the close of trial proceedings and pleaded publicly with the judge for permission to meet the teenage defendants. News media were everywhere, and Wilkerson unwittingly made himself the source of headline news throughout New York City.

The judge had been receiving death threats during the trial, and Wilkerson was almost arrested as a presumed assailant. The judge later refused Wilkerson's request to see the boys and ordered him never to return to his courtroom. He returned home but it wasn’t long since he started it to go back to the worse neighbourhoods of New York to reach the gang members.

Today the one-time rural preacher is known as the founder of a international drug rehabilitation program called Teen Challenge that has one of the highest success rates anywhere in the world. Since it's first center opened in New York in 1960, Teen Challenge has grown to over 120 centers in US and over 100 centers in 76 countries. There are 60 rehab centers in 32 European Countries from Russia to Iceland and from Finland to Portugal.

In his book The Cross and the Swichblade Wilkerson describes his spiritual adventure that led him to the streets of New York City and eventually to begin a ministry that would inspire millions and reach around the world. Write to us at valeriu@teenchallenge.ro for a free copy of this book.