The Today show shared a clip of Kathie Lee Gifford’s acceptance speech at the 28th Annual Movieguide® Awards. As a result, around 1 million people likely heard the TV star talk about Jesus.
Gifford’s former co-host Regis Philbin presented the Visionary Award to Gifford during the ceremony, which aired on Hallmark Drama Monday night.
“Most of the time I go, ‘Well hey, why me?'” Gifford says in the Today show’s clip of her acceptance speech. “All I’ve been doing my whole life is walking with Jesus. And He takes me on adventures since I was 12 years old. All I wanted to be when I was growing up was an actress and a singer.”
But that wasn’t the only thing Gifford said about Jesus during her speech. According to Movieguide®, Gifford also talked about the moment God called her into media.
“When I sat in that darkened little movie theater in Annapolis, Maryland, when I was 12 years old, and I watched a Billy Graham’s movie called The Restless Ones, it spoke to my heart. I felt like I heard Jesus Himself say to me, ‘Kathie, I love you. If you’ll trust Me, I’ll make something beautiful out of your life.’
“God lives everywhere. And, we’re going to take back everything that the evil one’s stolen, and bring it back for kingdom work. That’s what I was even doing when I was with Regis [Philbin].
“… Now, all these years later, I’m writing movies, I’m producing movies and, by the grace of God, now actually even directing movies in Israel to the oratorios that God has been blessing me to write with some of the greatest writers in this world. I simply cannot believe God’s grace and bounty in my life. I will forever praise him and thank him and, hopefully, make many, many, many movies to come.”
Gifford co-hosted Live! With Regis & Kathie Lee with Philbin from 1985 to 2000. Afterward, she started hosting Today With Kathie Lee and Hoda with Hoda Kotb. Gifford and Philbin have reunited periodically over the years on Today and in Gifford’s musical The Little Giant.
“Here’s the thing. Our dreams are born before we are, in our mother’s womb,” Gifford says. “We’re wonderfully, fearfully made. God has a purpose and a plan for all of us.”
