James Robison was born October 9, 1943, in the charity ward of a hospital in Houston, Texas. His mother decided it would be better for someone else to raise him, and she placed an ad in the local newspaper. For five years, James lived with Rev. Herbert Doyle Hale and his wife, Katie Bell Hale, who he came to know as Mom and Dad Hale. They gave him a home and led him to Christ. Their abiding love for the Lord and for James changed the entire direction of his life.
Then his mother returned to take him with her. Wherever they lived never seemed like home because they continually moved. But God had a plan for James’s life far greater than anything he could see. Pictured here with his mother, Myra Wattinger, and father, Joe Robison, a man James barely knew or saw for much of his life.
The summer after James graduated from high school, God called him into full-time ministry. Shortly afterward, his longtime friend Billy Foote gave him his first public opportunity to share the love of Christ, and any nerves he had were replaced by the empowerment of the Holy Spirit
He began speaking in churches, and doors quickly opened for crusades in stadiums and arenas nationwide. More than twenty million people would attend those meetings, with over two million recorded decisions for Christ.
In 1968, the James Robison Evangelistic Association began producing television programs to share the Gospel with even larger audiences. What started in a simple studio eventually became LIFE TODAY — a global audience reached through broadcast, cable, and satellite.
Pictured here, James stands with Dad Hale, his foster brother Clayton Spriggs, and Billy Graham, who was one of the very first to encourage him to pursue a weekly television program. These friendships were gifts from God, and James treasured every moment with them.
James spent considerable time in Washington in 1980, including speaking at the March for Life in January on the US Capitol steps and at the Washington for Jesus Rally in April on the National Mall, with more than 300,000 people gathered.
Pictured at the White House in 1981 with Vice President George H. W. Bush, and in 1982 with Betty, Mrs. Reagan, and President Reagan. God opened doors James never sought, and he always tried to walk through them as a servant carrying the message of Christ, not his own agenda.
During that time, James also helped lead the National Affairs Briefing at Reunion Arena in Dallas and had the privilege of introducing then-Governor Ronald Reagan to the crowd. Throughout his ministry, James believing that God’s Word is the only real answer for a nation.
In December 1989, Romania’s Communist dictator was overthrown after 42 years of rule — the only Eastern Bloc revolution to execute its leader. By 1990, the country was holding its first free elections in decades, emerging from repression into an uncertain, fragile future. When James heard the news and saw Romanians shouting for freedom in a town square, God spoke to his heart: “I’m the only way to freedom for those people.” In faith, James went to that very square and preached the Gospel.
That same journey also took him behind what remained of the Iron Curtain — preaching in East Germany even as reunification hung in the air — and onward through West Germany and Poland, carrying the same message of freedom to a region rewriting its history in real time.
From their earliest television appearances — just Betty and James on a simple black-and-white set — to the full LIFE TODAY studio in 1997, television became the vehicle God used to multiply the reach of the Gospel far beyond what any crusade alone could accomplish. LIFE TODAY received the National Religious Broadcasters award for Best Talk Show in both 2006 and 2007.
In obedience to God’s leading, and to reflect the broader scope of the ministry, the James Robison Evangelistic Association changed its name to LIFE Outreach International.
In 2023, James and Betty celebrated sixty years of ministry together — from one nervous teenager preaching in small churches to a global television outreach feeding hundreds of thousands of children every day. James believed every one of those sixty years belonged entirely to God, and that the best was still to come.
