Chuck Norris tells Liberty University grads to follow God's path

Saturday was the first time that television star Chuck Norris ever addressed a college graduation, but Liberty University Chancellor Jerry Falwell Jr. said it wouldn’t be his last.

“I don’t do this very often,” Norris told a crowd of about 20,000 at Williams Stadium. “In fact, I don’t do this at all.”

Norris delivered the keynote address at Liberty’s 35th commencement, which featured the school’s largest graduating class yet of about 4,800 students.

“Chuck! Chuck! Chuck!” the graduates chanted as he walked on stage. They were the ones who convinced Falwell to request Norris as their speaker, Falwell said.

The six-time world karate champion, actor, Internet phenomenon and humanitarian offered a piece of his own life story and said that God brought happiness back into his life.

Norris was born into poverty in Oklahoma, he told the audience, and grew up “shy, introverted and non athletic.”

After graduating from high school, he joined the Air Force, went to Korea, and had his first introduction to martial arts.

He returned home with a black belt in Tae Kwon Do and carried that into more aspects of his life by starting a martial arts school in Los Angeles.

Not long later, he started racking up national and international martial arts titles, and then began acting.

He gained fame and fortune, he said, and became well known for his starring role in the long-running CBS television series “Walker, Texas Ranger.”

But other aspects of his life were lacking, he said.

“I got sucked into the entertainment world of Hollywood,” he said. “I didn’t have that joy and that happiness that I thought I should have in my life.”

That’s when a friend introduced Norris to the woman he later married, Gena, who read to him from the Bible.

“It’s like the Holy Spirit hit me and said, ‘Chuck it’s time to come home,’” he recalled. “I was hot for the Lord, and I still am to this day.”

He told the graduating class to allow God to lead their lives.

“I hope that you’ll let him direct your steps because if you do, you can’t go wrong,” he said.

In recent years, Norris has become an Internet phenomenon from a Web site called “Chuck Norris Facts,” which pokes fun at roles the actor has portrayed.

Norris also made news this year for endorsing former Republican presidential contender Mike Huckabee, who spoke at Liberty during his campaign.

Falwell called Norris “one of the few positive role models left in the entertainment business today.”

Provost Boyd Rist recognized that role by awarding Norris an honorary Doctor of Humanities degree from the school.

After Norris spoke, Falwell took note of the accomplishments of the class of 2008.

“The class of 2008 is the first to graduate from Liberty as a debt-free institution,” he said.

In August, the school announced that a portion of a $34 million life insurance payout on the late Rev. Jerry Falwell had paid off the school’s roughly $20 million debt and also started to build the school’s endowment.

Falwell Jr. said the school’s second generation would work to strengthen that endowment and continue the Christian school’s mission.

“You must be strong in what you do,” he said. “The sky is really the limit to all of you.”

Liberty graduate Nina Polley, of Lynchburg, says hello to her daughter, Lauren, after Saturday’s commencement ceremony on the campus of Liberty University. Polley graduated with a bachelor’s degree in psychology.
Chet White/The News & Advance