Inspirational Speaker - Wintley Phipps - Motivational & Success Speaker

thank you very much thank you good evening my name is wintley phipps I was unconscious when they gave it to me and at the age of 14 years old I woke up one morning talking like this it really messed up my father if you can imagine your 14 year old going hey Dad how you doing not long ago I ran into James Earl Jones and I couldn't resist I walked up to him and I said this is CNN and he said how long have you had that it is so exciting to be here tonight I want to thank the president of this great organization and my dear friend Willie jolly I see is here and is just awesome to be in such a remarkable group of people and for the next few moments I'm just going to share like I always do one of my favorite quotes comes from one of my heroes of history I'll talk about him in a little bit Sir Winston Churchill who once said that for a message to be immortal it does not have to be eternal and so for the next few moments I'll just share as I am led first I want to tell you that it is an amazing gift what I'm about to tell you can only happen in America the story I'm about to tell you could only happen in America my resume is really weird very eclectic you see on the same page Billy Graham Crusades and Saturday Night Live you'll see Robert Schuller's our power and you see Soul Train I know most of y'all have no idea what Soul Train is oh I guess I got some boomers out here but a man called me one day and said sir I heard you sing this song about giving your life to God I sing inspirational music he said I want you to sing that song on Soul Train and I said to myself how is this man going to get me on Soul Train because that's all I've done is inspirational music I add you see I learned that you don't have to compromise to be recognized I've learned and so he called up the host Don Cornelius and said I want you to put this young man on Soul Train Duncan Ely said I'm sorry I can't put anything religious on Soul Train and the gentleman said looked down all you got is young people dressed funny and you know bumping into each other and what this young man is trying to say in his music those are the very young people who need to hear it and Don Cornelius said I'm sorry sir I can't put anything religious on Soul Train then the man said listen Don my name is george johnson of johnson products company you know ultra sheen afro shame and my company's been back in your show for the last eight years next thing I knew I was the first gospel artists on Soul Train and it has been a remarkable ride only here in America I was born in Trinidad in the Caribbean and at the age of 10 my family moved to Montreal Canada where I grew up some Canucks are here and to be a part of my new family and my new country I joined a hockey team and they made me goalie because I couldn't skate far for those of you who didn't get that that's the equivalent of Jamaican bobsled inaudible and I was actually born to a very difficult family situation and I used to get away from my parents troubles I had a little red tricycle and I'd go in the backyard of my house and turned the tricycle on its side and use one of the backside wheels as a steering wheel and I would sit there for hours and I would dream and I would dream that I was flying and driving too far up away places in the world and meeting important people when I was four and five and six years old when we moved to Montreal I'll never forget my father used to take us to the airport to say goodbye to people who are going back you remember when going to the airport was a big thing you pack a lunch my father took us to the airport to say goodbye to people and before leaving therefore I look around to see if anybody is looking I would grab a handful of the luggage tags and stuff them in my pocket and I go home and close the door and get a pencil and print my name wintley phipps flight 393 London flight 676 Paris and growing up in all this confusion all my life however I have had heroes who had mentored me some of them I've never met Sir Winston Churchill was the hero whom entered me I'll never forget in 1995 I took a trip to his gravesite beside a little Church in Oxford in England and early it was VE Day fifty years after the fall of the German Reich him I'll never forget I was by this gravesite and there were floral tributes that had been left earlier that morning before I got there by freedom fighters from Greece and France and Norway who fifty years later could not forget what's the Winston Churchill meant to the world in a critical hour of Earth's history but there was one tribute that I did not disturb but I read it it was obviously written by an American it was on a single sheet of paper handwritten an American flag in the corner and this American was thanking sir Winston Churchill for what he meant to the world and in it he closed with words of John F Kennedy about Sir Winston Churchill who once said of Churchill he commissioned the English language and sent it off to war and that's what you do commissioned language and sent it off to war some of the heroes have never met George Washington Carver did a documentary on his life you know who is the indented peanut butter probably your hero dude but he said one day he said he asks God to show him the mysteries of creation and God told him you can't handle the mysteries of creation ask for something you can have he said then he asked God show me the mysteries of the peanut another one of my heroes was dr. Martin Luther King jr. I remember sitting watching a film Montgomery to Memphis black and white and hear this speech I have a dream and heard pathos like I've never heard it before and I resolved in my heart I wanted to be like that kind of man who was willing to even die for what he believed I've had heroes that I've never met hey I never met him but Luther Vandross was one of my oh my goodness that man could paint a thousand colors in one song can I tell you something about singers if you may never know every singer in every song makes mistakes but the great ones the great ones know how to make us stumble look like a pirouette the great ones dazzle you with their recovery and then I've had heroes that I've met and I've worked with but it's been my joy to know I was the last one to sing amazing grace for Mother Teresa before she died I was in the crowd that welcomed Nelson Mandela when he came out prison I was on an Eastern Airlines flight year remember them years ago Los Angeles to Atlanta big l-1011 always used to fly like that you know and I saw this lady and flight attendant she looked a little discouraged so I went back to my seat and I got a cassette of my first album you remember cassette and I said to her you know I just feel impressed to give this to you the kind of music I sing his inspirational music she said thank you so much she said I travel with a cassette player and she said thank you I've been having a rough time and this will be really a blessing three days later she's working another flight and runs into a man who's on the flight by the name of cliff barrows who directed all the choirs and the music for the Billy Graham Crusades for about fifty years she says mr. barrows is such an honor to have you on my flight she said but can I ask you something have you ever heard of a young man by the name of wintley phipps she said he said no I've never heard him she says hold on a minute she went to her purse and got that cassette and had it at to him saying this has been a blessing to me but I want you to have it three weeks later I got a call from cliff bear saying we want you to become one of the soloists with the Billy Graham Crusades and for 25 years for 25 years it has been my honor to travel all over this country in some other parts of the world with great hero of mine and so some of the heroes I've met and some I haven't one of the things I must tell you about those heroes though they inspired me to dream they inspired me to dream but my greatest heroes our names you may never know Elaine that was my mother's name when she saw that I had this gift and drive she wanted to channel it right so she bought me some temptations cassettes and I became the temptations all by myself I can do I can turn a grey sky blue work with bigger brood you know whatever I want oh I use all the voices you know oh I forgot to tell you about two other heroes that I met growing up in the 60s okay growing up in the 60s I confess I want it to be another Sly Stone but then I met sly and he was stone and I said no something's wrong with this picture my hero is incoherent and then I would get a microphone and I practice singing like my new musical hero I'd walk around the house singing it's not unusual to be loved by anyone oh I want to be Tom Jones so bad but I met Tom Jones I was 15 years old can I tell you something about Canada that I love about Canada Canada's always kind of ten years behind America in its innocence you could get away with stuff ten years longer and in Canada than you can in too well let me explain it this way I had a job one time a summer job selling ladies dresses in Canada door-to-door I had a rack a dresses and I'd knock on the door and they opened the door and let me in and look at all the different styles and stuff and if they found the size they wanted they would go in the back room while I was in the house try it on and if they liked it pay me for it right there now you know you couldn't do that in America so I love Kevin but some of the heroes ii-i've been blessed and one of them was my mother she was an incredible human being I want you to meet perhaps one of the greatest heroes of my life she happens to be here today it's my wife of 34 years Linda will you mind saying hello to Linda Linda will you stand I chased her till she caught me and I told her she ever leaves me I'm going with it but my wife is an incredible human being I'll tell you a little bit about her later but she is you know it's nice to be married for 34 years and look 34 and she's the only woman I know that has been kissed by the man who loves her on every continent of the world except Antarctica she has been kissed in China in Australia in Africa in South America in Europe Hey and that great best my life thank God for the heroes who inspire us to dream and invest in us another name you never know from muna Singh Michigan up in the U P in 1972 I got ready to go to Oakwood college in Huntsville Alabama I hitched a ride from Canada to Alabama to go to school and I got there and I loved I'd never seen the school but I loved it when I saw it and I went to the counter and I said I didn't apply but I want to register lady said what did you say your name was I said my name is wintley phipps she said hold on a minute she went to the back she came out she said there's a ledger card here with your name on it with a credit of six hundred and thirty three dollars everything you need to register this lady from muna Singh Michigan heard I was driving down to this school and sent them money down so I can get in school I was there for four years in college and she never sent me any more money but every mother's day she heard from me every Christmas she heard from me I graduated went on to the seminary and I was doing a master's degree and she called me one day she said hey how's your album coming as an album what happened she said what's the hold up I said oh it just cost so much money she said what's it gonna cost I said I just picked out the largest figure ever said with my mouth I said at least ten thousand dollars she said oh I'll give you ten thousand dollars and in 1978 this lady brought out a check for $10,000 and that's how my singing recording career began from unison Michigan I can't name it all the heroes William Warfield you ever heard that name married to Linton price you know he had to be able to sing William Warfield I remember going to visit him he was a teacher in Champaign Urbana and there he said I said to him I don't know what I'm doing I'm just singing he said I don't know how you're doing it but you're doing a lot of things right said my dad used to say you got a car that's running right don't give it a tune-up just leave it alone he said I'd leave it alone don't let nobody touch that another one of my heroes that is invested into my life was a man by the name of Alex Haley who wrote the book roots I'll never forget before he died he is to keep in his office a picture of a turtle sitting on a fence he said that was his way of reminding himself that he didn't get there on his own a hero who invested in my life and you know as I looked at all of those heroes I found a common gene you'll probably hear about it in the scientific journals it's the HP LP gene they all have it helping people live their potential and you got it helping people live their potential and since that day when I don't know the day or the hour but I caught that gene just like you have it I got it and for the last 40 years I've spent my life on planes I've traveled more mile the other day i sat down in my house open the book to read and I reached from my seat belt and I was fishing for that's a lord or no I've been in a plane crash Spokane Washington private plane came over the Cascade Mountains it was dark and raining we crashed on the tarmac the pilot had forgotten to put the wheels down the other day I was flying from here Orlando to Cleveland in the middle of the flight I felt the plane shaked like I've never felt a plane shake before and I heard a sound that I had you know how when you fly a lot you listen come on now you listen for everything cuz you know and I heard a sound I've never heard before it went something like this mm and the flight attendant was pushing the cart beside me and she stopped and I heard her say oh no this does not sound good she she started backing up she stowed it away and after she stowed it away the pilot came on said ladies and gentlemen we have an emergency we've lost our number one engine now you got to know we're reasonable people so I'm calculating we only had two were they serviced together you know I'm asking pertinent questions and the plane got deathly quiet after a while flight attendant told the pilot that we were really scared so he got back on to comfort us he said ladies gentlemen I understand that you're really concerned but we've radioed ahead to Atlanta they've cleared the airspace we're gonna go in he said and I I don't want you to worry he said I've done this many times before in the simulator that's like I slept the Holiday Inn Express last night and we're gonna do surgery and so I and I've been spending my life powered by that gene the HP LPG helping people live their potential I've been touching lives all over got on the plane nothing I used to fly Eastern a lot fly Los Angeles stood ladder again saw this lady recognized her she was went back to my seat got a cassette knelt down beside I said you're not feeling pressed to give this to you she said thank you so much she said traveled a little Walkman here and I can play this tape you give me as I travel the plane landed she's standing in the jet way waiting for me she takes my hand she squeezes it her eyes and Mistie she says thank you so much god bless you that lady was Natalie Wood a few days before she drive and when I heard that she drowned I was shaken but I knew it wasn't by accident that our paths would cross I cannot begin to tell you the lives I'm singing in Baltimore Maryland 29 years ago come down off the platform young lady is standing there she says excuse me sir I just heard you sing and I'm really discouraged she's about to be fired from her job she said I feel like I can talk to you do you have time to talk to me I said sure she came by our home and we prayed together and after praying with I looked at her and I said you know before you go I don't know why but God has impressed me today he's gonna bless you give you an opportunity to speak to millions of people she said no you think God would do that for me and it was Oprah Winfrey that's how we met 29 years ago this story I'm telling could only happen in America I'm singing in Birmingham Alabama 20 years ago they announce that the governor's coming I straighten my tie brushed on my suit and they brought in Bill Clinton and I didn't know who he was since I was in Birmingham they said the governor's coming I assumed he was the Governor of Alabama so when they put him beside me I went into this long story with him of how much I loved Alabama and what a great state Alabama hears and and I noticed he's puzzled you know why am i extolling the virtues of Alabama and when the evening were on they made the introductions that's when it dawned on me oh no does the governor of Arkansas I sang he spoke I didn't see him again until about four months before the election in 1992 I was singing somewhere he walked into the room campaigning I thought that was my chance to fix it let him know I love Arkansas too sir I worked as a governor you probably don't know me or remember he said I remember you you sang for me a year ago in Birmingham Alabama so how could you remember that he said how could I forget it and after I sang I've been blessed to sing for every president since Ronald Reagan sat at the breakfast tables with every president of the United States since Ronald Reagan and after I sang for Clinton's first prayer breakfast he sent me a beautiful handwritten note thanking me for my ministry and the music how much he was blessed by it and he signed it with thanks Bill Clinton governor of Alabama only in America and then I'll tell you little sidebar to that story when the Monica Lewinsky's story broke I watched him Aging in front of my very eyes but I was able and a next venue tell you how I was able to intervene and he was able because of influence to go before the American people nudged by something I'd sent him to say for the first time to the world I did sin I was wrong only in America and I'm a equal opportunity guy I do stuff with Democrats and Republicans I sang for this big function one time where President Clinton spoke and the very same day I had to rush across town and sink to this big Republican function same night and when I got there I announced that I had just come from singing for the President of the United States there was this boo and rumblin that went through the audience I said wait a minute wait a minute I always go where people really need the Lord and there was this polite applause just like here tonight and then I said and that's why I'm here I got that gene helping people live their potential so I'm on a train Amtrak Baltimore to Philadelphia when Amtrak when you don't want somebody to sit next to you you know what you do your camp out you put your briefcase in front of you you papers all around you send a message find someplace else to sit well this man had camped out but he looked really discouraged to me so I walked up to him I said is anybody sitting next to you he smiled and he pulled up his papers and it was Chuck Colson of Watergate Fame who went to prison for the Watergate scandal and came out and started this incredible organization ministering to people in prison he began to take me into the prisons with him to sing and I was shaken by what I saw I did not know that one of every three young men in America between the ages of 18 and 30 who looked like my sons are now in prison in America one of every three I went to one prison in richland South Carolina and greeting the young men talking to them and just for a moment I felt like I was at Morehouse or on a black college campus I was shaken and so I began an organization called the US Dream Academy and we now tutor and mentor children whose parents are incarcerated because we found that that 70 percent of the kids who end up in prison come from the children of prisoners and we have centers in Washington Baltimore Philadelphia New Jersey Houston Memphis Salt Lake City Los Angeles Indianapolis Orlando and now I live my dream because I got the HP LPG helping people live their potential I started I didn't realize how expensive it would be had to raise I have to raise four hundred thousand dollars a month every month but you know when you treat people with respect when you don't know who they are or where they're going or what they can do for you one day so in 2008 and 2009 with tough fundraising years for charities we have a fundraising dinner each year for about a million dollars we try to raise a million dollars at this dinner because we need every bit of it 2008 we set the goal at 1.3 million to raise seven days before I'm sitting at five hundred thousand and I'm agonizing Annie well at eight hundred thousand I need a five hundred thousand dollar miracle and in my phone rings and the lady said mr. Phipps I've got a FedEx package here to send to you from Miss Oprah Winfrey where would you like me to send it I said well send it to the corporate office she said well there's a special way she wants you to open it I said well send it to my home I got home I live in Vero Beach Florida I got home it was as beautifully wrapped box handwritten note thanking me for my ministry in her life from my prophetic words of wisdom from my kindness she was very generous in her words and I saw this envelope that she'd put in when I opened it she had put in a check for 1.2 million dollars and behind that envelope I saw another envelope dated January 1 2009 with another cheque for 1.2 million dollars and behind that envelope was another envelope with another check for 1.3 million dollars she sent about four million dollars in three envelopes and she called me from South Africa where she had gone to see her girl said did you get it I said oh thank you so much and then she emailed me and she said you know I love giving and I love making it fun she said I considered sending you a FedEx envelope like three days in succession so Monday you get the first check Tuesday he got the second check Wednesday hid their check she said but I figured by the fourth day you'd be chasing the FedEx man down she was right she was right here's a woman who got the G helping people live their potential she got it and you have it it is at the foundation of your success this gene true story in New York City once they saw a disturbing crack appear on the 42nd floor of a high-rise apartment building and they sent the architect for the architect to come and investigate he arrived in the building the building manager he heard he was in the building and took the elevator up to the 42nd floor looking for him he couldn't find him they said oh no no no he's in the sixth basement six floors down so he then took the elevator to the sixth basement and he found the architect he said what you doing down here he said our crack is on the 42nd floor he said your crack may be on the 42nd floor but your problem is not on the 42nd floor your problem is down here at the foundation true story what had happened was a security guard who worked in the building wanted to build a garage on to his house and didn't have the money so every day before leaving work he would take the elevator to the sixth basement chisel out a brick put it in his bag and take it home and after five years of doing that a crack appeared on the 42nd floor when you are having difficulty making what you do successful don't go looking to fix what's happening on the 42nd floor go back to your found discs go back to the HP LPG make sure that your about helping people live their potential I'm going to give you a couple quotes before I leave and these are the foundation of who I am it is in the choir crucible of our personal private sufferings that our noblest dreams are born and our greatest gifts are given and often given in compensation for what we've been through it is in the quiet crucible of our personal private sufferings that our noblest dreams are born and our greatest gifts are given and often given in compensation for what we have been through make sure that you never lose the power of this gene helping people live their potential and people may never know your name they may they may not but history will record history will record that they lived a man they lived a woman who helped people live their potential I want to tell you a story as I close no black lady in Alabama told me this story she said to me one day said did you know that just about all Negro spirituals are written on the black notes of the piano you look skeptical so I brought a camera and a piano to prove to you what I'm talking about you can go home tonight and play almost any Negro spiritual if you just play the black notes on the pad what there are five black notes on the piano and you can play any Negro spiritual just play those notes Wes you know that every time man come on you remember you learned that in school how about this one that's cause the slaves didn't come to America with doremi pas Solari de that's somebody else's scale okay all they had in their musical scale were those five notes we know it in music as their pentatonic scale and they built the power and pathos of the Negro spiritual on five notes when you study music you also come across what are known as white spirituals yes and they often white composers who would work with this scale they used to call Negro spirituals slave songs and many call this scale the slave scale and I'm going to play for you what some musicologists think is the most famous white spiritual built on the slave scale or just the black notes you you anybody know who wrote that song thank you a man by the name of John Newton but do you know what John Newton did before he became a Christian he was the captain of a slave ship and many believed heard this melody that sounds very much like a West African sorrow chant and wrote the words Amazing Grace and set his words to a slave melody I believe that song was written just the way it's supposed to been written so that we would be reminded the whether black or white we all in this together we really are and I went to the Library of Congress I looked at that song and wherever you see it authentically printed you know what it says words John Newton melody unknown do you know how many people's lives have been changed by that song by someone named unknown who had the gene the HP LPG I'm gonna close by sharing this song with you by the way somebody put it up on YouTube and it is now the most-watched inspirational video of any kind by inspirational artist I sing the first verse I imagined the way John Newton probably first heard it coming up out of the belly of a slave ship Hey Hey Hey you Amazing Grace how sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me I was but now I'm found was blind but now I see you any dangers toils and snares I have already come twas grace that brought me safe thus far and grace will leave me ten thousand years bright shining eyes No less days to sing God's praise align with pose my god ha ha are you ha ha Oh I know Oh man all right that mess you

Channel: Gold Stars Speakers Bureau

Views: 922,686

Rating: 4.7394552 out of 5

Keywords: Wintley, Phipps, Gold, Stars, Speakers, Bureau, Shanokeye, Motivation, Success, Spirituality, Celebrity, Music

Id: o8bW5s2-nZ8

Length: 46min 34sec (2794 seconds)

Published: Tue Nov 13 2012