Greetings and Saluatations O Ye Book Worms...welcome to the 2nd Recommended Ruminator Reading post. Of course the first one was about the Book of All Books...that contained 66 Books...The Bible.
This time...we will be reviewing a book by a guy named Charles Eugene Boone...aka Pat Boone.
NOTE: The Ruminatin' Rod's Record Review will be a Pat Boone record also...called Songs From The Inner Court.
Charles...I mean Pat...has been a long time favorite of mine. I love his music...I love his movies...I love his books. Pat was a two time winner of the Ted Mack Amateur Hour... was on the Arthur Godfrey Show...has sold more than 30,000,000 million records....had his own TV show successful movies. He graduated magna cum laude from Columbia University...and was a Church of Christ minister.
His book... A NEW SONG...chronicles how all of his success, money, fame, fortune, religion...did NOT bring him true happiness. He had married Red Foley's daughter Shirley, had four beautiful girls...lived in Hollywood mansions...but this boy from Donelson Tennesee, son to Margaret and Archie Boone...was smiling on the outside but crying on the inside. According to the jacket notes on his book..."His marriage was on the rocks, financial ruin was near, and his career almost shipwrecked--then he discovered A NEW SONG."
NOTE: I have had a couple of encounters with Mr. Boone...(1) I use to see him at a hospital I worked at...and had a couple of times to express to him my appreciation...not only for his singing and movies...but for the impact that his book A NEW SONG had on my life. I was also able to talk with his mother and father, Margaret and Archie Boone also (at the hospital and at various Full Gospel Business Men's Fellowship International (FGBMFI) meetings. (2) I got to see him in a concert at the Centennial Park Bandshell with big band and get his autograph afterwards. I yelled out a request for the song July You're A Woman...and he had responded back...Oh...you're the one who bought a copy.
NOTE: These next two pictures of Randy Stonehill (Born Twice) and Larry Norman (Street Level) are album covers that they recorded...during what was know as the Jesus movement. They were funded by a gift from Pat Boone who gave them $2500.o0. Pat was always on the cutting edge when it came to "Jesus People." As a matter of fact...on Pat's album...PAT BOONE SINGS THE SONGS OF THE JESUS PEOPLE...you hear Pat singing at a concert...making the statement about people asking about the Jesus Movement...that it was simply..."Jesus...moving among people."Pat also founded Lamb and Lion Records for an outlet for young artist to record their music for Jesus...including himself, Dogwood, DeGarmo and Key, and many more. BUT... this is a book review so back to A NEW SONG.
The first chapter of A NEW SONG was HIGH ADVENTURE..and opens up with Pat and Harald Bredesen..."a black shirted and white collered" minister friend...as they go up in coldwater Canyon area. They began to jog...and pray. As the walked, talked, and prayed...Pat began to sense something that he had never experienced in his life. "Never before had I sensed the earness of God as I did now. Never before had I prayed as I was now praying." Pat was experiencing an encounter with the Holy Spirit...and encounter that would change his life, his wife's life (she had already had the experience), his children's life, many of his fan's lives...and FOR MY LIFE.Pat's parents...and Pat and his family were in a church that preached against the things that Pat had been experiencing because (1) gifts of the Spirit were only for the establishment of the church (2) these things past away with the last apostle passing away (3) these things past away because the Bible was in it's "final form" and no need for God to speak or move since we have his thought already. Pat was excommunicated from his church for his beliefs...and his mother and father...searched the Bible through so that they could show him in the Scriptures how he was wrong about the Holy Spirit, the gifts of the Spirit, miracles, healings, speaking in tongues...BUT...could not find their "proof text"...and ended up having the same experiences...and also were excommunicated.
Well....this book was released in August of 1970... about the same time the Lord was speaking to me about my relationship...or lack of relationship with Him. Brenda led me to the Lord in the Fall of 1970 by January of 1970 I was in Bible School in Chattanooga and by 1972 I had dropped out of Bible School and back in Murfreesboro...about to get married in July of 1972. I still loved the Lord... but something seemed to be missing. I had the salvation part...I was reading and hungry for his word....but I was not happy....I was getting more discouraged and miserable.Two things happened that lead me to an overflowing experience with the Holy Spirit. (1) I found a copy of the book in the Bible School bookstore... THE CROSS AND THE SWITCHBLADE by David Wilkerson (Pat played David later in the movie by the same name). What was odd...this particular school did not believe in what was being written about in the book. Chapter 28 in that book started out with the question...
"What is the baptism in the Holy Spirit?"I went to my roommate an ex-marine drill Sergeant and asked him about this book, and his response was..."Well...Nicky Cruz, David Wilkerson and his work with the gangs in New York was good...but you better watch out for those tongues." The book was about how God was changing drug addicts, prostitutes, gang members and delivering them and keeping them free for years...by the power of the Holy Spirit.
NOTE: I had experienced a taste of this experience in the prayer tower next to my dorm in Chattanooga...as I was praying for peoples needs and this overwhelming presence engulfed me and I initially prayed with utterings and groanings I could not understand. I immediately stopped it...because of my conversation with Monk.
(2) When I went home in Murfreesboro....the Jesus Movement was in full force...people were getting saved...revivals in churches were going on for weeks at a time...people who were considered unsaveable were getting saved. At the same time...I was working at a factory...and ran into a man named Vance Akin III who introduced me to the teachings of Derek Prince, FGBMFI, and the baptism of the Holy Spirit. I went into a local Christian bookstore, ran by the same denominational beliefs that Pat was excommunicate from...and where I grew up all my life...and I was looking around...and in their bargain bin of discarded books was a copy of A NEW SONG BY PAT BOONE...for fifty cents.
It was like the perfect storm for me...and as a result...I soon had experienced the same encounter (but individually different) as Pat Boone, David Wilkerson, Nicky Cruz, Derek Prince, Vance Akin...and many many more were experience. Rivers of Living water were flowing from my innermost being...the Word became alive to me even more that it had been, and I began praying differently and expecting different results from my prayers.
Well..I guess this is a book review...as much as a testimony...but I would recommend anyone who is seeking more in their walk with the Lord to read this book. It will point you to many Scriptures...so read it with your Bible next to you...and see what God has for you.
I give this book 5 moo-moos.
NOTE: Be sure to go read Ruminatin' Rod's Record Review of Pat's SONGS FROM THE INNER COURT.
Love and April Love Kisses
Rodney "Yes Lord" Boyd
