The Boone Boom Pat's Naïve Assertions
By Al Cronkrite The Covenant News ~ February 01, 2006
Singer, actor, Christian icon Pat Boone has passed his 70th year and announced his retirement. Gifted with a good mind, superior athletic abilities, and an outstanding singing voice Pat brought to the entertainment industry some of the same qualities his distant Grandfather, Daniel Boone, brought to our New Nation. Daniel Boone is said to have spent the winter of 1769-70 living in a cave on the fringes of civilization; Pat, Daniel Boones great, great, great, great, grandson, spent his carrier in the cave of Christianity on the fringes of the Hollywood entertainment industry.
I have always admired Pat Boone for his public acknowledgement of Jesus Christ and for his displays of righteous behavior. The Hollywood crowd is not friendly to Christians and some opt to keep a low profile.
In 1958, already a star performer married to musician Red Foley’s daughter Shirley, the father of four daughters, Boone finished his education with a magna cum laude degree in Speech and English from Columbia University. Such sagacity is not a hallmark in the entertainment industry. Besides his rise as a vocalist, he has acted in a number of movies, authored several books, and been an exemplary father and family man as well as an outspoken advocate for Christianity. His stage trademark, white buck shoes, reflected in his life as well.
Pat is a member of Pastor Jack Hayford’s Foursquare “Church on The Way”. Dr. Hayford has been described as the “Pentecostal Gold Standard”. His spindly, hawkish appearance gives wide girth to an untainted presentation of the Gospel. He is a solid Charismatic whose thirty-five year ministry built the church from eighteen members to its present 10,000. Sincere, unflappable, and well prepared, he is a pastor’s pastor and a teacher’s teacher. His congregation counts a number of high profile members.
Hayford is endowed with a Christian pragmatism that fosters mega-churches. He believes, "genuine spiritual fullness is bridge building. To be fully Pentecostal means being open to the fullness and breadth of the church. If you have a commitment to building the kingdom of God, you have to be committed to the church beyond the sector you're in." . He backs this up with this thought, "Reformed theology has … ended up creating a monster of theology that dampens the place of our passion and partnership with God."
Pat Boone’s actions have reflected Hayford’s ecumenism but in a slightly different way. His professional career did not quite mirror his personal life. In the January-February issue of Foundation magazine M. H. Reynolds, Jr. writes, “For nearly forty years Pat Boone has been a cross-over entertainer, sometimes using his musical abilities to entertain the ungodly, secular crowd and at other times entertaining professing Christians on supposedly Christian platforms.”
In early 1997 Pat Boone, then over 60 years of age, released a heavy metal album entitled “No More Mr. Nice Guy”. He then appeared with Alice Cooper on ABCs American Music Awards in a chest baring leather vest, heavily tattooed, with earrings and a studded dog collar. At the time, he lived near and was friendly with Alice Cooper and Ozzy Osbourne.
The shock of seeing a Christian figure in such company with attire to match created a threat to the financial god that sustains Trinity Broadcasting Network forcing Paul Crouch to release Pat from his regularly scheduled “Gospel America” program. According to Larry B. Stammer, a Los Angeles Times religious writer, Boone described the reason for his release as hundreds of calls from their 'little partners,' little old ladies and folks who contribute to TBN ministries who were so concerned about me in heavy metal clothing. They didn't get the joke. Secular fans of Alice Cooper and Ozzy Osbourne quickly saw the incongruity and described Boone’s presence as the joke Boone claimed it was.
Accompanied by Pastor Jack Hayford, Boone was given television time at TBN to defend his decision and about a year later when the furor died down his good graces were re-instated. Though the heavy metal episode seemed outlandish to both Christians and secularists, Boone maintained the quality of the music was superior and claimed several verses of scripture to support his decision.
Since his retirement Pat has become a columnist for Joe Farah’s WorldNetDaily webpage unabashedly supporting the secrecy and violations of individual rights that have marked the Bush II presidency. His December 31, 2005 column entitled “Media idiocy in time of war” lambastes the press for seeking information on the abuses at Abu Ghraib and for requesting a timetable for withdrawing troops from Iraq. His latest piece “To tap or not to tap: That is the question” supports government tapping of citizens telephone conversations.
There is a Biblical mandate for Christians to support government as a God ordained keeper of order in a potentially disorderly environment. That mandate, however, was not intended to support mendacious evil. Jesus strongly and forthrightly condemned sin and those who participated in it.
The abuses at Abu Ghraib and the transportation of American prisoners to friendly foreign sites that use tortures of unmentionable cruelty are a dark blot on the Bush II Administration and the NeoCons who framed it. The coarseness involved in these procedures creates a closer reflection of the Roman soldiers and Jewish Pharisees than of the Savior they crucified. Every American Christian should be ashamed of such actions and should understand that the war Pat Boone supports contributes to the major deterioration already evident in the morality and civility of our society.
Those of us who believe that powerful forces have conspired for over a century to destabilize America; rob her of her wealth; obliterate her culture; engage her in senseless, unproductive wars; and eventually steal her nationhood by melding her citizens into a tyrannical world government are branded “conspiracy nuts”.
When American citizens depend on the press and the media to keep them informed they never hear about meetings of the Committee of 300, the Bilderbergers, or the Council on Foreign Relations. These organizations involving the rich and powerful in government, industry, media and press, convene to determine the future of the world. The leaders of these organizations constitute a clandestine government that sets policy for the overt characters we see on the current political stage. The membership is multi-national and seeks covert world wide consensus.
Meetings of various United Nations organizations receive some publicity and there have been some attempts to legitimatize the Council on Foreign Relations but other meetings are secret. Members of these organizations often craft congressional legislation. Prepared before 9/11, the Patriot Act was rushed through congress in the wake of a convenient emergency many believe was contrived.
Some Americans believe a peaceful worldwide consensus is a noteworthy goal and in a humanistic sense, it would appear to be so. However, from a Christian perspective there are problems. First, secular governments always seek to usurp the throne of God and world governance advocates are no exception. Exclusive religions are deemed dangerous and divisive. In the new world order, the government will dictate moral standards and a new mandatory religion will be all inclusive. The denigration of Christian morality by America’s power centers is in preparation for this new order. Second, God separated the earth’s population in an effort to diminish their hubris. World government involves an effort to regain concerted power and the arrogance that will go with it.
Unfortunately, the lack of a Godly legal structure in the American Christian culture has set the stage for current events. Evangelicals make up over 50 percent of the American population and the lack of a sound theological base has left a legal void now being filled by an anti-Christian power elite.
How many Americans know that WWII was responsible for the deaths of 62,000,000 people - all created in the image of God? If New York, Chicago, and Los Angeles were destroyed and the entire population killed, the death toll would be only half the carnage involved in the Second World War. Click on the Wikipedia link for a detailed account.
Beginning with WWI none of America’s enemies has posed an immediate threat to the nation and nothing has been gained by engaging in the conflicts.
It is astonishing that our religious leaders who are responsible for righteousness fail to comprehend and condemn the sins fomented by a government that debilitates and threatens to destroy both the nation and the Christianity that birthed it. Power hungry national leaders use wars to consolidate and extend power. The Bush II Administration provides a textbook example.
Have Pat Boone, Jack Hayford, Paul Crouch, Joe Farah and scores of other Christian leaders across our nation failed to recognize the pernicious programs a treasonous government is foisting on the American people? Do they understand that the United Nations was constructed as a precursor to world government? Have they forgotten that God separated His creatures at the Tower of Babel? Do they not realize that America was created as a Republic and that Democracy is an abomination to free Christian citizens? Has it escaped their notice that the American Empire has troops stationed in 140 nations and that the Arab world is the last part not yet financially enslaved? Were they not taught about the Federal Reserve System and the conspiracy to control the entire world through tyrannical government?
“When a wayward and corrupt fiscal policy and fiat currency, coupled with runaway government spending, forces a nation to only be able to sustain the value of its currency with bullets, the citizenry of the country involved in wars primarily to sustain its currency have historically first became slaves to their government, and then to the nations that finally conquer them. If you question the validity of such a premise, or whether it could happen to the United States of America, study the fall of the Roman Empire. If you read the right books on the subject, you’ll quickly discover that towards the end of the Roman reign, the Roman Empire was doing exactly what America is doing today; attempting to sustain a failed fiat money system with bullets.”
There are several fields of error that plague American Christianity and that neuter its impact on the tenor of our times.
Pastor Jack Hayford’s doctrine of relationship before obedience is flawed. God is our creator and our ruler. His ways are not our ways. We are to worship Him; too much familiarity tends to sully worship. Dr. Hayford is correct in identifying the lack of passion in Reformed theological circles; we are often too much given to intellect and theology, making us appear to be God’s frozen people. However, to describe our relationship to God as a “partnership” goes too far. The central theme of the Bible is not “passion and partnership” nor is it baptism or evangelism. The central theme of the Bible is obedience and the relationship between the citizen and the King, though it may be close, could not properly be described as a partnership.
The second field is pivotal. Pastor Hayford’s ministry fails to emphasize God’s Laws. When we ignore God’s Laws, removing the criterion for obedience we quickly begin to do what is right in our own eyes. Pat Boone mentioned in one of his interviews that he disagrees with the statement that “you can’t legislate morality”. He is correct in his disagreement. All law is moral and law sets the religious base of society. If our basic laws derive from the opinions of men, we are living in a secular society. Without obedience to God’s Laws, we cannot advance His Kingdom.
Thirdly, God is not pragmatic. In the Kingdom of God the means justifies the end while in the secular world the end often justices the means. In an interview published in Christianity Today Pat Boone said, "If we're going to communicate with our culture, we've got to find ways to commend as well as to condemn. Otherwise, what kind of ministry are we going to have?" Jesus loved and had associations with sinners but He neither joined nor commended their sins. Paul became all things to all people by attempting to present the Gospel of Jesus Christ in a manner they could understand; he rebuked their sin, seldom, if ever, commending anything. Pragmatism nullifies law. God seeks an obedient people. To be obedient we must obey His Law.
Fourthly, an overwhelming percentage of America’s Christians believe that God has given us free will and that evangelism involves persuading people to choose Jesus. In response they associate with the likes of Alice Cooper and Ozzy Osbourne. They ignore the plain Biblical truth that God selected Adam and the great Nation of Israel, a product of his loins. He selected his Kings, Judges, and Prophets, He selected King David, and He selected the Apostle Paul. Selection has to do with His sovereignty and when this theological theme is forsaken, humanism overtakes the church. God is both omniscient (knowledge without beginning and without end) and omnipresent (His presence fills the entire creation). He knows both the beginning and the end. He is also sovereign (the highest authority) and has the power to control His creation (this is why we pray) and all that is in it. Though it seems to us that we are independent and can chose our course and that God rewards our obedience and condemns our disobedience, it is an ineffable Truth that being omniscient and sovereign He both knows and controls our behavior before it actually occurs. Free will is a humanist concept that seriously undermines the character of our God.
Fifth, Dispensational theology is pandemic. When the Romans destroyed Jerusalem and the Temple in 70 A.D. and in fulfillment of God’s frequent threat, the Jews were scattered among many nations, the New Covenant abolished Judaism and formed an exclusive avenue to God through The Father; this new exclusive relationship enjoyed only by those God drew to Christ was found in His Church and His Church became His chosen people. When this key theological maxim is ignored in favor of retaining the Old Covenant, Christians find themselves following the evil Pharisaical spirit Jesus so vehemently condemned. There is only one source of forgiveness from sin and only one avenue to the Father. The Temple will never again be of significance in God’s Kingdom. Both Jew and Gentile must come to the Father through the Son. Zionism is evil and those who support it are supporting evil.
Sixth, Christians are an exclusive people that need to be kept from sin. God made every effort to rid the Promised Land from evil influences that He knew would foster sin in His Chosen people. Now chosen, we are no different. Diversity, multiculturalism, and multi-religionism are all wicked. Christians should separate themselves, obey God’s Laws and live righteous lives. America was founded by Christians seeking that very opportunity but they soon found themselves foundering in varieties of devious doctrines and theologies.
Seventh, most American Christians are bereft of historical wisdom. They naively support secular government allowing the pagan Hegelian Dialectic to dictate the selection of their leaders and then failing to use discernment, they do not recognize the hidden agendas these wily individuals promote. Terror is not a nation, a person, or a particular object. President George W. Bush has declared war on an unsubstantiated enemy, an enemy exacerbated by the policies he is promoting and that can never be defeated in any definable fashion. Using war as a vehicle, he is sapping our nation’s strength, robbing its wealth, and taking us into a tyranny that will allow the imposition of world government. This kind of malignant treason is somewhat unique in world history. Though many nations were historically destroyed from within, past norms have been to attempt to defend sovereignty rather than destroy it.
Hopelessly entangled in all this is the illegitimate nation of Israel and the Dispensational theology that continues to support its re-establishment through the Zionist agenda. It is this heresy that relegates Arabs to an expendable status and allows American Christians to support a government that breaks the Eighth Commandment and supports a secular state that does likewise.
Boone is apparently unaware that Democracy is a sham that was condemned by our Founders and praised by Karl Marx. Rather than being suspicious when President Bush interminably touts Democracy he blissfully believes it has merit. Americans in general and Pat Boone in particular need a history lesson.
Pat Boone and the majority of American voters are either ignorant of the purpose behind current events or they are bemused by the heresy of Dispensational theology and support the destruction of our nation in a vain effort to restore what God has destroyed.
Pastor, Dr. Jack Hayford is correct in advocating a close association with our Triune God. God deserves and expects our praise and worship. The error is in emphasis. Prior to praise and worship God expects obedience. His objective in the sacrifice of His only Son is that those He has chosen would form a social order governed by His Laws and as a result live in peace and prosperity in His creation. His Laws are the embodiment of His love.