I only introduced Keith Green, from the context of my first encounter with him, in the last blog entry. Now I want to explain exactly who Keith Green was, in the context of the Jesus movement of the 1970s and within contemporary Christian music. During his ministry years, from the time that I first encountered him in 1976 and his untimely death in 1982, he offended many people, but at the same time he served as an example to the new converts that he led to Jesus. Shortly after he died in a tragic plane crash with 2 of his children, a pastor that I was having lunch with in Los Angeles commented, “Keith always acted like he was the only one who was a real Christian.”
The truth of the matter was that he followed a very literal Christian path, by using the Bible as his guidebook. In the book of Acts the disciples held all things in common, and Keith did just that with his own personal possessions. He took in homeless people and had them living in his house with him and his wife and children. Then after his house was overflowing with over a dozen people, he used his royalty money from his songwriting to buy another house and rent a couple more to house his growing community. He conducted daily Bible studies and frequent backyard barbeques on the weekend, when he would go door to door inviting neighbors over to eat food, listen to music performed by Keith and guests like Phil Keagy, and hear the gospel message.
Billy Ray Hearn signed Keith to Sparrow Records when he first started it in the early 1970s, with the 2nd Chapter of Acts and Barry McGuire. By the end of the 1970s Green wanted Hearn to release him from his contract, because he felt that it was immoral to charge people to hear the gospel message, so he wanted to give his albums out for free. Hearn released him from the contract and Green gave them away, for free, and was ripped off. Some people took advantage and ordered many albums without paying for them and then sold them for a profit.
Keith and Melody eventually purchased property in Texas and moved their community there. It was here that he started the Last Days Newsletter, which can be accessed at the website that Melody maintains, http://www.lastdaysministries.org/ . Keith Green was the poster child for what a sold out for Jesus, Jesus freak was during the Jesus movement of the 1970s. His attitude wasn’t unique, and in the early days it was common. To give away all your possessions and join a commune, where all was held in common was a part of the hippie philosophy that was popular in the last half of the 1960s. Non materialism was as normal an attitude as it was to take a dose of LSD and lose your mind to the point that you forgot that there was a planet named earth and your own identity. Yet this was part of the zeitgeist that was an antecedent to the direction that Western civilization took as it proceeded towards the new millennium.
Now I really didn’t say anything about his music, which is what he was all about in the first place. He was a child prodigy and was groomed to be a pop star and although he failed to get a record contract, he and his wife Melody had a joint song writing contract that provided them with the funds to build their ministry. His first album was called “For Him Who Has Ears To Hear,” and he only released 4 albums in his lifetime, but his impact can be felt in the 21st century. He was the first artist to record and release a solo worship album, and “Songs For The Shepherd” was his last album.
In July 1976 I resigned from the U. S. Postal Service, after 6 ½ years of continual service, to become a Foursquare minister, in an inner city church in Los Angeles. The name of the church was the Highland Park Neighborhood Church (HPNC), in the North East Los Angeles barrio. One of my jobs was booking musical artists to perform at neighborhood Friday night concerts. The first artist that I booked was new on the Jesus music scene, by the name of Keith Green. Chuck Girard, who had been the leader of Love Song, a seminal Jesus music group, recommended him to me when I contacted him about playing one night, which he did.
I’ll never forget that night, because it was bizarre in a transcendent sort of way. Keith arrived early and set up a table in the church vestibule and tested the sound system, which was pretty archaic. I was greeting people as they entered the sanctuary and one person that stood out to me was a man who appeared to be in his mid 30s with the longest fingernails that I had ever seen in my life, at the time. He was excited about the concert and said that “the community needed to provide more cultural events if they expected the proletariat to rise above the vomit that they wallowed in.”
At 8:00 P.M., I walked onto the platform and greeted the crowd of over 100 people, leading them in an opening prayer to dedicate the night to the Lord. Then I turned it over to Gloria Miller, who led the crowd in worship choruses using her autoharp.
“Seek ye first
The kingdom of God
And his righteousness…”
She sang as the congregation raised their hands in worship. After a half dozen songs, Gloria walked off the stage and I introduced Keith Green to the audience as the intense guy, wearing the same kind of body shirt that I sometimes wore, sat down at the piano and started pounding the keys like nobody ever had in the 5 years that I attended HPNC. Keith ranted and raged, with song and words, while at the same time he cooed and soothed, until the ecclesia was one. But there were still some who were not won over, and it was with these that the battle raged. They were the materialists who used their wealth for their own selfish purposes, rather than to help those less fortunate. But then isn’t that all of us? When we see a person with a cardboard sign saying “please help” or “why lie, I just want beer,” what do we think? If the person with the cardboard sign is talking on a cell phone, do we think, “hey your sign should say need more minutes”?
Anyway, Keith blew everyone away, and at the end of his set, rather that letting me give the alter call and doxology, he called the entire church to repentance, including the staff and senior pastor. Neither the senior pastor nor I went forward, but we wondered, who does this guy think he is?
So, while all of this was going on, I was studying photography at Pasadena City College so I could better document the Jesus movement that was going on around me, as well as produce multi-media slide shows for the edification and enlightenment of the body of Christ. The night that Keith Green ministered at HPNC, I asked him if it was okay for me to photograph him. He told me that I could take a couple of photos but that was all. I only took 2 and this is the best one.
In July 1976 I resigned from the U. S. Postal Service, after 6 ½ years of continual service, to become a Foursquare minister, in an inner city church in Los Angeles. The name of the church was the Highland Park Neighborhood Church (HPNC), in the North East Los Angeles barrio. One of my jobs was booking musical artists to perform at neighborhood Friday night concerts. The first artist that I booked was new on the Jesus music scene, by the name of Keith Green. Chuck Girard, who had been the leader of Love Song, a seminal Jesus music group, recommended him to me when I contacted him about playing one night, which he did.
♪Jesus♬Rocks♬The♬World♪ 