Wednesday, May 25, 2011

"The Grandfathers" Movie Review


From Sacrifice to Reconciliation, a Young Man Discovers His Heritage in The Grandfathers

The Grandfathers
showcases both the burden and benefit of the Saint family’s legacy. Jesse Saint, Steve’s oldest son and Nate’s grandson, was not raised among the tribe like his father. He struggles to find his place under the weight of the memory of a famous grandfather he never knew and a heroic father he does not fully understand. This will all change after Jesse travels to the jungles of Ecuador with his family and gradually forms a special bond with Mincaye, one of the tribesmen who took part in his grandfather’s murder. Only then will he confront his family’s past and come to terms with his own destiny. And there he will find his place in this story.

The Grandfathers chronicles the personal quest for greater connectedness and significance. It is also a moving tribute to ordinary people living extraordinary lives in extreme situations. Jim Hanon, the film’s director, states, “Forgiveness is an awe-inspiring virtue that seems to have been passed on by the Saint family and is shared by many among the Waodani tribe—both demonstrate a profound capacity for forgiveness and healthy self-healing.”

Steve Saint consulted with Jim Hanon and Mart Green, EGM’s producer, to help bring the story of his father, Nate, to screen through the feature film End of the Spear and the companion documentary film Beyond the Gates of Splendor. These films trace events leading up to and including the deaths of these men. More than that, they show the impact these events played on the lives of both their survivors and their killers. When the widows and their children went to live among the Waodani—a tribe regarded as the most violent on earth—they became an integral part of an incredible redemptive journey.

The Grandfathers, completes a trilogy produced by EthnoGraphic Media (EGM) that includes End of the Spear and Beyond the Gates of Splendor. These first two films, also from award-winning director Jim Hanon and producer Mart Green, tell the unforgettable and inspiring story of the killing of five missionaries by a stone-age tribe deep in the Amazon jungle. The impact of this tragic event lives on today in families of these slain men as well as among those responsible for their deaths.

FamilyApproved

This inspirational film has been awarded

The Dove Foundation seal of approval.


MY REVIEW:

This movie is a documentary that had me riveted to the screen. I grew up hearing about Jim Elliot and the missionaries that died with him by the very tribe of people they were trying to help. It always made me sad, but this movie brought that to life. Not so much on their actual deaths (though when those that murdered them talk about what happened afterwards I was in tears) as much as how the love of God caused family members to go minister to the very people that killed the missionaries in the first place. Jesse Saint really opens up and reveals what it is like to live under the expectations of those that heard about his grandfather (Nick Saint, one of the missionaries) and how he became his own man while living among those that killed his own grandfather. A moving story of God's forgiveness that I can't wait to share with my children.

Thursday, May 19, 2011

"Undaunted Faith" Book Review

This week, the
Christian Fiction Blog Alliance
is introducing
Undaunted Faith
Realms (May 3, 2011)
by
Andrea Boeshaar


MY REVIEW:
This is book 4 in a series and every one of them is wonderful. Andrea has created an amazing family through this series and it was so fun to visit them again and see where Luke and Jake McCabe are now (along with a couple of lovely ladies - Bethany and Annetta). There are some wonderful storylines involving redemption and forgiveness, and the fact that God's grace will truly cover anything. But they are wrapped up in this great story with enough action and romance to keep you engaged from page 1 until the very end. Great book!

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:



Andrea Kuhn Boeshaar has been married for more than 30 years. She and her husband, Daniel, have three adult sons, daughters-in-law, and two precious grandchildren. Andrea's educational background includes the University of Wisconsin - Milwaukee, where she studied in English, and Alverno College where she studied in Professional Communications and Business Management.



Andrea has been writing stories and poems since she was a little girl; however, it wasn't until 1984 that she started submitting her work for publication. Eight years after that, she was convicted about writing for the Christian market. She read books in her genre (Inspirational Romance & Women's Fiction), studied the market, and worked hard to hone her craft.



Finally her first novel was published in 1994. Since then she's written numerous articles and devotionals. Andrea has also published inspiration romance novels, women's fiction, and novellas.



In 2003, Andrea joined the Hartline Literary Agency and worked for Joyce Hart as a literary agent. She saw much success. But then in 2007, Andrea realized she was more of a teacher/encourager than a sales person. She left the agency and became a certified Christian life coach. Now, in addition to her writing, Andrea enjoys encouraging others to use their God-given talents and gifts to their fullest.



Andrea Kuhn Boeshaar is a certified Christian life coach and speaks at writers’ conferences and for women’s groups. She has taught workshops at such conferences as Write-To-Publish, American Christian Fiction Writers (ACFW), Oregon Christian Writers Conference, Mount Hermon Writers Conference, and many local writers conferences. Another of Andrea’s accomplishments is cofounder of the American Christian Fiction Writers (ACFW) organization. For many years she served on both its Advisory Board and as its CEO.



ABOUT THE BOOK



When Pastor Luke McCabe begins paying extra attention to her, Bethany takes his fine-sounding words with a grain of salt. She's heard sweet talk before. This time she is going to keep her mind on the Lord and on her new teaching job in the Arizona Territory.



But when her reputation is accidentally soiled by the rakish town sheriff, Luke steps in with a marriage proposal to save Bethany's good name. Luke is certain their marriage is God's will...but Bethany is just as certain God must have someone else in mind to be Luke's wife.



Someone sweet and spiritual, who knows the Scriptures better than Bethany does. Someone like Luke's old friend from home.



If you would like to read the first chapter of , go HERE.





Watch the video trailer:



Wednesday, May 18, 2011

New tv show from ABC - "Once Upon A Time"

This looks awesome!

OH MY GOODNESS! I am so excited for tv right now - which is really unusual for me to say as I don't watch a lot of it because of my crazy schedule during the school year. I basically keep up with Biggest Loser on NBC and then my daughter and I like to watch Make It Or Break It on ABC Family together. During the summer my girls and I watch So You Think You Can Dance and as a family we all sit down and tune into America's Got Talent (my boys can't wait for it to start!). But when it come to the fall lineup and new shows I never get very excited... until now!

I just watched the preview for a new show on ABC that starts this fall and I am so excited - hopefully this is a show that I can watch with the family. And to top it off it will be on Sundays which is a great day for me and I'll actually be able to watch it in first run! It is called Once Upon A Time and it looks amazing! Jennifer Morrison (from the tv shows House and How I Met You Mother) and Ginnifer Goodwin (from the tv shows Ed and Big Love) star in this show and will be amazing. Once Upon A Time, is a modern day fairytale from two of Lost's master storytellers for their fall line up. It centers on a woman with a troubled past who is drawn into a small town in Maine where the magic and mystery of Fairy Tales just may be real. Click this link to watch the trailer...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yz9VFa7Z6Y0

And read some details here:
Anna Swan (Jennifer Morrison) knows how to take care of herself. She’s a 28-year old bail bonds collector who’s been on her own ever since she was abandoned as a baby. But when the son she gave up years ago finds her, everything will change. Henry (Jared Gilmore) is 10 years old now and in desperate need of Anna’s help. Henry believes that Anna actually comes from an alternate world… and is Prince Charming (Josh Dallas) and Snow White’s (Ginnifer Goodwin) missing daughter. According to his book of fairytales, they sent her away to protect her from the Evil Queen’s (Lana Parilla) curse, which trapped the fairytale world forever, frozen in time. Of course Anna doesn’t believe a word, but when she brings Henry back to Storybrooke, she finds herself drawn to this unusual boy and his strange New England town. Concerned for Henry, she decides to stay for a while, but she soon suspects that Storybrooke is more than it seems. It’s a place where magic has been forgotten, but is still powerfully close… where fairytale characters are alive, even though they don’t remember who they once were–including the Evil Queen who is now Henry’s foster mother. The epic battle for the future of all worlds is beginning, but for good to win, Anna will have to accept her destiny and fight like hell.

"Fade To Blue" Book Review

This week, the
Christian Fiction Blog Alliance
is introducing
Fade to Blue
B&H Books (May 15, 2011)
by
Julie Carobini


MY REVIEW:
Julie Carobini is the queen of the summer romance - she writes the perfect books to read while laying out under the sun soaking up the rays. "Fade To Blue" is a fun book with a familiar setting in Otter Bay, California. As we revisit some old friends and meet some new ones I loved getting reacquainted with the fun world that Julie has created in Otter Bay. She doesn't let me down with this book and leads me on an adventure with Suz and Seth as they meet up with each other after 5 years apart. I wasn't sure how things would turn out and I enjoyed the lead up to the ending. What a great beach read!

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:



A word from the author:

I grew up as Julie Navarro, in a family of truly right-brained individuals. Among us you’ll find writers, artists, and musicians, all of us willing to talk about the arts at a moment’s notice.



Over the years, I’ve published several hundred articles and stories in magazines and books, including Aspire, Decision, Expecting, Focus on the Family, Key Magazine and God’s Abundance: 365 Days to a Simpler Life. As I wrote, I found a common theme cropping up: my family, the sea, and God’s timely work in the lives of those around me.



Maybe it was time to incorporate those interests into novels, I thought.



And so I did. Not once, but twice. Both times, God shut both doors and windows. So I continued to write and dream and raise my kids with Dan. Eventually I decided to write romantic seaside novels, and that’s where I found my voice.



When I’m not writing, marketing, or editing for others, I’m driving my kids around town, imagining that my mid-sized SUV is actually a sleek sailing yacht.



ABOUT THE BOOK



Suz Mitchell is the determined dreamer we should all be and won't allow her ex-husband Len's jail sentence to ruin their young son Jeremiah's life. An accomplished artist, she moves with her child across the country to California's central coast and lands a sweet job restoring priceless paintings at the historic Hearst Castle overlooking the ocean.



To her utter surprise, a serious old flame, Seth, is also now working at Hearst and jumbles the dreams inside Suz's heart. While sorting out the awkwardness of their past split and current spiritual differences, a repentent Len shows up eager to restore his family.



Suz must learn to let God be the true restorer of all that once seemed lost.



If you would like to read the first chapter of Fade to Blue, go HERE.

Monday, May 16, 2011

"The Redeemer"

It is time for a FIRST Wild Card Tour book review! If you wish to join the FIRST blog alliance, just click the button. We are a group of reviewers who tour Christian books. A Wild Card post includes a brief bio of the author and a full chapter from each book toured. The reason it is called a FIRST Wild Card Tour is that you never know if the book will be fiction, non~fiction, for young, or for old...or for somewhere in between! Enjoy your free peek into the book!

You never know when I might play a wild card on you!


Today's Wild Card author is:


and the book:


The Redeemer

Realms (May 3, 2011)

***Special thanks to Anna Coelho Silva | Publicity Coordinator, Charisma House | Charisma Media for sending me a review copy.***

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:



Linda Rios Brook has worked as a media executive in broadcasting for over thirty years. A highly acclaimed teacher and member of the International Coalition of Apostles, she teaches at the Covenant Centre International in Palm Beach Gardens and at the Wagner Leadership Institute in Colorado Springs. Linda serves on the board of directors for Global Harvest and is vice president of the International Christian Chamber of Commerce USA. She has taught classes on the Dominion Sky Angel satellite network and is the author of several books: Lucifer’s Flood, The Deliverer, The King, Frontline Christians in a Bottom Line World, Wake Me When It’s Over: From the Boardroom to the Twilight Zone and the Faithfulness of God, and Jesus for Adults.

Visit the author's website.

SHORT BOOK DESCRIPTION:

As the final installment in the series that began with Lucifer’s Flood, Linda Rios Brook’s The Redeemer finds ancient language expert Samantha Yale translating a final batch of ancient scrolls written by a fallen angel. This volume of writings covers the demon’s eyewitness accounts of biblical events that cover the life of Jesus. In the process we also discover the mysterious Mr. Wonk’s true identity and learn an amazing secret that Samantha has been keeping. This is a story about rebellion and consequences. It is about demonic strategy to disrupt and destroy the people of God. But ultimately it is a story about the unrelenting love, grace, mercy, and determination of a sovereign God in pursuit of His errant children.

Product Details:

List Price: $13.99
Paperback: 304 pages
Publisher: Realms (May 3, 2011)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1616382066
ISBN-13: 978-1616382063

AND NOW...THE FIRST CHAPTER:


I never knew how Satan was going to react to bad news, so I waited as long as possible before mentioning the new star-like object. At the slightest chance an irregularity might resolve itself, I usually saved myself the grief and didn’t tell him.
This time I may have waited too long.

Satan stared at the glowing ball hanging in the vacuous space between the heavens. “How long has it been there?”

“I’m not sure, sir. It appeared suddenly. I watched it for a few days, and when it didn’t disappear, I called for you; that is, as soon as I realized it might be important. But then on the other hand, perhaps it means nothing.”
He leaned over the ledge, looked down, and then back up at the strange new light.
“You should have notified me immediately.”

“My fault entirely, All-Knowing One.”

“I knew you were dumb—always have been. How could you think something like this appearing in my territory without my permission could mean nothing?”

Trick question.
“I meant to say maybe it doesn’t mean anything to you— personally. Perhaps I shouldn’t have bothered you until I was sure.”

“It’s your fault for not telling me sooner if this turns out to be trouble for me.”
He was becoming agitated. I needed to diffuse the situation.

“Oh, you know what it probably is? I should have remembered. Before we were thrown out of heaven, Adonai was always making new stars, but some of them didn’t turn out, and He threw them away. This one is probably a reject. He tossed it here to get it out of

His way.”
I paused to gauge his reaction. When he didn’t have one, I kept talking.

“Of course, that’s just what it is, nothing but a botched star. I should have figured it out before I interrupted you. A thousand pardons...”
“It’s not a star.”
“You’re right; it’s not.”
“Don’t patronize me.”
“That would be impossible, sir.”

I knew it wasn’t a star, but it shone like one, and I had to call it something. I was about to explain my choice of descriptors when Molech arrived.
“You sent for me, my lord.” Molech bowed his head, as all lesser beings were required to do when addressing Satan.

“Do you see it?” Satan pointed toward the light.

“Yes, it’s been there for weeks. We’ve all been watching it.”

“Weeks?” Satan snarled and looked at me.

“Uh, well, it’s like this, master—” I had to think of something fast, or I would be so found out. It was my job to watch and report anything unusual immediately. For sure a new light source fixed in the sky as if tethered by an invisible wire over a small town on

the earth would, by anyone’s interpretation, fall into the unusual category. The truth was, of late I’d grown lax about monitoring the earth.

Ever since the prophets died off, God seemed to have lost interest and hadn’t said a word to the Jews in four hundred and thirty years. Humanity was not that interesting without God, and I got bored. I hadn’t been watching Earth every day like I should have been. I still checked on it on a somewhat regular basis, but the truth was, I didn’t know where the light came from or how long it had been there. One look at Satan’s scowl and I knew I’d better find something to say in my defense.
“As you know, master,” I continued, “I’m always at my post watching, but my vision isn’t what it used to be. Recently I’ve seen a number of things that weren’t there, and knowing how busy you are, I didn’t want to trouble you with a figment of my poor eyesight and vivid imagination. But as soon as I knew it was real, I notified you right away, O Sovereign One ever to be praised.”

“God is behind this,” Satan said to Molech, ignoring me entirely. “Send scouts; find out what He’s planning. Miss nothing.”

“As you say, my liege.”
Molech spread his leathery wings and was off. Satan watched the light a little longer and then went back to his lair without saying another word to me. I hopped up on my perch to study the light more closely.

What can it be? Have I ever seen anything like this? No. So why does it seem familiar?
As I strained to recollect, a long-dormant memory woke up in the back of my mind and wiggled its way to the front. Goosebumps formed on my tail as it all came back to me.

How could I have forgotten? I was right here on this very perch when I saw it the first time.
It was after we were thrown out of heaven, thousands of years ago when Lucifer ordered me to watch the earth languish in devastation after he and his rebellious angels ravaged it until there was nothing left of the beautiful blue-and-green planet except for the black, swirling waters. I was with them, but it wasn’t my fault, and I wasn’t a rebel. I was a victim of circumstance.
I was standing in the wrong place when the war in heaven broke out, weighing the odds between Lucifer and Michael, trying to make up my mind what to do, as any reasonable person would, given the situation. When I figured out that there was no possibility Lucifer could win, I was just about to walk over to Michael’s side; then suddenly the

war was over, and Lucifer and one-third of the angels were cast to the earth. I got caught in the downdraft and fell with them. Five minutes more and none of this would have happened to me.

The day things changed for the earth I was right here at my post in the second heaven watching the dank waters that covered it. I confess that from time to time the boredom became unbearable, and I would close my eyes and let my mind wander to a happier time when I was still in the third heaven with God. Fortunately for me, I wasn’t wandering that day. I scanned the sea like always, and like always I saw nothing happening—except for one tiny glimmer that appeared in the black water.

“It can’t be light,” I said to myself. “There is no light left anywhere on the earth.” I looked again. “That is definitely a glimmer of light.”
I got a little closer and watched as the luminous ripples grew bigger and spread further until the murkiness of the water began to clear. When I finally figured out what was happening, I wanted to run and hide.

Ruah Ha Kadosh was hovering over the deep. I was a witness when God began the re-creation of the fallen earth.

“There’s something about this star, or whatever it is, that feels like the light I saw in the seas so long ago.” I scratched my head. “But how could it be?”
I continued to watch the glow for several more hours until I heard the beating of wings. Molech was back with a cadre of platoon leaders. They set themselves down on the steps leading into Satan’s throne room. I hurried to catch up and followed them inside.

“What have you learned?” Satan demanded. “Something is happening on the earth, isn’t it?”
“That may be, my lord.” Molech paused and exchanged looks with Tammuz, the demon to his right. “But whatever might be happening on the earth cannot be nearly as important as what has happened in the third heaven.”
“How could you know anything about the third heaven?” I blurted out before I could catch myself. “We have no access there anymore.”

Molech glared at me. “You have no access, but my associate here”—he nodded toward Tammuz—“has, shall we say, sources.”

Tammuz stepped forward and bowed to Satan. “My lord, legions of angels are leaving the third heaven—right now—and are heading to the earth.”
Any news involving the heavenly host always made Satan’s eyes twitch, especially if the word legions was in the same sentence.

“But there’s more.” Molech prodded Tammuz along by poking him on the arm. “Tell him the rest—the part about Adonai.”

Satan’s twitching eyes widened.
“I was coming to that,” Tammuz said. “Adonai is missing.”

“Missing?” Satan squeaked, then cleared his throat. “Do you mean to say they’ve misplaced Him?”
Neither Molech nor Tammuz laughed at the ridiculous nature of Satan’s question, and I certainly didn’t, but only because I clamped my teeth over my tongue.
“He’s gone, master,” Tammuz said.

“Vanished,” Molech added. “He’s left the third heaven.”

“Impossible,” Satan declared. “He never leaves home. Besides, where would He go? You’re mistaken and wasting my time.”

Satan drew back his arm as if he might strike the messengers. Molech and Tammuz cowered and stepped back.

“He’s not there, my lord,” Tammuz said. “My sources looked everywhere. He’s gone. The rank-and-file angels are as perplexed as we are.”

Satan lifted an eyebrow.
“There was one witness to something strange.” Tammuz chose his words carefully. “Someone saw the host lined up in front of the throne room, facing each other with their swords drawn and crossed.”

“And?” Satan waved his claw hand in circles, urging Tammuz to say whatever he was trying not to say.

“And the witness saw Adonai come out of the throne room, walk under the crossed swords, and leave. No one has seen Him since.”

“It’s a trick.” Satan walked across the floor and kicked over a footstool, then turned back to Molech. “Where could He have gone?”

“The angels don’t know, sire, not even the elite guard. They are as mystified as you—I mean us; of course you are never mystified.”

Suddenly the door flew open as Baal, Satan’s highest-ranking demon god, barged into the room without being announced. He was breathing so hard we could barely understand him.

“You’ve got to come now, master—to the rim. We’re about to be overrun by them. Hurry!”
“Overrun by what? Whom?” I asked.

“Angels!”
“Are we being invaded?” Satan demanded.

“You must come and see for yourself.”

Wasting no more time, Satan raced with Baal to the edge of the second heaven with the rest of us right behind them. We lined up along the perimeter, where we had a clear view of the earth and all that lay in between it and us. Baal hadn’t exaggerated. Tens of thousands of high-ranking angels were gathering above the earth’s blue sky.

“What are they doing?” Satan asked.

I didn’t realize he was talking to me until he slapped me and demanded an answer.
“I, uh, well, I’m not sure, sir, but it doesn’t look like they’re coming here. It looks like they may be about to penetrate the veil between heaven and the earth and reveal themselves to that group of shepherds down there in the fields.”



“Nonsense. The heavenly host wouldn’t waste their time on gypsies. Besides, I’m sure it would be an illegal military maneuver.”

He was about to huff off when Baal tugged on his sleeve.

“Moron may be right.” He was referring to me. “Look at how the shepherds are scattering. They definitely see the angels.”

We watched as some of the shepherds ran away in fear, while others trembled and fell to their knees. But let me tell you, the trembling ones weren’t by themselves. There were no heroes in the demon horde that day either. We didn’t know why the angels had gathered,

but if it had anything to do with us, we knew we were outmanned by two to one. The chatter among the demons began.

“Why are the angels out there?”
“Is there going to be a fight?”
“Look, they’re closing ranks!”

“Ask Satan what we should do.”

Satan grabbed me by my wing.
“Find out what this means,” he ordered as he pushed me nearer the rim. “Get closer.” Then he pushed me off the edge.

I flapped as hard as I could to keep from falling. I was afraid of what the angels might do if they noticed me, but I knew what Satan would do if I didn’t obey, so I carefully fluttered a little farther out over the abyss where I could see them better. As I got closer, I realized the angels weren’t wearing their combat gear; there was not a sword in sight. They were lining up in choir formation.

“Are they going to attack?” Satan yelled out at me.

“No, sir, I believe they’re going to sing.”

“What?” Satan asked in disbelief as he flew to my side to see for himself.
And sing they did. The angelic royalty of heaven went near the earth and sang a song to fewer than a dozen cowering shepherds.

“Fear not, for behold we bring you glad tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. For born unto you tonight in the city of David is the Messiah, the Lord who will bring salvation to all mankind. Go, and you will find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes and lying in a manger.”
The angels’ voices were so loud we covered our ears to muffle the sounds as they continued.
“Glory to God in the highest and on the earth, peace and goodwill toward men.”
I was terrified like all the rest but so excited by what the angels sang I could barely contain myself. I followed Satan back to the rim and tried to appear as disturbed as the rest of the demons, but inside I was bursting with hope. How long I had waited for Him—the one promised to David so many generations ago. Oh, yes, He was the hope of the Jews, but He was my hope as well, my only hope.

The veil between heaven and the earth closed, and the angels were no longer visible to the shepherds or to us; still, no one moved from his place. It was almost as if an invisible force held us there. We seemed hypnotized by the light that still hung over the blackness of the great abyss.
“What was that all about?” asked one of the demons.

“Maybe Satan knows.”
“Yes, Satan must know.”
But Satan didn’t know. When he heard the chattering among the demons, he whispered to me out of the side of his mouth.

“Do you think it’s over? Should we move on?”

“Can you move, sir?”
He grimaced as he tried to lift a hoof. I pretended not to be looking.

“Maybe we should wait a bit longer,” I said.

I didn’t know what was coming, but the tingling scales on the back of my neck told me something else was about to happen. At once another blinding light appeared and hovered over the abyss right in front of Satan. I knew him immediately. It was Gabriel, the essenger angel of the most high God. All the demons took one step back. Except for me.

“Gabriel! Hello.” I stepped forward and waved.

Satan stepped on my tail and jerked my wing. “Stay still and shut up!”

“Sorry, sir.” I slunk back.
“Lucifer, fallen son of the light.” Gabriel’s voice was like thunder.

“What do you want?” Satan tried to appear annoyed, but his swishing tail said he was nervous. “You’re in my territory.”

“I bring you a message from I AM, one that will be good news to all mankind.”
“Then why are you telling me?”

“Guess what it means for you.”

Every demon took another step back.

“Wha–what is it?” Satan stammered.

The angel’s eyes narrowed as he answered.

“Game on.”

"How Huge The Night: A Novel"

It is time for a FIRST Wild Card Tour book review! If you wish to join the FIRST blog alliance, just click the button. We are a group of reviewers who tour Christian books. A Wild Card post includes a brief bio of the author and a full chapter from each book toured. The reason it is called a FIRST Wild Card Tour is that you never know if the book will be fiction, non~fiction, for young, or for old...or for somewhere in between! Enjoy your free peek into the book!

You never know when I might play a wild card on you!


Today's Wild Card authors are:


and the book:


How Huge the Night: A Novel

Kregel Publications (March 9, 2011)

***Special thanks to Cat Hoort of Kregel Publications for sending me a review copy.***

MY REVIEW:
No review yet because I only received the book two days ago - but it looks great and I can't wait to read it!

ABOUT THE AUTHORS:


Heather Munn was born in Northern Ireland of American parents and grew up in the south of France. She decided to be a writer at the age of five when her mother read Laura Ingalls Wilder’s books aloud, but worried that she couldn’t write about her childhood since she didn’t remember it. When she was young, her favorite time of day was after supper when the family would gather and her father would read a chapter from a novel. Heather went to French school until her teens, and grew up hearing the story of Le Chambonsur-Lignon, only an hour’s drive away. She now lives in rural Illinois with her husband, Paul, where they offer free spiritual retreats to people coming out of homelessness and addiction. She enjoys wandering in the woods, gardening, writing, and splitting wood.

Lydia Munn was homeschooled for five years because there was no school where her family served as missionaries in the savannahs of northern Brazil. There was no public library either, but Lydia read every book she could get her hands on. This led naturally to her choice of an English major at Wheaton College. Her original plan to teach high school English gradually transitioned into a lifelong love of teaching the Bible to both adults and young people as a missionary in France. She and her husband, Jim, have two children: their son, Robin, and their daughter, Heather.


SHORT BOOK DESCRIPTION:

When had God ever stopped a war because a teenager asked him to?

For fifteen-year-old Julien Losier, life will never be the same. His family has relocated to southern France to outrun Hitler’s menace. But Julien doesn’t want to run. He doesn’t want to huddle around the radio at night, waiting to hear news through buzzing static. Julien doesn’t want to wait.
Angry, frustrated, and itching to do something, Julien finds a battle everywhere he turns.
Soon after his family opens their house to a Jewish boy needing refuge, Julien meets Nina, a young Austrian who has fled her home by her father’s dying command. Nina’s situation is grave and Julien suddenly realizes the enormity of having someone’s life or death depend on… him.

Thrown together by a conflict that’s too big for them to understand, these young lives struggle to know what to do, even if it is not enough. Is there a greater purpose in the shadows of this terrible war? Or will their choices put them in greater danger?

Endorsements:

“The Munns have written an engrossing historical novel that is faithful to the actual events of World War II in western Europe during the tumultuous year 1940. But How Huge the Night is more than good history; it is particularly refreshing because the reader sees the conflict through the lives of teenagers who are forced to grapple with their honest questions about the existence and goodness of God in the midst of community, family, and ethnic tensions in war-ravaged France.”—Lyle W. Dorsett, Billy Graham Professor of Evangelism, Beeson Divinity School, Samford University

“Seldom have the horrors of war upon adolescents—or the heroism of which they are capable—been so clearly portrayed. I loved this coming-of-age story.”—Patricia Sprinkle, author of Hold Up the Sky


“The book expertly weaves together the lives of its characters at a frightening moment in conflicted times. As we read of their moral dilemmas and of their choices, we too wonder, Would I do has these in the story have done?”—Karen Mains, Director, Hungry Souls



Product Details:

List Price: $14.99
Reading level: Young Adult
Paperback: 304 pages
Publisher: Kregel Publications (March 9, 2011)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 082543310X
ISBN-13: 978-0825433108

AND NOW...AN EXCERPT:


From Chapter 23

Thursday the power came back on. They sat in the living room, around the radio that crackled with static; they looked at each other, and then away. The room grew quiet as the announcer began to speak.

“Since Mussolini’s declaration of war on France two days ago, Italian troops are pushing west—”

Mama was on her feet. “The thief!” she hissed. “The backstabber, the coward!” Her face was red. Everyone was staring. She sat down.

Papa looked at her. “Saw his chance, I guess.”

“He’s a shame to his nation,” Mama snapped. Julien stared. Then they heard the shift in the announcer’s voice and turned sharply to the radio.

“German troops are approaching Paris at a rapid pace. As we speak, the vanguard is reported to be fifteen kilometers from Versailles. This will be our last broadcast for a while.”

They did not look at each other. The silence was total.

“Today Paris has been declared an ‘open city.’ Our military will not defend it. This decision was made to avoid bombardment and the great destruction and loss of life that it entails. . . .”

Julien realized he had not been breathing. It was an amazing thing, breathing. Tears shone in Mama’s eyes.

“They won’t bomb Paris,” said Papa quietly.

“They won’t bomb Paris,” Mama whispered.

Benjamin stood, his face very still. He walked slowly to the door and took the stairs.

Julien waited, breathing, seeing Paris; seeing Vincent and his mother look up out of their second-floor window at a clear blue sky. He waited until the news ended, until they had read a psalm that said The Lord has delivered.

Then he followed Benjamin.

Benjamin’s door was closed. Julien hesitated, biting his lip, and went into his own room.

He looked out the window in the fading light. They wouldn’t defend it. This was it, then. What Pastor Alex said was true. German tanks would roll down the Champs-Elysées for real in just a couple days. Then the boches would come here. And they would stay.

He pulled Vincent’s last letter out from under his nightstand. I can’t believe you almost died, it said. That’s crazy. He got up, and went and knocked on Benjamin’s door.

No answer.

“Benjamin? You all right?”

“Fine.”

Julien opened the door. Benjamin turned quickly, scowling.

“Did I say you could come in?”

“Well sorry,” Julien growled. How am I supposed to help when he’s like this? “Just wanted to say good night.”

“Good night then.”

“Look, it’s not as bad as it could have been, okay? They could have bombed the place to shreds like Ro—” He bit his tongue.

“You’re right,” said Benjamin, looking away. “That’s good for your relatives. I’m glad.”

“And your parents!”

“Nothing’s good for my parents.” His voice was toneless. “Look, Julien, we can talk about this in the morning. I need to go to bed.”

Julien knew when to quit. He turned away. “Sleep well.”

“You too.”

But he couldn’t. He turned and turned in his bed, twisting the sheets.

He got up and looked out at the crescent moon and the stars high over Tanieux, so white, so far, always the same; they would still be there when the Germans were here; they would still be there all his life. They were still there over Rotterdam, too. It didn’t make any difference.

When he finally slept, he dreamed: Paris on the fourteenth of July, the fireworks, bursts of blue, of gold, of red above the city. A whirling rocket going up with a hiss and a bang. Then a louder bang. Then a bang that threw up a great shower of dirt and stones, and people screaming, people running as the shells began to fall—

He woke, and lay shivering. He got up to close the window. The stars shone down like cold eyes.

He heard a faint scratching. Mice maybe. A floorboard creaked. He listened.

And he heard it. Very slow, stealthy footsteps going down the stairs.

He sat up slowly. Magali or Benjamin. Tiptoeing down the stairs to the kitchen, wishing there was something to eat. . . . He got out of bed and leaned out the window, watching for the faint light that would come through from the kitchen. No light came.

But on the ground floor, the heavy front door opened, and a dark shape slipped out into the street. A shadow with a suitcase in its hand.

He ran across the hall and threw open Benjamin’s door. A neatly made bed, a letter on the pillow. He grabbed it, ran back to his room, jerked his pants on over his pajamas, and ran downstairs in his socks. He’d catch him. Benjamin was on foot. He had to catch him. He scrawled on the flip side of the note, I’ve gone after him, pulled on his shoes and jacket, and flew down the stairs and into the dark.

He raced down the shadowed street and stopped at the corner, heart pounding, looking both ways. North, over the hill: the road to St. Etienne. A train to Paris, like he’d said? There were no trains now. Or south—south to where? Oh Lord if I choose wrong I’ll never find him.

Think. What would he do if it were him? He’d go south—north was suicide, but—he didn’t know, he didn’t know Benjamin. Who did? Nothing is good for my parents, he’d said—he didn’t seem to even care that Paris wouldn’t be bombed—

Because his parents weren’t in Paris.

Julien turned, suddenly sure, and ran.

The Kellers had left Germany because of Hitler and his people. Would they stay in Paris and wait for them? “Let’s walk south,” Benjamin had said—and that stupid map—he should have guessed.

He ran, breathing hard, his eyes on the dark road ahead. Oh God. Oh Jesus. Don’t let me miss him please—please—

He broke free of the houses; the Tanne gleamed in front of him under the splintered moon, cut by the dark curve of the bridge. He froze. He ducked into the shadows and breathed.

There on the bridge was a slender figure leaning on the parapet, looking down at the dark water.

Oh God. Oh Jesus. Now what?

Benjamin turned and took a long, last look at Tanieux. Then he adjusted his backpack, picked up his suitcase, and walked away.

Julien slipped out of the shadows and up to the bridge, his heart beating help me Jesus help me, his mind searching for words. Come home. And if he said no? Drag him? Help me Jesus. He was across the bridge, ten paces behind Benjamin; he broke into a silent run on the grassy verge of the road. He caught up to him. Laid a hand on his arm.

“Benjamin.”

Benjamin whirled, eyes wild in the moonlight. They stared at each other. “Why.” said Julien. “Tell me why.” His voice was harder than he meant it to be.

“Let me go.”

“No.” He tightened his grip on Benjamin’s arm.

Benjamin tried to pull away. “Julien, let me go. You have no idea. You have no idea what they’re like.”

“The boches?” This time his voice came out small.

“The Nazis, Julien. Ever heard of them? Yeah, you heard they don’t like Jews—I don’t think any of you people understand.” The sweep of his arm took in the school and the sleeping town. “Your parents are great, Julien—offering shelter and all—they really are. But they don’t know. Yet.”

But they do. They know. “Know what? What’ll they—do?”

“I’m not waiting around to find out.” His face was white and deadly serious. “Trust me on this, Julien. They are coming here and when they do, it’s better for you if I’m long gone.” I believe it is very dangerous to be a Jew in Germany. And soon—

Julien stood silent. The night wind touched his face; the hills were shadows on the horizon where they blotted out the stars. Suddenly he felt how large the world was, how huge the night, how small they stood on the road in the light of the waning moon. Ahead, the road bent into the pine woods, and in his mind, Julien saw Benjamin walking away, a small form carrying a suitcase into the darkness under the trees. His fingers bit into Benjamin’s arm.

“I don’t care,” he said savagely. “Where would you go?”

Benjamin said nothing; the moonlight quivered in his eyes as they filled with tears. He turned his head away. “I don’t know.” His voice shook.

Julien caught him by the shoulders, gripped him hard. “Well I do,” he said fiercely. “You’re coming home.”

Saturday, May 14, 2011

"The Lightkeeper's Ball" Book Review

It is time for a FIRST Wild Card Tour book review! If you wish to join the FIRST blog alliance, just click the button. We are a group of reviewers who tour Christian books. A Wild Card post includes a brief bio of the author and a full chapter from each book toured. The reason it is called a FIRST Wild Card Tour is that you never know if the book will be fiction, non~fiction, for young, or for old...or for somewhere in between! Enjoy your free peek into the book!

You never know when I might play a wild card on you!


Today's Wild Card author is:


and the book:


The Lightkeeper’s Ball

Thomas Nelson; 1 edition (April 19, 2011)

***Special thanks to Audra Jennings, Senior Media Specialist, The B&B Media Group for sending me a review copy.***

MY REVIEW:
This book not only has one of the most gorgeous covers I have seen in awhile, it also has one of the best plot lines of the books I've read so far this year. I love Colleen's style, the way she develops her characters so beautifully, puts them in a setting that is so realistic that I feel like I'm there and then she artfully weaves story lines around the characters as she melds everything together. In this particular case Olivia is a strong heroine that wants justice for her sister and sets out to make things right and find out who murdered her. The very man she holds responsible creates a puzzle for her as she starts to doubt his guilt (and then slowly falls in love with him). She finds that she is in grave danger herself and whoever murdered her sister isn't done yet. What a great book!

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:



Colleen Coble’s thirty-five novels and novellas have won or finaled in awards ranging from the Romance Writers of America prestigious RITA, the Holt Medallion, the ACFW Book of the Year, the Daphne du Maurier, National Readers’ Choice, the Booksellers Best, and the 2009 Best Books of Indiana-Fiction award. She writes romantic mysteries because she loves to see justice prevail and love begin with a happy ending.


Visit the author's website.

SHORT BOOK DESCRIPTION:


Olivia seems to have it all, but her heart yearns for more.

Olivia Stewart's family is one of the Four Hundred—the highest echelon of society in 1910. When her sister dies under mysterious circumstances, Olivia leaves their New York City home for Mercy Falls, California, to determine what befell Eleanor. She suspects Harrison Bennett, the man Eleanor planned to marry. But the more Olivia gets to know him, the more she doubts his guilt—and the more she is drawn to him herself.

When several attempts are made on her life, Olivia turns to Harrison for help. He takes her on a ride in his aeroplane, but then crashes, and they’re forced to spend two days alone together. With her reputation hanging by a thread, Harrison offers to marry her to make the situation right. As a charity ball to rebuild the Mercy Falls lighthouse draws near, she realizes she wants more than a sham engagement—she wants Harrison in her life forever. But her enemy plans to shatter the happiness she is ready to grasp. If Olivia dares to drop her masquerade, she just might see the path to true happiness.



Product Details:

List Price: $14.99
Paperback: 304 pages
Publisher: Thomas Nelson; 1 edition (April 19, 2011)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 159554268X
ISBN-13: 978-1595542687

AND NOW...THE FIRST CHAPTER:


The New York brownstone was just half a block down from the Astor mansion on Fifth Avenue, the most prestigious address in the country. The carriage, monogrammed with the Stewart emblem, rattled through the iron gates and came to a halt in front of the ornate doors. Assisted by the doorman, Olivia Stewart descended and rushed for the steps of her home. She was late for tea, and her mother would be furious. Mrs. Astor herself had agreed to join them today.

Olivia handed her hat to the maid, who opened the door. “They’re in the drawing room, Miss Olivia,” Goldia whispered. “Your mama is ready to pace the floor.”

Olivia patted at her hair, straightened her shoulders, and pinned a smile in place as she forced her stride to a ladylike stroll to join the other women. Two women turned to face her as she entered: her mother and Mrs. Astor. They wore identical expressions of disapproval.

“Olivia, there you are,” her mother said. “Sit down before your tea gets cold.”

Olivia pulled off her gloves as she settled into the Queen Anne chair beside Mrs. Astor. “I apologize for my tardiness,” she said. “A lorry filled with tomatoes overturned in the street, and my driver couldn’t get around it.”

Mrs. Astor’s face cleared. “Of course, my dear.” She sipped her tea from the delicate blue-and-white china. “Your dear mother and I were just discussing your prospects. It’s time you married.”

Oh dear. She’d hoped to engage in light conversation that had nothing to do with the fact that she was twenty-five and still unmarried. Her unmarried state distressed her if she let it, but every man her father brought to her wanted only her status. She doubted any of them had ever looked into her soul. “I’m honored you would care about my marital status, Mrs. Astor,” Olivia said.

“Mrs. Astor wants to hold a ball in your honor, Olivia,” her mother gushed. “She has a distant cousin coming to town whom she wants you to meet.”

Mrs. Astor nodded. “I believe you and Matthew would suit. He owns property just down the street.”

Olivia didn’t mistake the reference to the man’s money. Wealth would be sure to impact her mother. She opened her mouth to ask if the man was her age, then closed it at the warning glint in her mother’s eyes.

“He’s been widowed for fifteen years and is long overdue for a suitable wife,” Mrs. Astor said.

Olivia barely suppressed a sigh. So he was another of the decrepit gentlemen who showed up from time to time. “You’re very kind,” she said.

“He’s most suitable,” her mother said. “Most suitable.”

Olivia caught the implication. They spent the next half an hour discussing the date and the location. She tried to enter into the conversation with interest, but all she could do was imagine some gray-whiskered blue blood dancing her around the ballroom. She stifled a sigh of relief when Mrs. Astor took her leave and called for her carriage.

“I’ll be happy when you’re settled, Olivia,” her mother said when they returned to the drawing room. “Mrs. Astor is most kind.”

“She is indeed.” Olivia pleated her skirt with her fingers. “Do you ever wish you could go somewhere incognito, Mother? Where no one has expectations of you because you are a Stewart?”

Her mother put down her saucer with a clatter. “Whatever are you babbling about, my dear?”

“Haven’t you noticed that people look at us differently because we’re Stewarts? How is a man ever to love me for myself when all he sees is what my name can gain him? Men never see inside to the real me. They notice only that I’m a Stewart.”

“Have you been reading those novels again?” Her mother sniffed and narrowed her gaze on Olivia. “Marriage is about making suitable connections. You owe it to your future children to consider the life you give them. Love comes from respect. I would find it quite difficult to respect someone who didn’t have the gumption to make his way in the world. Besides, we need you to marry well. You’re twenty-five years old and I’ve indulged your romantic notions long enough. Heaven knows your sister’s marriage isn’t what I had in mind, essential though it may be. Someone has to keep the family name in good standing.”

Olivia knew what her duty demanded, but she didn’t have to like it. “Do all the suitable men have to be in their dotage?”

Her mother’s eyes sparked fire but before she spoke, Goldia appeared in the doorway. “Mr. Bennett is here, Mrs. Stewart.”

Olivia straightened in her chair. “Show him in. He’ll have news of Eleanor.”

Bennett appeared in the doorway moments later. He shouldn’t have been imposing. He stood only five-foot-three in his shoes, which were always freshly polished. He was slim, nearly gaunt, with a patrician nose and obsidian eyes. He’d always reminded Olivia of a snake about to strike. His expression never betrayed any emotion, and today was no exception. She’d never understood why her father entertained an acquaintance with the man let alone desired their families to be joined.

“Mr. Bennett.” She rose and extended her hand and tried not to flinch as he brushed his lips across it.

“Miss Olivia,” he said, releasing her hand. He moved to her mother’s chair and bowed over her extended hand.

Olivia sank back into her chair. “What do you hear of my sister? I have received no answer to any of my letters.”

He took a seat, steepled his fingers, and leaned forward. “That’s the reason for our meeting today. I fear I have bad news to impart.”

Her pulse thumped erratically against her ribcage. She wetted her lips and drew in a deep breath. “What news of Eleanor?” How bad could it be? Eleanor had gone to marry Harrison, a man she hardly knew. But she was in love with the idea of the Wild West, and therefore more than happy to marry the son of her father’s business partner.

He never blinked. “I shall just have to blurt it out then. I’m sorry to inform you that Eleanor is dead.”

Her mother moaned. Olivia stared at him. “I don’t believe it,” she said.

“I know, it’s a shock.”

There must have been some mistake. She searched his face for some clue that this was a jest. “What happened?”

He didn’t hold her gaze. “She drowned.”

“How?”

“No one knows. I’m sorry.”

Her mother stood and swayed. “What are you saying?” Her voice rose in a shriek. “Eleanor can’t be dead! Are you quite mad?”

He stood and took her arm. “I suggest you lie down, Mrs. Stewart. You’re quite pale.”

Her mother put her hands to her cheeks. “Tell me it isn’t true,” she begged. Then she keeled over in a dead faint.

#
Harrison Bennett tugged on his tie, glanced at his shoes to make sure no speck of dirt marred their perfection, then disembarked from his motorcar in front of the mansion. The cab had rolled up Nob Hill much too quickly for him to gather his courage to face the party. Electric lights pushed back the darkness from the curving brick driveway to the porch with its impressive white pillars. Doormen flanked the double doors at the entry. Through the large windows, he saw the ballroom. Ladies in luxurious gowns and gentlemen in tuxedos danced under glittering chandeliers, and their laughter tinkled on the wind.

His valet, Eugene, exited behind him. “I’ll wait in the kitchen, sir.”

Harrison adjusted his hat and strode with all the confidence he could muster to the front door. “Mr. Harrison Bennett,” he said to the doorman.

The man scanned the paper in his hand. “Welcome, Mr. Bennett. Mr. Rothschild is in the ballroom.”

Harrison thanked him and stepped into the opulent hall papered in gold foil. He went in the direction of the voices with a sense of purpose. This night could change his future. He glanced around the enormous ballroom, and he recognized no one among the glittering gowns and expensive suits. In subtle ways, these nobs would try to keep him in his place. It would take all his gumption not to let them. It was a miracle he’d received an invitation. Only the very wealthy or titled were invited to the Rothschilds’ annual ball in San Francisco. Harrison was determined to do whatever was necessary to secure the contract inside his coat pocket.

A young woman in an evening gown fluttered her lashes at him over the top of her fan. When she lowered it, she approached with a coaxing smile on her lips. “Mr. Bennett, I’d hoped to see you here tonight.”

He struggled to remember her name. Miss Kessler. She’d made her interest in him known at Eleanor’s funeral. Hardly a suitable time. He took her gloved hand and bowed over it. “Miss Kessler. I wasn’t expecting to see you here.”

“I came when I heard you were on the guest list.”

He ignored her brazen remark. “It’s good to see you again. I have some business to attend to. Perhaps later?”

Her eyes darkened and she withdrew her hand. “I shall watch for you,” she said.

And he’d do the same, with the intent to avoid her. “If you’ll excuse me.” He didn’t wait for an answer but strolled through the crowd. He finally spied his host standing in front of a marble fireplace. A flame danced in the eight-foot hearth. Harrison stepped through the crowd to join the four men clustered around the wealthy Rothschild.

The man closest to Harrison was in his fifties and had a curling mustache. “They’ll never get that amendment ratified,” he said. “An income tax! It’s quite ridiculous to expect us to pay something so outrageous.”

A younger man in a gray suit shook his head. “If it means better roads, I’ll gladly write them a check. The potholes outside of town ruined my front axels.”

“We can take care of our own roads,” Rothschild said. “I have no need of the government in my affairs. At least until we’re all using flying machines.” He snickered, then glanced at Harrison. “You look familiar, young man. Have we met?”

Flying machines. Maybe this meeting was something God had arranged. Harrison thrust out his hand. “Harrison Bennett.”

“Claude’s son?”’

Was that distaste in the twist of Rothschild’s mouth? Harrison put confidence into his grip. “Yes, sir.”

“How is your father?”

“Quite well. He’s back in New York by now.”

“I heard about your fiancée’s death. I’m sorry for your loss.”

Harrison managed not to wince. “Thank you.” He pushed away his memories of that terrible day, the day he’d seen Eleanor Stewart for what she really was.

“Your father was most insistent I meet you. He seems to think you have a business proposition I might be interested in.”

Harrison smiled and began to tell the men of the new diamond mines that Bennett and Bennett had found in Africa. A mere week after Mr. Stewart’s passing, Mr. Bennett had renamed the venture to include Harrison. An hour later, he had appointments set up with three of the men as possible investors. His father would be pleased.

Harrison smiled and retraced his steps to toward the front door but was waylaid by four women in brightly colored silk. They swooped around him, and Miss Kessler took him by the hand and led him to a quiet corner.

“Let’s not talk about anything boring like work,” she said, her blue eyes sparkling. “Tell me what you love to do most.”

He glanced at the other women clustered around. “I’m building an aeroplane. I’d like to have it in the air by the time Earth passes through the tail of Halley’s Comet.”

She gasped. “Do you have a death wish, Mr. Bennett? You would be breathing the poisonous fumes directly. No one even knows if the Earth will survive this.”

He’d heard this before. “The scientists I’ve discussed this with believe we shall be just fine,” Harrison said.

“I assume you’ve purchased comet pills?” the blonde closest to him said.

“I have no fear.”

The brunette in red silk smiled. “If man were meant to fly, God would have given him wings. Or so I’ve heard the minister say.”

He finally placed the brunette. Her uncle was Rothschild. No wonder she had such contempt for Harrison’s tone. All the nobs cared for were trains and ships. “It’s just a matter of perfecting the machine,” Harrison said. “Someday aeroplanes will be the main mode of transcontinental transportation.”

The brunette laughed. “Transcontinental? My uncle would call it balderdash.”

He glanced at his pocket watch without replying. “I fear I must leave you lovely ladies. Thank you for the conversation.”

He found Eugene in the kitchen and beckoned to his valet.

Eugene put down his coffee cup and followed. “You didn’t stay long, sir,” he said. “Is everything all right?”

Harrison stalked out the door and toward the car. “Are there no visionaries left in the country?”

Eugene followed a step behind. “You spoke of your flying machine?”

“The world is changing, Eugene, right under their noses—and they don’t see it.”

Eugene opened the door for Harrison. “You will show them the future, sir.”

He set his jaw. “I shall indeed.”

“I have a small savings set aside, Mr. Bennett. I’d like to invest in your company. With your permission, of course.”

Eugene’s trust bolstered Harrison’s determination. “I’d be honored to partner with you, Eugene. We are going to change the world.”

Thursday, May 12, 2011

"An Unlikely Suitor" Book Review


This week, the

Christian Fiction Blog Alliance

is introducing

An Unlikely Suitor

Bethany House (May 1, 2011)

by

Nancy Moser



MY REVIEW:


I have decided that if the book is written by Nancy Moser then I need to read it. She never fails to write a unique story with fascinating perspectives and the best part... everything isn't always tied up in a neat bow at the end, but it is always satisfying. "Unlikely Suitor" doesn't fail. Here we delve into the lives of Lucy and her younger sister Sofia and then Lucy's unlikely friend Rowena. As their lives are intertwined we start to see love come to each of them in the most unusual ways. I loved seeing how everything unfolded and while I knew I was in for a twist I wasn't quite sure how Nancy Moser would pull it off, but she did. This book was enjoyable and quite the page turner, I read it in a day - fantastic!

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:



Nancy Moser is the award-winning author of over twenty inspirational novels. Her genres include contemporary stories including John 3:16 and Time Lottery a Christy Award winner, and historical novels of real women-of-history including Just Jane (Jane Austen) and Washington's Lady (Martha Washington). Her newest historical novels are Masquerade and An Unlikely Suitor.


Nancy and her husband Mark live in the Midwest. She’s earned a degree in architecture, traveled extensively in Europe, and has performed in numerous theaters, symphonies, and choirs. She gives Sister Circle Seminars around the country, helping women identify their gifts as they celebrate their sisterhood. She is a fan of anything antique—humans included. Find out more at http://www.nancymoser.com/ and http://www.sistercircles.com/ and her historical blog: http://footnotesfromhistory.blogspot.com/





ABOUT THE BOOK




New York dressmaker Lucy Scarpelli befriends socialite Rowena Langdon as she's designing her 1895 summer wardrobe. Grateful for Lucy's skill in creating fashions that hide her physical injury, Rowena invites Lucy to the family mansion in Newport, Rhode Island, encouraging the unusual friendship.



One day Lucy encounters an intriguing man on the Cliff Walk, and love begins to blossom. Yet Lucy resists, for what Newport man would want to marry an Italian dressmaker working to support her family?



Rowena faces an arranged marriage to a wealthy heir she doesn't love, but dare a crippled girl hope for anything better?



And Lucy's teenage sister, Sofia, falls for a man well above her social class--but is he willing to give up everything to marry a woman below his station?

As the lives of three young woman--and their unlikely suitors--become entangled in a web of secrets and sacrifice, will the season end with any of them finding true happiness?



If you would like to read the first chapter of An Unlikely Suitor, go HERE.

Saturday, May 7, 2011

"To Win Her Heart" Book Review

This week, the
Christian Fiction Blog Alliance
is introducing
To Win Her Heart
Bethany House (May 1, 2011)
by
Karen Witemeyer


MY REVIEW:
Karen's series is wonderful and while I enjoyed the first two books, this third book is amazing. Don't judge a book by it's cover is displayed brilliantly in this storyline (the actual cover is beautiful by the way). Two misunderstood people meet in this fun book and yet will the pasts that haunt them actually allow them the opportunity to be together? This book makes it fun to find out. I can't wait to see what Karen has in store for her readers next!

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:



Karen Witemeyer is a deacon's wife and mother of three who believes the world needs more happily-ever-afters. To that end, she combines her love of bygone eras with her passion for helping women mature in Christ to craft historical romance novels that lift the spirit and nurture the soul.



After growing up in California, Karen moved to Texas to attend Abilene Christian University where she earned bachelor and master's degrees in Psychology. It was also there that she met and married her own Texas hero. He roped her in good, for she has lived in Texas ever since. In fact, she fell so in love with this rugged land of sweeping sunsets and enduring pioneer spirit, that she incorporates it into the pages of her novels, setting her stories in the small towns of a state that burgeoned into greatness in the mid- to late1800s.



Karen is living her dream by writing Christian historical romance novels for Bethany House. When she visited her publisher back in January of 2010, she was interviewed by the staff. If you'd like a behind-the-scenes glimpse into how she develops her story ideas and a description of her bumpy journey to publication, click here to listen to a podcast of that interview.



ABOUT THE BOOK



After completing his sentence for the unintentional crime that derailed his youthful plans for fame and fortune, Levi Grant looks to start over in the town of Spencer, Texas. Spencer needs a blacksmith, a trade he learned at his father’s knee, and he needs a place where no one knows his past.



Eden Spencer has sworn off men, choosing instead to devote her time to the lending library she runs in the town her father founded. When a mountain-sized stranger walks through her door and asks to borrow a book, she's reluctant to trust him. Yet as the mysteries of the town’s new blacksmith unfold, Eden discovers hidden depths in him that tempt her heart.



Eden believes she's finally found a man of honor and integrity. But when the truth about Levi's prodigal past comes to light, can this tarnished hero find a way to win back the librarian’s affections?



If you would like to read the first chapter of To Win Her Heart, go HERE.

Wednesday, May 4, 2011

"The Gift" Book Review


This week, the

Christian Fiction Blog Alliance

is introducing

The Gift

Crossway Books (April 30, 2011)

by

Bryan Litfin



MY REVIEW:


I really enjoyed the first book in this series, but this second book is even better! Years in the future and after a global epidemic that practically wiped out all mankind, society has reverted to an almost midevil state. Christianity has been eradicated - or has it? This book takes us on a journey to Roma in search of a copy of the New Testament (in Book 1 Teo and Ana found a copy of the Old Testament). Along the way Ana and Teo are separated and both of them make the ultimate sacrifice for each other. I can not wait until the next book comes out - alas, I think it will be awhile, but worth the wait!

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:




Bryan earned a bachelor’s degree in print journalism from the University of Tennessee as well as a master’s degree in historical theology at Dallas Theological Seminary. From there he went to the University of Virginia, taking a PhD in the field of ancient church history. He is currently professor of theology at Moody Bible Institute in downtown Chicago, where he has been since 2002. He teaches courses in theology, church history, and Western civilization from the ancient and medieval periods. He is the author of Getting to Know the Church Fathers: An Evangelical Introduction (Brazos, 2007), as well as several scholarly articles and essays. Bryan has always enjoyed epic adventure stories as well as historical fiction, but most of his reading these days is taken up by academia.



Today Bryan lives in downtown Wheaton in a Victorian house built in 1887. He and his wife Carolyn are parents to two children. For recreation Bryan enjoys basketball, traveling, and hiking anywhere there are mountains. The Litfins attend College Church in Wheaton, where Bryan has served on the Board of Missions and as a deacon. He also helped start Clapham School, a Christian primary school in Wheaton using the classical model of education.



ABOUT THE BOOK




The Chiveis Trilogy takes readers hundreds of years into the future. War and disease have destroyed civilization as we know it. Much technology has been discarded and history is largely forgotten. Slowly, the few survivors have begun to build new communities, and kingdoms now prosper in a kind of feudal order. But the Word of God has been lost for centuries.



After the finding of an Old Testament in book one of the trilogy, The Gift picks up the story of Teo and Ana. Exiled from their homeland and trying to survive in unknown and dangerous lands, they search for any record of the missing Testament.



Their journeys lead them into the region we know as Italy. An elite society welcomes Ana, who finds she must choose between her new life and her dream of returning to Chiveis. Will Teo and Ana’s relationship withstand the circumstances and new enemies pulling them apart? And can Teo keep ahead of a powerful and mysterious force opposing his search for the New Testament?



If you'd like to read the first chapter of The Gift, go HERE.



Watch the book trailer:





The Gift Trailer from Crossway on Vimeo<>

Sunday, May 1, 2011

"God's Generals: The Healing Evangelists" Book Review

It is time for a FIRST Wild Card Tour book review! If you wish to join the FIRST blog alliance, just click the button. We are a group of reviewers who tour Christian books. A Wild Card post includes a brief bio of the author and a full chapter from each book toured. The reason it is called a FIRST Wild Card Tour is that you never know if the book will be fiction, non~fiction, for young, or for old...or for somewhere in between! Enjoy your free peek into the book!

You never know when I might play a wild card on you!




Today's Wild Card author is:






and the book:




God’s Generals: The Healing Evangelists


Whitaker House (April 5, 2011)

***Special thanks to Cathy Hickling of Whitaker House for sending me a review copy.***

MY REVIEW:
When I was a teenager my youth group did a study using "God's Generals" by Roberts Liardon and I remember it to now. So when I got the chance to read his new book focusing on the healing evangelists I was excited. Roberts is a master of history and bringing it to life. This book doesn't disappoint and I was very pleased to see that the series is continuing on. Excellent!



ABOUT THE AUTHOR:


Roberts Liardon is a bestselling author, public speaker, church historian, and humanitarian whose outreach teams have provided food, clothing, and spiritual teaching to impoverished people around the world. He has published 54 books that have sold over seven million copies in over 50 languages. Liardon maintains an active speaking schedule that has taken him to 112 countries. He is fervent researcher and biographer of Christian leaders throughout the ages, published in his popular God’s Generals series. Prior to The Healing Evangelists the series includes: God’s Generals: Why They Succeeded and Why Some Failed, God’s Generals: The Roaring Reformers, and God’s Generals: The Revivalists.

Visit the author's website.



SHORT BOOK DESCRIPTION:

In this fourth God’s Generals volume, Roberts Liardon chronicles the healing evangelists of the twentieth century whose ministries crossed denominational lines using the technologies of radio and television to reach audiences worldwide. Liardon chronicles the ministries of: Oral Roberts, a pioneer in Christian television who would build a world-class university, hospital, and medical school; Lester Sumrall, healed of tuberculosis as a boy, he dedicated his life to reaching others for Christ; Charles and Frances Hunter, the “Happy Hunters,” known as two of the most anointed and enthusiastic evangelists on earth; George Jeffreys, a Welsh preacher who ministered with his brother Stephen throughout England, Wales, and Ireland; F. Bosworth, a Depression-era faith healer and one of the founders of the Assemblies of God.


Product Details:

List Price: $22.99
Hardcover: 144 pages
Publisher: Whitaker House (April 5, 2011)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1603742689
ISBN-13: 978-1603742689

AND NOW...THE FIRST CHAPTER:




F. F. Bosworth

On a cold winter morning in 1925 in a schoolyard in Scranton, Pennsylvania, a group of rosy-cheeked children laughed gleefully as they chased each other around the tall oak tree. Little girls giggled on the swing set as they swung higher and higher.

Suddenly, one little girl fell to the ground, crying as she clutched at her chest. Apparently, she had injured herself, but even as she wiped her tears, the adults who were supervising were not concerned. Nine-year-old Raffaela Serio continued to have pain near the “invisible” injury on her chest. Her parents were concerned, so they took her to see one doctor and then another. It appeared she had just bruised the area near her left breast, but as the pain increased, a small lump formed and then grew to the size of an orange.

Raffaela’s parents called on a friend who was a pediatric specialist trained at John Hopkins University. After administering several difficult tests, the doctor gravely pronounced the diagnosis. Little Raffaela Serio had sarcoma cancer of the left breast.

The grieving parents watched as their precious daughter lost weight rapidly. The specialist determined that the cancer was rooted too deeply for surgery and said he could do little for the pain. There was also an open, seeping sore, but since not much was known about cancer at the time, the doctor prescribed a special brown salve to be applied on the affected area each day, which would then be wrapped with clean bandages. Although they tried to be hopeful, Raffaela’s doctors saw slim chance for a recovery.

After months of ineffective treatment and worry, the Serios invited Raffaela’s doctor to join them for dinner one Sunday afternoon. As they quietly conversed around the table, the doctor looked with mournful eyes at the sick little girl he had been unable to help. Turning to her mother, he made an unusual statement for a physician: “There is a man holding some kind of special meetings in a large tent in Scranton. He prays, and people get well.”

“Doctor, really, you must be kidding!” the Serios responded.

“No, I’m not joking. I mean it. I had a patient with a very large goiter who has been healed. She said Evangelist F. F. Bosworth prayed for her, and she was instantly healed.” Mrs. Serio looked at the doctor in amazement, and he continued, “Why don’t you take dear little Raffaela down there? They may be able to help her also.”1

The Serios drove to Scranton that very evening to hear F. F. Bosworth preach a sermon on Christ’s salvation and divine healing. They purchased a copy of Bosworth’s book Christ the Healer, which would become a Christian classic on the power of Christ to heal. For the next week, the Serios read large portions of the book aloud to Raffaela so that all three of them could understand the biblical promise of healing in Christ.

With their faith greatly increased, the family drove back to the crusade the following Sunday. During the time of prayer for healing, F. F. Bosworth stepped toward the little girl standing on the platform and prayed a beautiful prayer for God’s healing power. He prayed that God would heal her and use her as a living monument for His praise and glory.2

When they returned home later that night, Mrs. Serio got the salve ready for Raffaela’s daily treatment. Raffaela looked at her mother in astonishment. “Why, mother dear, where is your faith? Didn’t you hear the man say that Jesus healed me? I don’t need any more bandages. I am healed.” Neither the large lump nor the swelling from beneath her arm to her collarbone had gone away, but the little girl had begun to see herself through the eyes of faith.

There was little sleep for Mrs. Serio that night as she tossed and turned, worrying about her sweet girl. But the next day, as she later recounted, “Morning dawned and with it came a newness of life for our darling! She had stepped out into the faith life with Jesus and He had met her. Oh! the joy and glory of it!”3 The morning sunlight revealed that all the swelling from the collarbone and under the arm was gone! Five days later, the lump was the size of a hickory nut; shortly after that, it disappeared completely!

“Praise our wonderful, precious Jesus” was the joyous mother’s cry that summer of 1925 in the city of Scranton, Pennsylvania.4 Her little girl had been miraculously healed because a man of God had been faithful to preach complete salvation in the atonement of Christ—salvation for the mind, body, and spirit. And God had been faithful to perform His Word.

An Early Pentecostal General

F. F. Bosworth was a frontier evangelist, a pioneer Christian radio broadcaster, one of the most successful healing evangelists of the 1920s, and a man who created a bridge to the healing revivalists of the 1940s and 1950s. From his visit to Azusa Street and on, Fred Bosworth was a cornerstone of the modern Pentecostal movement.

In his early revivals, Bosworth came in contact with other Pentecostal leaders, such as John Alexander Dowie, Maria Woodworth-Etter, Charles F. Parham, John G. Lake, Paul Rader, and E. W. Kenyon. Years later, in the 1950s, with his vast knowledge of the Scriptures and his broad experience as a healing evangelist, he became a mentor for men like William Branham, T. L. Osborne, Jack Coe, a young Oral Roberts, and Ern Baxter.

F. F. Bosworth was a man of great integrity and honor. He was not overcome with emotionalism in the healing ministry, but steadily looked to God to fulfill His Word. Because of this, he never wanted people to claim healings due to emotional responses. Bosworth faithfully recorded the names and addresses of those who were healed through his ministry. To him, they were the “witnesses,” living proof that God’s Spirit was at work among His people to heal. Bosworth welcomed doctors’ confirmations of the healings, as well.

As a result, during his years in ministry, Bosworth accumulated over 250,000 letters and testimonies from people who had been touched by his messages. A number of those testimonies will be shared in these pages as we look at one of God’s true generals who led some astounding healing revivals in the early twentieth century.

A Frontier Boy

When the Civil War finally ended, the United States was a wounded nation. The U.S. government decided to create a new national vision of change and expansion to encourage its citizens to look beyond the years of war to a future of hope and promise. People were enticed to move West and settle new territories. With the Homestead Act of 1862, which supplied homesteaders with free federal land, and with the expansion of the railroad, families were moving by the thousands to the Midwest.

Burton Bosworth had served in the war as a Union soldier, and he and his wife, Amelia, headed out to Nebraska, where they could buy land for just “$5 an acre on ten years credit.”5 They bought a small farm in Utica, Nebraska, and began a family.

On a frigid winter day, January 17, 1877, Amelia Bosworth gave birth to her second son, Fred Francis. The Bosworths were grateful to have another son to help build their farm. It would have brought them greater joy if they had known that this son would also touch more than one million people with the love and power of Jesus Christ.

Fred was a boy with steadfast determination. He was a hard worker who set some lofty goals, and he ultimately reached them. When he was only nine years old, Fred accompanied his father to a Civil War reunion at Fort Kearney, Nebraska, to enjoy the brass band and military ceremonies. A lover of music from his earliest days, Fred was mesmerized by the music flowing from the decorated stage. As the crowd cheered and sang patriotic songs, Fred inched forward to watch the cornet players. Fascinated by the instrument, Fred was determined to possess his own cornet and to learn how to play it. He had a yearning for music deep within his soul.

Being a farmer’s son, Fred was adept at using the resources around him. For example, when his uncle gave him the runt of a pig litter to have as his own, he fattened up the pig and sold it at the local market. With that money, the industrious boy bought a cow, raised her, fattened her up, and traded her and her calf for a brand-new cornet. Now that he had his coveted instrument, he needed money for lessons. Undaunted, Fred pored over the elementary instruction book on to the old organ in their farmhouse parlor, and that is how he learned to read music and play notes.

Fred purchased the most advanced cornet music book he could find. While working in his father’s feed store, he would practice for hours when business was slow. He studied the notes, learned the musical values, and practiced diligently. Early in his life, he showed the perseverance that would take him through difficult times and even persecution in years to come.

Soon, Fred was skilled enough as a musician to play in a community band. When his family moved to University Place, Nebraska, he auditioned and won a seat in the Nebraska State Band. One day, this young man’s fine musical talent would even grace the stage in New York City.

By the age of sixteen, Fred Bosworth was restless with life and ready to be out on his own. In addition to his natural aptitude for music, he was a natural salesman. He met a “general agent” who wanted him to sell a variety of products, including cement for building industries. Fred and his older brother “rode the rails” around the State of Nebraska, often jumping open train cars to ride for free, as they tried to make their fortune as traveling salesmen. On one of these adventures, Fred visited a pretty girl on a lark and had his life changed forever.

Changed Forever!

Many of young Fred’s sales trips took him to Omaha. On one trip, he stopped to visit Miss Maude Greene, a friend of the family who was several years older than he. She’d invited him to join her at an old-time revival at the First Methodist Church that week. The first two nights, he listened politely to the gospel singing and the preaching, then escorted Miss Maude home and returned to his hotel. On the third night, however, the Holy Spirit began to tug on his heart.

For the first time, Fred really heard the message of salvation and understood the sacrifice Jesus had made for him on the cross nineteen hundred years earlier. His heart was stirred within him. Sensing that something was happening, Maude encouraged Fred to take a trip down to the altar when the preacher called.

Reluctantly at first, but then with a firmer step, Fred Bosworth approached that little Methodist altar. While he knelt there, he knew that he must decide that very night if he was going to make a decision for Christ or walk away from Him.

With the presence of God flowing through him, Fred decided to say yes to God. Immediately, his heart was filled with joy to overflowing, and he erupted in holy laughter. “Such a happiness filled his heart he laughed for joy, till he actually felt embarrassed because he could scarcely stop.”6 Now, Fred had another decision to make. Much of his sales success had been based on dishonest methods and half-truths. He needed to quit his salesman’s life and go home. But what would he do with his life in Christ now?

For the next two years, Bosworth held so many different jobs, it was hard to keep count. He worked in a windmill factory, then as a clerk in a grocery store. Following that, he was a department store clerk, a meat market butcher, a railroad maintenance worker, and a house painter. He learned more about his relationship with the Lord during this time, but he also struggled with the restlessness in his soul.

A Female Healing Evangelist

Fred’s career was not his only struggle. His health was deteriorating rapidly. Eight years earlier, when the Bosworths lived in University Place, a young boy had been hurt, and the local doctor needed to perform surgery. There was not enough adult help available, so young Fred helped the doctor during the surgery. The operating room was kept very warm, and when Fred left, he walked out into an icy-cold Nebraska night. As a result, he developed a severe cough that weakened his lungs and resulted in a chronic lung condition that manifested as a dry, raspy cough.

Now, at the age of nineteen, his cough had worsened, and it had become painful to breathe. After spending several weeks in bed, Fred was finally diagnosed with tuberculosis—the “killer disease” of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. And the doctor’s verdict was hopeless. He predicted that Fred had little time left to live.7

What should he do now? His family had moved to Ferguson, Georgia, for a fresh start one year earlier. Facing death at nineteen, Fred Bosworth decided to take a train trip to Georgia to see his parents one last time. He was seriously ill during the long, agonizing train ride and wondered if he would make it there alive. When he finally reached Ferguson, Fred stumbled off the train and into his mother’s loving arms. She nursed him over the course of several weeks, until he was finally able to get out of the house for short periods of time.

On his first outing, Fred went to another Methodist revival so that he could be encouraged by the Word of God. Miss Mattie Perry, a healing evangelist, was teaching a series on developing a deeper walk with God. Fred coughed throughout the service, and she looked his way intently several times. At the end of the sermon, Fred went forward to pray for more of God in his life.

Miss Mattie walked directly over to Fred, looked him in the eyes, and told him that God still had work for him to do, and that he was too young to die. With that, Miss Mattie laid hands on Fred and prayed for him to be delivered completely from tuberculosis. From that very moment, Fred began to heal, and within days, his cough was gone completely. A doctor’s visit confirmed that his lungs were totally restored. Fred Bosworth rejoiced in his healing, but he had little idea at the time that he had been healed to bring forth the truth of God’s gospel message to thousands of people, believers and nonbelievers alike.

“God, I Still Need a Plan”

Fred’s health returned quickly. He didn’t know how he was to serve God, so he settled in Georgia with his family and found work, first as the assistant postmaster in Ferguson. Next, he was elected town clerk. After a time, he moved on to work as a banker. When Fred was twenty-three, he met and married a young lady named Estelle Hayde. He had led her to the Lord shortly after they’d met, and she was also dedicated to finding a way to serve Jesus.

Fred and his wife attended church faithfully, but restlessness continued to plague his soul. To ease his discontent, Fred returned to music and played the cornet that he loved, which was possible because of the renewed strength in his lungs. Soon, he was playing and directing the Georgia Empire State Band, performing at weekend community events throughout the State of Georgia, and waiting for God to show him the next step.

God is faithful to His Word. He had a plan for F. F. Bosworth, whose life was about to make a sudden turn in God’s direction. In God’s providence, Fred and Estelle had been given a copy of the magazine Leaves of Healing. Written by Scottish evangelist John Alexander Dowie, it proclaimed the healing power of Jesus Christ at work on the earth today. It also described a Christian community that Dowie had established in Zion City, Illinois.

Fred and Estelle discussed the new city with great excitement. Fred already knew from personal experience that Jesus Christ still healed. Now, he was eager for the opportunity to learn from someone who believed the same thing and to serve the Lord in this new city. As soon as the young couple arrived in Zion City, Fred found a job as a bookkeeper in a local store. At each community church service, he played his cornet joyfully to the Lord.

The Zion City Band was not very accomplished. John Alexander Dowie quickly recognized the scope of Fred Bosworth’s musical talent, and when he asked Fred if he would take on the paid position of band director, Fred jumped at the chance. In the past, Fred had played with secular bands, and he thrilled at being able to play the music he dearly loved while lifting up the name of Jesus.

According to one of Bosworth’s early biographers, “The Zion City Band rapidly changed from a discordant, amateur musical group to one of the largest and finest musical organizations in the entire United States.”8 Fred’s reputation as a musician spread just as quickly. Within months, the forty-seven-member band was touring nationally and receiving high acclaim in every city where they performed. As a result, Zion City received a great deal of recognition as a result. Soon after, the Zion City Band was invited to perform at Carnegie Music Hall in New York City!

Bosworth was to direct twenty consecutive concerts, two per day for ten days. Critics in New York initially viewed the Midwestern Christian band with cynicism and predicted a cultural disaster, but they were unprepared for Bosworth’s musical talent and his dedicated service to God. After the first performance, the press offered its praise, saying, “The Concert…was awaited with no little apprehension, but before the players on the stage had swept the first four bars of the first overture, all present knew they were listening to real music produced by masters of the art.”9 F. F. Bosworth was just twenty-six years old at the time of this musical victory.

The Sweeping Power of the Holy Spirit

Not everything in Zion City was going so well. Beginning in 1903, John Alexander Dowie became increasingly autocratic in his role as the city’s leader. He proclaimed himself a prophet, “Elijah the Restorer,” and donned the robes of an Old Testament priest. Financial and personal troubles surrounded him.

At the same time, a resident of Zion City named Mrs. Waldron attended a tent crusade under the ministry of Charles F. Parham and received the baptism in the Holy Spirit with the evidence of tongues. When she brought the exciting news to Zion City, John Alexander Dowie was determined to keep the “tongues movement” out of his community. However, Bosworth and evangelist John G. Lake, who also lived in Zion City at the time, were hungry for the presence of the Holy Spirit in their lives. When Parham came to Zion City to preach on the baptism in the Holy Spirit, the Bosworths welcomed him into their home to hold meetings. Shortly after, Fred Bosworth and Lake received the baptism of the Holy Spirit. Together, they made a trip to Azusa Street in California to experience the Holy Spirit’s revival there and to seek answers to their questions from Reverend William J. Seymour concerning this “new” work of God.10 After Bosworth received the baptism in the Holy Spirit, he looked back at his early days of moving restlessly from one job to the other and said, “I wish someone at that time had told me about being baptized in the Holy Spirit. I did a great deal of drifting not knowing what the right place was for me.”11

The right place for Fred Bosworth became clear to him almost immediately. During the years that he lived in Zion City, he spoke of his fear that God would call him to preach the gospel. After receiving baptism in the Holy Spirit, however, he became afraid that God would not call him to preach. At twenty-nine years of age, his life had been radically changed. He began to search the Scriptures on the Holy Spirit, such as Matthew 3:11, “I indeed baptize you with water unto repentance: but he that cometh after me is mightier than I, whose shoes I am not worthy to bear: he shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost, and with fire” (kjv), and Acts 19:2, “Have ye received the Holy Ghost since ye believed? And they said unto him, We have not so much as heard whether there be any Holy Ghost” (kjv). Jesus had promised that the Holy Spirit would come, and that He would be the One to baptize the disciples in the Spirit.

Bosworth also read some of the writings of A. J. Gordon, who spoke out forcefully on the scriptural proof for the baptism in the Holy Spirit as a second and separate experience from salvation. “It is as sinners that we accept Christ; but it is as sons that we accept the Holy Spirit,” Gordon wrote as he expounded on the baptism of the Holy Spirit. “We must withhold our consent from the inconsistent exegesis which would make the water baptism of the apostolic times rigidly binding but would relegate the Baptism in the Spirit to a bygone dispensation.”12

Bosworth admired the wisdom of using biblical logic and the Word to defend the good news of the full gospel. It would become a hallmark for him in future debates on the healing power of God on the earth in modern days.

Committed in the Face of Death

Leaving Zion City, Fred and Estelle Bosworth decided they would rely completely on the Lord for His provision. Fred abandoned his secular job and his music once again to preach the gospel wherever they were invited. In the beginning of this new life of faith, the Bosworths had to rely daily on the Lord for their provision. They now had a young daughter, Vivian, and they would pray for each meal to be provided, often up to the last minute. At one point in time, they ate boiled wheat for three meals a day. It sustained them for that period, but afterward, they never had boiled wheat on their table again.

When there was no food left, Fred Bosworth would stick his head into the empty bread box and shout, “Glory!” at the top of his lungs. Then, Estelle and little Vivien would do the same. God always provided!

The little Bosworth family traveled to South Bend, Indiana; Austin and Waco, Texas; Conway, South Carolina; and Fitzgerald, Georgia, before finally settling in Dallas, Texas. The year was 1909, and the Pentecostal movement was gathering momentum throughout the nation as the Holy Spirit moved. In Dallas, Fred began a church affiliated with the Christian and Missionary Alliance. They held tent meetings all over the area, sometimes four meetings in one day, introducing people to the power of God through His Holy Spirit.

Excited to see others come to know the Lord, Fred was always open to new opportunities to preach. One hot summer night in 1909, a friend told him of a camp meeting in Hearne, Texas, some miles outside of Dallas, where the Spirit of God was moving among a black congregation. Racial tensions were high in Texas at the time, so the tent meetings were segregated. The white folks didn’t want to approach a “black altar.”

Bosworth took a train to Hearne and then followed the music to find the camp site. Excitement for Jesus filled the air, and the white people who were listening on the outskirts of the camp invited Bosworth to come and preach to them about the power of God. Standing on a platform between the two segregated groups, Fred gave a short message on the love of Christ and the power of His Spirit to change lives.

“Please stay at my house tonight,” one of the other white ministers invited him, “so that you can continue your message tomorrow.” Bosworth welcomed the opportunity, and they headed toward the man’s home. Suddenly, a mob of angry white men carrying clubs and sticks rushed up behind them. They spit and yelled at Bosworth, accusing him of coming to preach to the black congregation. He explained that the white congregation had invited him, but the incensed men still threatened him and ordered him to leave town immediately.

Filled with a hatred that comes only from Satan, these men meant business, and Bosworth knew it. He agreed to leave and walked rapidly to the train station to head back to Dallas. Standing in the dark station in the quiet of the Texas night, Bosworth was suddenly confronted with an even larger mob of drunken men, who cursed aloud as they stumbled toward the train station.

The mob fell upon Bosworth and knocked him to the ground. They threatened him, saying he would never leave there alive, and beat him with boat oars and sticks all along his back until the skin was torn and bleeding. Several cracks of a baseball bat on his left arm resulted in a broken wrist, leaving his hand to hang painfully at his side. Through it all, Fred Bosworth didn’t put up a fight. He committed himself to the Lord’s protection and did nothing to defend himself.

As suddenly as the beating had begun, it stopped. The mob, tired of their sport, picked up Bosworth and demanded that he leave town immediately rather than wait for the next train. Bleeding, and with his wrist pounding with pain, Bosworth picked up his suitcase with his other hand and began walking toward Dallas. An attempt to flag down a train on the way proved futile, so he continued on foot. Two days later, he reached home and collapsed in front of his frightened wife. It took a month of bed rest to recover, but Bosworth was thankful that he was still alive to preach the Word of God. Not long after, a report came to Fred and Estelle that the two leaders of those mobs had met with separate and untimely deaths.

Ten Years of Revival

As the Pentecostal wave moved through the country, Assemblies of God congregations began to spring up. In 1910, Bosworth established the First Assembly of God church in Dallas, and people flocked there from miles around to hear him preach. From the very beginning, seekers were saved and baptized in the Holy Spirit with the evidence of speaking in tongues. Bosworth didn’t have any formal seminary training, but he was an intelligent man who studied the Bible with more diligence than he had displayed when teaching himself to play the cornet. God had placed him in the spiritual office of evangelist, as well as teacher, for building up the body of Christ. (See Ephesians 4:11–13.) This was evident to everyone who heard him.

In 1912, Bosworth invited Maria Woodworth-Etter, the famous Pentecostal evangelist, to lead a series of meetings at his church. During her six-month stay, revival rocked the city of Dallas. Scores of people were saved, filled with the Holy Spirit, and healed under her ministry. Bosworth became well-known among Pentecostals because of the success of Woodworth-Etter’s meetings. Revival continued in his church for the next several years.

The Assemblies of God grew, and Bosworth was selected as a delegate to the General Council of the Assemblies of God as it was being formed. In April of 1914, the first General Council met in Hot Springs, Arkansas, to discuss the new work. Bosworth was then invited to become one of the sixteen members of the executive presbyters. It was the role of the Council and the presbyters to set the tenets of faith for the new denomination.

Even while pastoring his church in Dallas and working as a delegate for the Assemblies of God, Fred Bosworth traveled over 75,000 miles throughout the Southwest and took every opportunity to preach. If there was even one ear open to the gospel of Jesus Christ, Fred Bosworth was eager to bring the good news! He believed in an interceding church that also reached out to the lost, so he organized many tent meetings in different areas of Dallas that occurred simultaneously. The gospel was preached night after night, and more and more people turned to Christ for salvation.

From Pastor to Full-time Evangelist

As the revival began to slow down in Dallas, Fred and Estelle’s only son, four-year-old Vernon, became sick and suddenly died.

Within months of the loss, Fred resigned from the church he had pastored and loved. Earlier, he had been selected as a delegate to the first General Council of the Assemblies of God when it was being formed. Then, he was invited to become one of only sixteen executive presbyters. It was the role of the Council and the presbyters to set the tenets of faith for the new denomination.

From years of studying the Word, Bosworth had come to the conclusion that speaking in tongues was not the only initial evidence of the baptism in the Holy Spirit. The other members of the Assemblies of God founding board disagreed with Bosworth; they believed unanimously that tongues as the initial evidence of the baptism should be one of the irrefutable tenets of the denomination. A fellow minister in the Dallas area began to spread rumors about Bosworth, accusing him of heresy among the Pentecostal churches.

Quietly and without protest, Bosworth resigned from the church he had founded in Dallas and turned in his Assemblies of God ordination papers in July 1918. He was invited to present his beliefs to the General Council one more time concerning why speaking in tongues need not be the initial evidence of the baptism of the Holy Spirit. Bosworth did so with a humble heart, presenting his beliefs passionately. The Council listened but still voted against his proposals, and they parted ways.

With little time to recover from this tremendous disappointment, Fred faced another, greater tragedy. Estelle had been a hardworking helpmate for eighteen years, but in her exuberance for the ministry, she often overexerted herself. As her health slipped, she continued to ignore the bed rest that she needed. Early in 1918, she developed a cough, which quickly became pneumonia and then tuberculosis. Even though prayers for healing went up in earnest, Estelle Bosworth died on November 16, 1918, leaving two little girls without a mother. Fred had seen countless healings as a result of answered prayer, which made his wife’s death seem a great tragedy, but he never gave up his faith in a faithful, living God.

Through these tragedies, Fred Bosworth became a more compassionate human being. He was seen as kind, self-effacing, and completely dependent on the Lord for everything. Through these trials, his faith was not moved, so God gave him a greater power in witnessing for Him.

After finding someone to take care of his daughters, Fred Bosworth turned his steps to national evangelism, answering the call to preach wherever he could. He had rejoined the Christian and Missionary Church and asked his younger brother, Burton, to join in his revival ministry as the worship leader. They began traveling wherever they were invited, carrying a burning passion to see the lost come to Christ. The decade of the 1920s would see F. F. Bosworth preaching the Word of God in power with signs and wonders following.

Healing Victories in Lima, Ohio

In the summer of 1920, Bosworth was invited to preach at a revival in Lima, Ohio. The pastor had one simple request—that he would bring a message on the healing power of Jesus Christ for today. Accepting the summons as God’s will, Bosworth spent a great deal of time studying the Bible, both the Old and the New Testament, to learn more about the healing presence of God.

God had brought Bosworth back from near death with tuberculosis through His healing power, so Fred knew that Jesus Christ healed today. Healing for the believer was a part of the message of salvation message; it was included in the price Christ had paid on the cross. Now, Fred studied the Word closely to find as much scriptural support as he could for his messages.

Fred still had one nagging fear. “I said to the Lord, ‘But suppose I preach healing, and the people come, and they don’t get healed?’ And the Lord responded, ‘If people didn’t get saved, you wouldn’t stop preaching the gospel.’”13 With that, Fred went forth boldly to share the complete message of Jesus’ atonement.

The Lima meetings were held in a large tent during the hot evenings of August 1920. On the first night, Fred Bosworth stood at the podium and announced to the expectant audience, “I am convinced that healing of the body is just as much a part of the gospel as salvation for the soul.” He assured them that Christ longed to do for their “pain-wracked” bodies what He also wanted to do for their lost souls. Then, he made a bold proclamation: bring your sick and infirm—whether they know Jesus or not, God wants to heal them.

The congregation was electrified by this announcement, and many planned to return with their sick and dying loved ones. Bosworth emphasized that the saved and unsaved alike should bring the sick to be healed by a compassionate Christ. He offered hope that they could be well again.

The next night, hundreds of people were present; the night after that, thousands made their way to the tent meeting. Soon, the meetings had to be moved into Memorial Hall. Some came expecting a miracle; others came ready to laugh at failure. But everyone present saw the same things: deaf ears were opened, blind eyes could see, the lame could walk. The Holy Spirit was moving among the people, and He was unstoppable. Doctors came and brought their most critical patients, and many of them were cured.

A woman without hope named Alice Baker attended one of the early Lima meetings. She suffered from cancer of the face, and her upper lip had been so eaten away that her teeth were visible. She kept her face covered with cloths so that no one would see the destroyed flesh. To ease her agonizing pain so she could sleep at night, the doctors had resorted to giving her small doses of ether. Alice had spent what little money she had on appointments with specialists in New York and New Jersey, but there was absolutely nothing they could do for her. Alice was filled with despair.

When she heard about the healing meetings taking place at Memorial Hall, she didn’t understand what was happening there, but she decided to go and see if there was any hope left. The first thing she heard from the pulpit was the price Jesus Christ had paid on the cross for her sins. With a glad and grateful heart, she knelt and accepted Him as her Savior. Then, she went forward for a healing prayer.

She later recounted what happened when she met with the Bosworth team. “After they prayed for me it seemed a rubber cap was drawn over my face, and it gradually slipped off, and I knew I was healed. I told a lady to remove the bandages and God blessed my soul, so I could not help shouting, and I shouted many times. It is so good to be without pain.…Oh, I am so happy all the time. I went down the street shouting.…The next morning after I was healed I went to the hotel where I worked and showed the lady that I was without the bandages and that the Lord had given me a new lip that night, and she was shocked.…Many have come from other towns to see me…and hear about my healing. I am glad to tell them. My doctor came to see for himself, and all he said was it was wonderful.”14

F. F. Bosworth was a simple man with a heart to bring the lost to Christ. He believed that physical healing was included in the atonement and that true healings would draw crowds to hear the message of Christ’s salvation. He was also a very deliberate man, so he looked for confirmation of each healing that took place. Often, the local newspapers would record in detail the miracles that had occurred on those August nights in Lima.

In an article published in the National Labor Tribune, a newspaper in nearby Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Bertram Miller wrote of the miraculous Bosworth campaign, “There has been no criticism from the public press, no fanaticism or carnal emotionalism at any of the services…. Many denominations and nationalities were in attendance at the meetings, and many were saved and wonderfully healed, wondering why they had never heard the full gospel before….”15

Some were healed instantly, many at their homes in the following days. At one service alone there were ten doctors present watching the proceedings with deep interest. Several of them had terminally ill patients of their own healed before their very

The Miracles Move to Pittsburgh

After several weeks of ministering in Lima, the Bosworth team moved on to Pittsburgh. Many of the newly healed went with them, eager to help in the work and pray for the sick themselves. Bosworth never believed that healing came through his hands alone but through faith that was built up in the hearts of those who needed healing.

The miracles in Pittsburgh surpassed those in Lima. No church was large enough to accommodate the crowds, so the meetings were held in Carnegie Hall in Oakland, a suburb near downtown Pittsburgh. The National Labor Tribune continued to report the amazing meetings as they were occurring.

All denominations crowd the hall—Catholics, Episcopalians, Presbyterians, Methodists, Baptists, United Presbyterians, Primitive Methodists, Methodist Protestant, Pentecostal Nazarene, with many others, may be seen among those at the altar seeking Divine aid. Several hundred seekers after God crowd the platform daily.…Doctors, lawyers, financiers, merchants, professional men of all types and caliber. Christian Scientists—including practitioners—nurses, and head nurses from the hospitals and sanitariums, all seeking soul salvation or bodily healing. It is a sight that astounds the onlookers to see those multitudes seeking their way to God….Beyond belief are the results.16

“John Sproul Can Talk!”

John Sproul had fought in WWI as a young soldier. While he was on a special assignment to secure supplies in France, he and a friend were hit with mustard gas. The friend died within a day or two, but John survived—just barely. He had to have fourteen operations in the French hospital where he was admitted. Six operations were performed on his throat and eight on his lungs. Following the operations, he completely lost the ability to speak, and so many of his neck muscles were cut away that he had a hard time holding his head up.17

Sproul returned to the States in constant pain with hemorrhaging in his lungs and frequent bouts of stomach sickness or sudden unconsciousness. He traveled throughout the country trying to get medical help, but his case was declared hopeless. When he returned to his hometown of Pittsburgh, the mayor, Edward Babcock took up his cause. The country was disturbed by the lack of medical aid for wounded veterans, so Mayor Babcock and the local congressmen sent Sproul to Washington, D.C., for special medical treatment.

When he returned from Washington, Sproul informed the mayor that he had been pronounced incurable by the physicians there and given a certificate of permanent, total disability for life. He was awarded a monthly disability payment, but he still faced a future filled with unrelenting pain.

By the providence of God, soon after Sproul’s return from Washington, he saw an advertisement for Evangelist F. F. Bosworth’s campaign in Pittsburgh. He went simply because he felt he had nothing to lose. As he sat and listened to the testimonies of those who had given their hearts to Christ, the Spirit moved in his soul. He later exclaimed, “Oh, the joy that filled my soul when I realized the Lord was ready to save me, right then, and I said, ‘Yes’ to God. How I longed to be able to speak, to tell people that I knew I was saved!”18

When Bosworth called for those who wished to be healed to come forward, John Sproul walked up to the platform with a heart full of faith. After prayer, a Christian brother exclaimed, “Praise the Lord,” and Sproul thought the man meant that he should praise the Lord with his own voice. “Of all the foolish things,” John later reasoned, “to expect me to praise the Lord when I can’t talk!” Then he thought, Well, that isn’t faith. I’ll try, even if nobody hears it.19

The moment he made the effort to praise the Lord, a strange power seemed to fill his whole body. Pain coursed through him from his stomach through his throat and into his head. It was excruciating, but in an instant, it was gone. With it went all of the agonizing pain that John had experienced for four years. There was no more lung pain, no more throat pain, and no more wheezing! At the top of his voice, he yelled, “Praise the Lord! Praise the Lord!” Soon after the service, his family cautioned John to be careful with his newly recovered voice, but his response was, “I was shouting His praises, and I knew as long as I praised God, nothing would ever happen to my voice.”20

John called his friends and his mother on the telephone to tell them the amazing news, but none could believe it was he. When the news reached the local newspaper reporters, they insisted on meeting with him, as did Mayor Babcock. Fred walked into the mayor’s office with his head held high, and he smiled and spoke normally. The next day’s newspaper hit the stands for the whole city to see the headline, “John Sproul Can Talk!”

The Sproul family rejoiced when John’s three-year-old daughter, Mary Jane, who had never heard him speak, clapped her little hands and exclaimed, “Daddy can talk! Daddy can talk! Jesus made Daddy talk!”21

The Veterans Bureau ordered John to report for tests, after which they declared him well, indeed. He had to forsake his disability payments, but he had been healed by God and could work now. For years after his healing, he corresponded with F. F. Bosworth, letting him know how much he enjoyed perfect health in his body and his soul!

Christ the Healer

From his intimacy with Scriptures on divine healing, Fred wrote Christ the Healer in 1924. The book remains a classic work on Christ’s healing power, and it is just as relevant to the body of Christ today as it was upon publication nearly one hundred years ago.

The primary question Bosworth wanted to answer in his book was, “Did Christ redeem us from our diseases when He atoned for our sins?”22 To him, the Bible answered with a resounding “Yes!” He believed that the healing nature of God was revealed in both the Old Testament and the New Testament.

In the Old Testament, the book of Exodus recounts the Israelites’ miraculous journey through the Red Sea, which God parted through Moses, as they fled captivity in Egypt. When they reached the other side of the sea, this same God of salvation introduced Himself as their healer for the first time, saying, “I am the Lord that healeth you” (Exodus 15:26 kjv). In the psalms, King David also recognized the healing nature of God’s salvation: “Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all of his benefits: who forgiveth all thine iniquities; who healeth all thy diseases” (Psalm 103:2–3 kjv). David realized that both the forgiveness of sins and the healing of the body were benefits that belonged to the people of God.

Perhaps the most decisive Scripture of all for Bosworth was Isaiah 53:5: “he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed” (kjv). In these Scriptures, the Lord is revealed as a complete Savior who forgives sins and heals diseases. Both benefits are offered equally for anyone would receive them.

In Christ the Healer, Bosworth wrote that God’s healing nature continued to be revealed in the earthly ministry of Christ, citing Matthew 4:23: “And Jesus went about all Galilee, teaching in their synagogues, and preaching the gospel of the kingdom, and healing all manner of sickness and all manner of disease among the people” (kjv), Matthew 12:15: “Jesus…withdrew himself from thence: and great multitudes followed him, and he healed them all” (kjv), and Luke 6:19: “And the whole multitude sought to touch him: for there went virtue out of him, and healed them all” (kjv).

Bosworth was convinced that these Scriptures clearly revealed the will of God concerning healing. He declared, “Faith begins where the will of God is known.”23 The Word reveals that it is God’s will to heal, and believers can accept His will by faith—faith that is produced by hearing the Word of God. (See Romans 10:17.)

Finally, Bosworth pointed out that the Greek word for salvation, soteria, implies all the deliverance, preservation, healing, and soundness that Christ promised with His death and resurrection. Full salvation was in the atonement of the blood of Christ.

Faith Cures Her

During the first half of the 1920s, Fred and his brother Burton traveled continuously throughout the nation. Their primary purpose at each meeting was to save souls.

During a seven-week campaign in Ottawa, Canada, the “conservative” Canadians showed a great enthusiasm for the Lord. Twelve thousand people surrendered their hearts to Christ, and ten thousand people attended the farewell meeting. The Canadians were so grateful for the powerful message that Christ heals soul and body that five thousand of them accompanied the Bosworth party to their train. They picked up the brothers and carried them on their shoulders all the way to the train station! Yet Fred Bosworth was always careful to give the glory to God and not to take it for himself.

It had been several years since Estelle Bosworth had passed away, and Fred was perfectly content to remain unmarried while serving the Lord. But he also desired God’s will for his life. When he was forty-five years old, he met a young lady named Florence Valentine, a post-graduate student a New York campus of Nyack Bible School. When Bosworth met her, he realized that she shared his desire to serve God and preach the gospel. They both prayed that God’s will would be done and were married quietly a short time later. Florence brought him great joy and was an excellent helpmate during their thirty-six years of marriage.

With Florence helping to spread the message of faith in God’s healing power, the Bosworth brothers continued to hold healing meetings throughout the 1920s. Then, Burton moved on to minister on his own, while Fred and Florence conducted much of their ministry in the Chicago area. The revival meetings were often held in Chicago’s Gospel Tabernacle, and people continued to be miraculously healed.

On Wednesday, March 28, 1928, the Chicago Daily News featured a front-page headline that read, “Deaf Six Years, Faith Cures Her.” Beneath the headline was a large photo of Fred Bosworth teaching a smiling teenage girl how to use a telephone.

The girl was Ruth Peiper, age sixteen. Her mother had died when Ruth was only eight, and her father had refused to provide a home for her. So, Ruth had been sent to a home for dependent girls. When she was eleven years old, she contracted diphtheria and scarlet fever. Due to those illnesses, she lost hearing in both her ears. She also had to wear a body cast and walked with a noticeable limp due to a severe curvature of the spine. Her doctors had not been able to help her, and her stay in the home became far longer than that of most other girls her age.

Ruth had become a favorite at the home, and one of the volunteers had taken a special interest in her. This volunteer had urged Martha Dixon, the matron, to take Ruth to a Bosworth healing meeting at the Chicago Gospel Tabernacle. Ready to do anything that might help Ruth, Mrs. Dixon took her to the meeting. That night, March 2, 1928, Ruth Peiper was completely healed!

Ruth came running into the front parlor of the home to tell the Chicago Daily News reporter more of her story. “‘Yes, it’s all true,’ she said as she walked across the room without a limp. ‘Something just suddenly happened to me as I stood on the platform being anointed by the Reverend Bosworth. It was like lightning and thunder in my head. Then there was a ringing in my ears.’”

Riding home on the bus that night with Mrs. Dixon, Ruth couldn’t believe how loud everything was. Every time someone paid the bus fare and the bell rang, she jumped. The sounds were loud, but they were also wonderful! “‘It’s all in the Bible,’ Ruth concluded to the reporter. ‘It is just believing what is there that has made me well.’”24

The power of God to heal was still moving through the Bosworths’ ministry at the end of the 1920s.

What Manner of Man Is This?

Without a doubt, F. F. Bosworth had become one of the most successful of the healing evangelists of the 1920s. But what sort of man was he? Many of his Pentecostal contemporaries were known for their loud meetings and emotional appeals. Bosworth was different. So, who was Fred Bosworth?

One news reporter from Pittsburgh alluded to Luke 8:25 when he wrote, “The simplicity of the services and the wanton lack of any attempt to play upon the emotions of the great throngs who crowd themselves into the building naturally incites the onlooker to inquire, ‘What manner of man is this?’”25

Eunice N. Perkins, Bosworth’s early biographer, was a great admirer of his preaching style, which she described thusly: “No dramatics! A clear, convincing logic ofttimes, for altho uneducated in a worldly sense, he has an unusually bright mind, has studied the cream of Christian literature, and is continually being taught the Word of God, by the Spirit of God. Moreover, his simple naturalness, or natural simplicity, is delightfully refreshing to all who hear him, while it is, at the same time, more forceful than the most amazing pulpit oratory.”26

Bosworth believed in the living power of the Bible to build faith in the hearts of those who read from its pages or heard it preached. Because he believed so steadfastly in the solid foundation of the Word, he preached with a quiet, firm authority that was uncommon at the time.

When the Bosworth party was conducting a crusade in St. Paul, Minnesota, the Reverend J. D. Williams reviewed F. F. Bosworth in the local newspaper. He admired “the wide scope of his message. The preaching was Scriptural and earnest and the truth presented covered the entire Fourfold Gospel, i.e., Christ as Saviour, Sanctifier, Healer and Coming King. Special stress was laid upon the Atonement covering both spiritual and physical needs.”27 Commendable aspects of Bosworth’s ministry, according to Williams, included the thorough preparation of the workers who were ready to pray for those who came forward, as well as the preparation of the hearts of those who were so ready to receive.

Williams went on, “The meetings were generally very quiet, with few expressions of any kind from the audience….It was evident…that each message was taking deep root in hearts….There was no attempt upon the part of the Evangelist to produce an effect or to urge anyone to hasty decisions by emotional appeals. The total dependence upon the Holy Spirit for all results was gratifying. In short, ‘They preached not themselves but Christ.’”28

There was a “holy joy” that pervaded the atmosphere at Bosworth’s meetings. Because the man himself was joyful at what had been provided in Christ’s atonement, he passed that same hope and joy on to his audiences. The men and women who came to the Bosworth revivals heard the good news of complete salvation in Christ!

Fred Bosworth was also acknowledged as a gifted teacher. P. S. Campbell, a professor of Greek from McMaster University, Toronto, said this of Bosworth: “His addresses are thoroughly Biblical. He believes in the Word of God, and his arguments are amply supported by quotations from the sacred Scriptures. His language is absolutely free from sensationalism, and is the acme of simplicity. And what is clear to himself, he never fails to make clear to his audience. His sermons show that he possesses in a marked degree the teaching gift. Hence his hearers never fail to be instructed by his presentation of the truth.”29

Pioneer of Radio Evangelism

As the 1920s drew to a close, there was such a demand for Bosworth’s time and ministry, yet so few resources, that he realized he needed a new means to reach people with the gospel. After ministering with Paul Rader in Chicago for a while, Bosworth had his answer: the radio. Rader had already begun one of the first Christian radio programs in the nation. The first crude radios had been released for sale in 1926, and people had rushed to purchase them as a welcome addition to their homes.

F. F. Bosworth’s first radio program was called The Sunshine Hour. Each morning at 9 a.m. on Chicago’s station WJJD, Bosworth’s theme song “Don’t Forget to Pray” would fill the airwaves. Soon after, he established the nonprofit organization National Radio Revival Missionary Crusaders to reach the masses with the gospel of Jesus Christ.

The Bosworths settled in River Forest, Illinois, outside of Chicago, and Fred recorded his radio shows in a studio in his home. The message then traveled ten miles to Chicago by telephone wire and was put on the air from the radio station. Thousands heard the message and wrote to Bosworth requesting prayer for healings or praising God for their salvation. The successful reports of lives touched by the Holy Spirit poured into his home office. By the time he retired from radio ministry in the 1940s, Bosworth had received over 250,000 letters from those who had been touched or healed from his preaching.

Even though Bosworth’s daily radio preaching enabled him to limit his travels, his healing meetings were not discontinued altogether. Thousands still flocked to hear him preach the Word of God with power and to receive their healing. But in the 1930s, the Great Depression made it very difficult to travel far from home, so most of his ministering was done in the Chicago area.

In his years of radio ministry, Bosworth may have reached tens of thousands with the gospel message, but he was largely reserved when it came to his personal life. During this time, Bosworth adopted a controversial view called British Israelism, a concept that gained popularity in the early twentieth century and continues to be accepted by some people today.

British Israelism maintains that Western Europeans, particularly those from Great Britain, are direct descendants of the ten lost tribes of Israel who were taken into captivity by the Assyrians. (See 2 Kings 17:18.) The belief was most widely upheld in England and the United States. How strongly Bosworth embraced this idea is unknown, but he did resign from the Christian and Missionary Alliance denomination for several years because if it. By the mid-1940s, Bosworth had renounced his belief in British Israelism and was reinstated in the church.

Retirement Not in His Plans

By 1947, at seventy-one years of age, Fred Bosworth was ready for the next step in his life. He and Florence decided it was time to retire to Miami, Florida. But what would this dedicated man of God do with the remainder of his years?

Retirement was not in his plans, and it clearly was not in the Lord’s plan for him, either. William Branham, an American evangelist from the Midwest, was beginning to move out in his healing ministry and had been invited to Miami, Florida, to conduct a revival campaign. Curious, Fred and Florence attended the revival and were moved by the powerful presence of the Holy Spirit and the number of healings that had been recorded as a result of Branham’s ministry. Bosworth introduced himself to the younger man and, after they’d spent some time fellowshipping together, offered to travel with him and minister as part of his team.

Branham jumped at the opportunity to be mentored by the older, wiser evangelist, who had forty years of experience in the healing ministry. Beginning in 1948, Fred Bosworth traveled with the Branham team and taught about faith for salvation and divine healing. He spoke at the daytime meetings so that Branham would have time to rest and have enough energy to conduct the larger healing meetings, which were held in the evening. Joining them in the ministry was W. Ern Baxter, a young evangelist from Canada, who served as Branham’s traveling manager and preached daytime messages during the campaign, as well. The reports of Branham’s successful healing meetings were written by Gordon Lindsay in the magazine The Voice of Healing. As a result, Branham’s reputation as a Pentecostal grew rapidly.

Fred Bosworth was still very sharp-witted and solid in his biblical presentation of the Word. In 1950, Branham was challenged to a debate on divine healing by W. E. Best, the pastor of a large Baptist church in Houston, Texas. Best believed that miracles and divine healing had ceased, and that the healing evangelists were frauds. Branham declined the challenge, but seventy-three-year-old F. F. Bosworth accepted it enthusiastically. He was an adept apologist and welcomed the opportunity to spread the truth about God’s healing promises in the atonement.

The debate was covered closely by the local newspapers. During the debate, Bosworth presented the scriptural evidence he had outlined years earlier in Christ the Healer, including healing in Christ’s atonement and the redemptive name of God, Jehovah-Rapha. Then, he appealed to the “living witnesses” who were present, asking them to stand if they had been healed by God. The Houston Press reported: “When the Rev. Best made a point, the Rev. Bosworth would rush to the microphone on stage and dramatically ask those in the audience who had been cured through faith to stand. Each time hundreds would rise. ‘How many of you are Baptists?’ the Rev. Bosworth shouted. At least 100 stood up.”30 Bosworth was confident in the Word of God and the proof that God was still ministering healing power to His people.

Overseas Ministry Captures Bosworth’s Heart

On November 25, 1951, F. F. Bosworth looked out incredulously at a vast crowd of people at the Grayville Race Course in Durban, South Africa. The police estimated the crowd at 75,000 people. In over forty years of ministry, Bosworth had never seen anything like the tens of thousands who sat there with open hearts to hear the Word of God.

In the morning service, Bosworth preached on the Holy Spirit’s desire to heal and explained how to obtain the faith to receive that healing. Later that day, thirty-seven-year-old Ern Baxter gave a message of salvation through the blood of Jesus Christ. When Baxter invited those who wanted to receive Christ as Savior to stand, over ten thousand people stood to their feet. Turning to Bosworth, Baxter whispered in awe, “They must have misunderstood me. There couldn’t be all these thousands who want to become Christians!”31 Baxter repeated the message of commitment to Christ, and the people waved their hands in surrender to the Lord. Later that evening, William Branham brought forth the message, and thousands more were saved and healed by the grace of God. During the three services on that day alone, an estimated thirty thousand people gave their hearts to Christ! Bosworth was delighted to be a part of this move of God.

In those later days of ministry, nothing touched Fred Bosworth’s heart like the overseas ministry he participated in. He was astounded by the sizes of the crowds and the open hearts of faith, the likes of which he had never experienced in the U.S. While he was traveling with the Branham team, they went on to hold overseas campaigns in Cuba, Germany, Switzerland, and Japan.

Bosworth was in his mid-seventies by this time, but he still carried a full load of responsibilities in these foreign fields, teaching every morning and bringing the Word of God to help build up the faith of those to whom he ministered. He also stayed at the evening meetings long after Branham left, exhausted, and prayed for the sick.

By 1956, Bosworth had left the Branham campaigns, but he continued in the foreign mission field for two more years, conducting meetings in South Africa and Japan, where his final meeting took place.

Praising as He Goes Home

One of Bosworth’s biographers, who wrote in the Herald of Faith magazine in 1964, was Oscar Blomgren Jr., a young man who first met the healing evangelist as a boy. At five years of age, Oscar was walking precariously on the back of a park bench near Lake Forest, Illinois, when he fell. He was rushed to the hospital, where an X-ray revealed that his elbow had been shattered into several fragments. Doctors were concerned that his arm would be stiff for the rest of his life.

Oscar’s father was a faithful Christian and a personal friend of Bosworth, so he called the evangelist at his home for prayer. He didn’t ask him to lay hands on the child, just to simply pray in faith for Oscar in the name of Jesus. The next day, the little boy had several hours of surgery on his arm. The following morning, X-rays were taken again to determine whether the surgery had been successful. Puzzled, the doctors ordered a third X-ray. They called Oscar’s parents into the therapy room to discuss the results. Both X-rays revealed no sign of a break. It was if nothing had happened. Oscar’s elbow was completely restored.

The rambunctious little boy hung from his arms on a crossbar in the hospital therapy room while his parents and the doctors discussed his miraculous recovery. His cast was removed immediately. In relating the story, Oscar Jr. always gratefully added that his once-shattered arm played in many successful football games in the years to follow!

In his biography of Bosworth, Oscar remembered the man with great affection:

Fred Bosworth gave me, and tens of thousands of others an unshakable faith in God that we will carry to our graves. He demonstrated again and again that the real benefits of Christianity are not just spiritual, but physical as well. And through him God gave the inquiring mind a granite-solid foundation for faith….Those of us who were privileged to know him will remember him always. But more important, the Faith that he gave us will live on in our children and grandchildren for years to come.32 (Blomgren 6/64)

In 1958, when Bosworth returned to Florida after his final campaign in Japan, he announced to his family that the Lord was about to take him home. At the age of eighty-one, he was not ill; he had asked the Lord to allow him to live his life without succumbing to any illness, and he simply believed that his time on earth was over.

Bosworth retired to his bed, and all of his children came home to say good-bye, getting together for the first time in over sixteen years.33 His son Robert wrote about the final weeks of his father’s life:

About three weeks after he took to his bed, we were around the bed talking, laughing singing. Suddenly Dad looked up; he never saw us again. He saw what was invisible to us. He began to greet people and hug people—he was enraptured. Every once in a while he would break off and look around saying, “Oh, it is so beautiful.”34

For several hours, Fred remained in this state, between two worlds. Then, he quietly fell asleep. Sometime later, he passed from sleep to his eternal place in Christ. It was Thursday, January 23, 1958. After five decades of honoring and preaching about Jesus Christ, his Redeemer and Healer, Bosworth joined Him in heaven. It has been estimated that during his lifetime, Bosworth was instrumental in more than one million decisions for Christ. There would have been many joyful souls in heaven to greet him in heaven.

Just days before his death, Bosworth was quoted as saying, “All I have lived for, for the past sixty years, has been the Lord Jesus. And, any minute, I’m looking for Him to walk in the door and go with Him for eternity.”35