Larry Norman Message Board

My brother and I discovered Larry Norman back in the seventies. Missionary kids, straight-cut and sometimes afraid of our own shadow, Larry gave us the voice we never knew we had.

A few years later, in the summer of 1977, having taken a job as a youth pastor, I took our high-school choir to Santa Ana Rescue Mission. We went there to sing, but we had no idea what to expect. Arriving at the mission, we unloaded our two vans full of prim, pretty socal boys and girls, all dressed (for some reason) in red, white and blue outfits. Inside the building were a dozen or more men who could best be described as derelicts. Dirty, slow-moving and smelling like open sewers, they stared at our young, pink-scrubbed faces, showing no expression or emotion at all. We filed past them quickly into a back room to warm up, thankful for an excuse to slip away.

Time for the service and we filed back out into the hall. I grabbed a mic and said the usual "hey, we're really glad to be here," and kicked off a background tape. We belted out the first measures of a song called "Happiness." It went something like: "Eight..chay, double-pee-iiii, eight-chee double-pee happiness (happiness, echo the girls)." And so on. The contrast between our crisp, glowing outfits and those of our audience must have been staggering. As a youth minister, I guess I thought that was good--like maybe we were giving these guys an example of what they could aspire to. As I write this, I honestly don't know what I was thinking, but there it was. And there we were.

Our little song had no visible effect upon our audience at all. When it ended the silence was broken only by a wheezing cough somewhere. No one moved much. It remained that way through another two songs, until it slowly dawned on me that they were sitting through our presentation only because they were waiting for dinner. They were being polite--or stunned, I'm not sure which.

Finally, an idea hit me. I turned around and told the choir to sit tight; I grabbed my guitar, motioned to my younger brother, who was part of the choir, and we headed for the back room. I told him my idea. He lit up. We ran through the words, just to see if we still remembered them all: "sippin' whiskey in a paper cup, you drown your sorrows 'till you can't stand up." Feeling suddenly electrified and full of purpose, we then headed back out into the tiny auditorium and sang that old religious classic, "Why Don't You Look Into Jesus," to our roomful of outcasts.

From the first phrase, ears perked up. Boy, did they perk up. Everywhere. (If possible, our youth choir was even more stunned than the intended audience.) By the time we got to "think rock 'n roll will set you free," no one was sleeping, or even appearing tired.

Somehow, by the time we reached the end of the song, our little crowd had grown. The hall was more like halfway full by now. Even better, our message had been clarified. "Ready to admit your life hasn't been working out? Why don't you look into Jesus--He's got the answer." It doesn't get any clearer.

Gingerly, I decided to extend an altar invitation. Most of those present got up and came forward. We prayed with everyone who wanted us to. And nearly everyone wanted us to.

I've thought back on that night many times since. I don't think we ever used those cute choir outfits again...

God bless Larry Norman for not only writing great songs that really spoke to people, but also for teaching a bonehead youth pastor a thing or two about ministry. We gotta do what Jesus did. Leave our pretty throne and go be with people. That's the only way our mission gets fulfilled, because that's the only way they will listen to us.

God bless you, Larry. I will miss you.