Lost Boy: My Story [Hardcover]

Greg Laurie (Author), Ellen Vaughn (Collaborator)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 15, 2008

As a hippie and drug user who had grown-up in a dysfunctional family, Greg Laurie knew what it was to be lost. A seventeen-year-old, long-haired Greg soon discovered his passion for seeing people rescued from hopelessness and transformed into renewed beings with a saving faith in Christ. Laurie quickly became a wonder and an example as to how God could use someone with a sordid past to impact the world with the gospel. Throughout Greg’s autobiography, be encouraged by the trials he overcame and the far-reaching impact these lessons have had. The Lord’s influence in Greg’s life has been thoroughly evidenced by the fruit seen from the ministries Greg has planted, watered and grown; namely, Harvest Christian Fellowship (one of the 8 largest churches in America) and the Harvest Crusades. Greg Laurie’s legacy has been seasoned with trials and questions, but if God can take a hippie from a severely dysfunctional family and raise him to be one of the nation’s leading evangelists and pastors, what can God do with you?

Editorial Reviews

From the Back Cover

[show large photo of Greg Laurie]

About the Author

GREG LAURIE is senior pastor of Harvest Christian Fellowship in Riverside, California. He began his pastoral ministry at the age of 19 by leading a Bible study of 30 people, which God has since transformed into a congregation that is among the eight largest churches in America. In 1990, Laurie began holding public evangelistic events called Harvest Crusades. Since then, more than three million people have attended Harvest Crusades across the U.S., Canada, New Zealand and Australia. He is the author of over 35 books, including the Gold Medallion Award-winner, The Upside-Down Church and his most recent Regal release Lies We Tell Ourselves.

Product Details

• Reading level: Ages 12 and up
  
• Hardcover: 256 pages
• Publisher: Regal; First Edition edition (June 15, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0830745785
• ISBN-13: 978-0830745784
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6.3 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (23 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #628,479 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

31 of 32 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A compelling autobiography of a unique life., June 1, 2008

By 

Brent Ayotte (Riverside, CA United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Lost Boy: My Story (Hardcover)

Great autobiographies - whether by statesman, celebrity, hero or scoundrel - have 3 elements. A great autobiography:

1) has a compelling reason for being read: It always gives more than just the facts or details "behind the scenes". Not just a personal recounting of history, a great autobiography gives you such a sense of the "real" person that you can personally relate to them. The subject's foibles, failures and weaknesses are included with the requisite telling of their strengths.

2) when you start reading, it makes you want to keep on reading.

3) after finishing it, you know about more than just the writer's story. You know more about "life" - the human condition, life's possibilities, life's parameters, how the world "works" - than you did before reading it.

"Lost Boy" by Greg Laurie, is a great autobiography. The reader is captured by the opening chapter, a description of Greg waiting to take the stage in front of 40,000 people who have filled Anaheim Stadium to hear him speak. Having spoken to over 4 million people in stadiums around
the world, Greg should be on auto-pilot by now. But Greg Laurie has a reason for not being on "auto-pilot". The chapter then goes into short bursts of flashback, most painting a picture of how improbable it is that Greg Laurie could possibly be the guy about to take the stadium stage.

Greg Laurie is not your typical church pastor. Nor is he a type of "TV evangelist". Avoiding the political traps and scandals of both the previous and current generations' religious leaders, Greg Laurie has proven to be a different kind of Christian leader for people to check out. Coming from a broken home (fatherless, mother divorced seven times), checking into 60's drug culture, cynical and untrusting in human relationships, Greg Laurie was not the kind of person who turns into a pastor at 19 years old. Certainly not a pastor who oversees a group of 30 people turn into one of America's first "megachurches", with over 15,000 weekly attendees. Certainly not the kind of speaker who combined cutting edge technology, culturally current music performances and understandable preaching to sold-out events at venues like Madison Square Garden. Certainly not the kind of person who Billy Graham would call the "evangelist of the future". And most certainly not a man profiled by the major TV networks and on the front page of the New York Times. Yet no one seems to understand that better than Greg Laurie himself. "Lost Boy" explains this unique life that has touched millions of other lives for the better, leaving the reader inspired and encouraged to personally dig further into the reason and message behind the book.

A can't-put-it-down-like-a-mystery-novel kind of read, "Lost Boy" is a great gift choice for any reader.

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars More than an autobiography..., August 5, 2008

By 

Wael Qahoush (Riverside, CA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Lost Boy: My Story (Hardcover)

Although this is an autobiography of a pastor, it is much more than that. It is a story of redemption, God's grace and power at work in the life of a "Lost Boy". As Greg put it best, if you see a turtle on a fence, you know one thing for sure: it didn't get there by itself, someone put it there. Likewise, this autobiography is about what God did and can do in people's lives.

Moreover, this autobiography is a very honest story of a regular guy, with all his weaknesses and "baggage" who has been mightily used by God to do His work. As you read this book, you will hurt from laughing so hard, yet parts of it will drive you to tears. My 9 year old son is reading it and cannot put it down. Even if you do not know who Greg Laurie is, you will know him very intimately after reading this book.

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Lost Boy: My Story, August 30, 2008

By 

Patricia Hodel (Northern California) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Lost Boy: My Story (Hardcover)

I enjoyed this autobiographical sketch of Greg Laurie, a Christian Pastor, especially well-known for his stadium Harvest Crusades in Southern California. One thing I learned about him was his passion for drawing cartoons and how this talent served the first church he attended. Easy- heartwarming read describes his difficult childhood abusive background, yet culminated in a complete character change as he came to understand Biblical teaching. He could have been lost to addiction, etc. This story was especially meaningful to me because of a recent tragedy in Greg Laurie's life (not covered in this book). He lost his boy, his adult, married son in an automobile accident this summer of 2008. His response to this grief is an inspiration to all of us who have or will lose someone we love. I bought this book so I could know the background of this man, Greg Laurie, who is modeling courage along with his tears.