Redemption @ MindSay

Pearlman straddles steaming seas;
Black waves buckle, wreck and foam.
He grips His brood with bloody tongs.

As seamud grasps, dark Neptune frees
his wealth of broken shell and bone.

Pearlman roars His harvest song.

Billy Moore grew up in a tough city in Ohio to an impoverished family. He got involved with crime when he was young. They'd smoke dope and get drunk and break into taverns and steal cash registers, or they'd break into cigarette machines, all kinds of petty theft. Then he joined the army, got married. His wife left him, took their kid with her. He was broke, and he was desperate. One night he and a friend were drinking, smoking dope, and talking about how broke they were. His friend said, "I know about a guy who lives not too far from here, and the word is, he doesn't trust banks. He keeps all his money in his bedroom." Billy said, "Is he some big, tough guy?" And the friend said, "No, he's an old guy. Wouldn't hurt a fly." So the plot hatched in Billy's mind. He went back to the barracks, got his gun, and loaded it. He drove to that man's house, broke in, and started ransacking the house. Put yourself in the position of this elderly gentleman. He's 77 years old. He's in the bedroom as Billy breaks in the front door. He hears the noise, and he's afraid. He doesn't know what to do. He had a shotgun he used for hunting. As Billy Moore broke through the bedroom door with a gun in his hand, this elderly gentleman pointed a shotgun, pulled the trigger, and a blast went off. The buckshot went over Billy's shoulder, missed him completely. Billy took his gun, pointed it at the old man, and he pulled the trigger twice. The elderly gentleman fell dead. Billy rifled through his pockets for any cash, ransacked the bedroom, and he walked away with $5,600.

 

He fled to his trailer in rural Georgia. It didn't take long for the police to track him down. He wasn't a clever criminal. They arrested him and took him to jail. You can just imagine the first night in a jail cell, he realizes his life is over. That's it. He's charged with capital murder. There's an electric chair waiting for him.

 

Well, Billy Moore's mom was a Christian, and she knew a Christian couple who lived not far from the jail in Georgia. She called and said, "I got a son, and he's charged with a death penalty case. He's on death row. Would you please go visit him?" They went to visit Billy Moore, and they sat down with him and told him about Jesus. They said to Billy, "Jesus is willing to give you a fresh start and a new chance at life." Billy looked back at them dumbfounded and said, "You got to be kidding me. Don't you realize my situation here? I murdered an old grandfather. I am charged with a death penalty case. My life is over. There are no new beginnings for me." But that Christian man looked back at Billy Moore and said, "No, you don't understand. Jesus Christ loves you so much he wants to adopt you as his son. He wants to lift the burden of guilt off your shoulders. Jesus Christ loves you so much he wants to find a way to make your life count." Billy not only heard these words from this man and woman, but he saw Jesus in them. He said later, "Nobody ever told me that Jesus loved me. Nobody ever told me Jesus had died for me." He says, "It was a love I could feel. It was a love I wanted. It was a love I needed."

 

And so Billy Moore, as hopeless and broken an individual as you're ever going to see, got on his knees in his jail cell and said, "God, are you telling me you want to adopt the likes of me, you want to forgive me? If you are willing to do that, Jesus, then have at it. I'm sorry for all I've done, and I want to live for you. If you would adopt me and take me to heaven, that would just be the best." And then, "I don't have much time left, but if you could do something to make my life count, it would be like icing on the cake." Jesus heard that prayer.

 

There was a bathtub there on death row. They got permission from the guards to fill it up with water. Billy Moore knelt in the bathtub, and they dipped him backward into the water to baptize him. God began to change that man from the inside out. Billy went to court and pleaded guilty. He said, "How can tell you I didn't do it when I did?"

 

They found him guilty and sentenced him to death. But the criminal justice system is slow. It took 16 years of living in a cage waiting to die, but during those 16 years Billy opened his life up to God. God changed him from the inside out. Billy Moore became a model prisoner, so much so that the guards had a nickname for him. They called him "the peacemaker." Death row was an ugly, forsaken, violent, hateful place until Billy Moore got there. Billy had Bible studies with the other inmates, and one by one they found hope and redemption and new life in Jesus Christ. The place that had been awful and violent became a place of hope where people cared for each other.

 

So I would say,  "The issue has never been whether God would forgive you for what you have done. The Bible makes it clear. First John 1:9: 'If we confess our sins to him, he can be depended on to forgive us and to cleanse us from every wrong.' That's not the issue. The issue is, will you let God forgive you like Billy Moore did? If Billy Moore can be forgiven by God for murdering a defenseless old grandfather, then what in the world have you done in your life that you think would disqualify you from the forgiveness of God? "The issue has never been can God make your life count. The issue has never been, will God transform you? The Bible makes it clear. Second Corinthians 5:17 says when someone becomes a Christian he becomes a new person. He's not the same any more. The question is not, will he change you? The question is will you, like Billy Moore, open your heart to God? Will you invite him to change you? Will you invite him to give you a purpose for living beyond eating and drinking and going to work every day?"

 

If God can use a guy like Billy Moore living in a cage, then think what he could do with your life. Think what he could do in your family, with your children, in your neighborhood, and in this church.

 

In August of 1990 the court system finally caught up with Billy Moore. The Supreme Court said that's it, time to die. The hours were ticking down to August 22, when they would kill him. He was put in the death watch cell, which is where they put the guys in the last hours of life. His lawyers would call him, and I had an opportunity to talk to one of those lawyers. "What was it like to call this guy who was facing death in just a few hours?" The lawyer said, "It was the strangest experience I've ever had." "What happened?" "We would call to console him, but he ended up consoling us. Billy would say things like, 'Are you guys okay? Are you coping? I know this is difficult for you. Can I pray for you? It's going to be okay.' We were trying to reach out to him, and he was reaching out to us. Why?" Why? Because Billy Moore was not afraid to meet Jesus Christ face to face. Why wasn't he afraid? Because he knew, If God loves me so much, if Jesus wants to adopt me, if he wants to forgive all my sins, then I can trust that when I close my eyes in that electric chair as I die, he's going to take care of me forever.

 

On August 21, 1990, seven-and-a-half hours before Billy Moore was to be electrocuted, something amazing took place. In fact, it's unprecedented in American history. The Georgia Pardon and Parole Board held an emergency hearing about a model prisoner they'd heard about. Let me tell you something about Billy Moore. On that day he knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that he was guilty. He knew he had committed a heinous crime, and he knew he deserved to die in that electric chair. But the five members of that Pardon and Parole Board looked at this repentant man, and they did something so amazing it made the front page of the New York Times. They looked at Billy Moore and said, "We are going to show you mercy." They threw out the death penalty against Billy Moore and did something that had never been done before in American history: they set the gears in motion to release him from prison. It was the first time in history a confessed killer on death row was to be set free.

 

And that,  is like Jesus. It's like his grace. His grace is unmerited favor. Billy Moore deserved to die. Instead he was set free. That's what Jesus does.

 

You know where Billy Moore is right now? Billy Moore today is where he is every Sunday. He's in church worshiping the God of the second chance, because Billy Moore is a pastor. I remember sitting in Billy's living room a couple of months ago, and we were talking. I started to goad him a little bit. I said, "It's just the two of us here. You can tell the truth now. What is really at the root of the miraculous change in your life? It was the prison rehabilitation system, wasn't it?" He laughed. He said, "No, , it wasn't that." I said, "What was it then? Was it a self-help program?" He said, "No, it wasn't that." I said, "Was it transcendental meditation? Was it psychological counseling?" He said, "Come on, you know better than that. You know what it was." I did know what it was, but I wanted to hear him say it. I said, "No, Billy, you tell me. What changed Billy Moore?" He said, "I will tell you plain and simple. It was Jesus Christ. He changed me in ways I could never have changed myself. He gave me a reason to live. He helped me do the right thing for a change. He gave me a heart for other people. And he saved my soul."

 

I thought, Bingo. That's the business Jesus is in. Aren't those the exact five things all of us want? Don't we want to be changed in ways we can never change on our own? Don't we want to have a reason for living? Don't we want to be helped to do the right thing? Don't we want to have a heart for other people? Don't we want God to save our soul and to take us to heaven? That's what Jesus does. And the amazing thing is it's free. It is a gift. It cost Jesus everything. The price tag was his suffering and death on the cross to pay for our sin. It cost him everything; it costs us zero. He offers it as a free gift because he loves us.

 

In my imagination I think about this friend sitting across from me in Starbucks, and I just wish he would look back at me and say, "I want to know that Jesus. How could I not want to know that Jesus? How could I not want to be adopted and forgiven and empowered to live? What do I do?" I would say to my friend, "It is so easy. Just do what Billy Moore did. Billy Moore went into court and confessed. All you have to do is come into the court of God. Pray and confess what you know is true--that you've done things you ought not to have done. Say, 'God, I've messed up in ways I know I shouldn't have. I realize, God, that you're perfect. You're holy, and my sin, my wrongdoing has separated me from you. I understand now that's why you seem so distant from me. I don't want you to be distant anymore. I want you to live inside of me. I want you to change my life, to adopt me, to forgive me, to do something with my life.'  And he will. 

What I'm about to blog about is not what I personally believe, nor do I personally disbelieve it. It is an unexplored idea I just had that I thought was worth sharing.

A conversation I've been having on someone else's blog has gotten me thinking about something...

Christianity has been criticised for creating a culture of guilt, and using guilt as a means of controlling its "believers." In some cases, this might be true, but I don't think that that is what Christianity is supposed to be about. In fact, I believe the opposite, that Christianity is supposed to be about freedom from guilt.

But this got me thinking about what I believe about original sin. The general belief amongst many Christians is that because of the original sin of Adam and Eve, all the descendants of Adam and Eve, that is, the human species, bears original sin from the moment they are conceived that they need to be forgiven for.

Now, I certainly understand why this seems unfair. Should I be punished for something that happened before I even existed? Should I need forgiving becase my parents are humans, which is something I've never had any control over, nor my parents, for that matter? Is there really such thing as original sin? Do I bear personal responsibility?

Then I thought, the answer to that last question, might be no. I don't bear personal responsibility. I don't bear personal responsibility.

I thought about our aborigines. For many years the Australian indigenous population has been asking our government to apologise for the way our ancestors treated them, which today many aborigines are still suffering from. Our previous Prime Minister, John Howard, from the Liberal Party, thought that although the way the were treated was terrible, he should not be the one to apologise, or bear moral responsibility for. After all, everyone who was involved in those acts towards aborigines were dead, and he wasn't even born at the time. Although some Australians agreed with him, he was rather unpopular with a large number of them, aborigines and white people alike. We all felt a national guilt that, even though none of us were personally responsible, we should bear the responsibility of the actions of our forebears. In our last election, John Howard was voted out and Kevin Rudd from the Labour Government was voted in, and one of the first things he did as Prime Minister was make a public announcement on behalf of the Australian people, apologising to the indigenous Australians.

I also thought about the African slave situation in America. Although slavery is now illegal, and Americans of African descent have as much rights as any other American in America, many white Americans still feel white shame, and I have met a few over the internet that have felt ashamed of being born white because of the actions of their ancestors, even though they had nothing personally to do with it. And even though some might not feel it as keenly as others, there is still a "sensitivity" between the races.

Do any Germans feel ashamed that theirs was the nation that produced the Nazis? I don't know a lot about the German mindset, but I wouldn't be surprised.

Anyway, this got me thinking. Maybe original sin is simply species shame. Eating a fruit from a tree versus crimes against humanity? Okay, not quite the same ball park, I'll warrant, but this story is full of symbolism. The seven days of creation? Science tells us how unlikely it is that the universe was created in seven days, but the number seven itself was highly symbolic to the Hebrews, a number representing wholeness. The fruit that they ate wasn't just any fruit, God didn't forbid it for just any reason; it was the fruit from the knowledge of good and evil. There's some symbolism right there.

So people use the story of Adam and Eve to make people feel guilty for something that happened before they were born. But maybe it's not about having personal guilt, because it's not our personal sin. But maybe it's the responsibility we all have as human beings, to be resonsible for each other and not to seperate ourselves from our shared past. Maybe us Australians do bear some responsiblity for the actions of our ancestors. The consequences of their actions are still existing, after all, and they're not around to fix it, so maybe it's not enough for us to say, "tough luck, I feel bad, but it's nothing to do with me." Do I feel personally guilty for the way our aborigines were treated? Of course not. I had nothing to do with it. Do I think I should share at least some moral responsiblity? Maybe so.

There is a resonsiblity we have as humans towards other humans, when we see one part of humanity committing atrocious sins, even though we are not a part of that "part," maybe we, as humans, need to take action, and not just sit back and do nothing; because maybe the acts of one human reflects on all humans. Maybe, I thought, this is what original sin is about. Not personal guilt, but shared responsiblity.

And as for Christianity? I mentioned before, is about freeing us from the shackles of guilt. All types of guilt, whether guilt that we feel we deserve when we don't, guilt that we don't feel when we do deserve to, and guilt that we feel that we rightly deserve. Whether that guilt is our personal guilt, or the shared guilt of humanity. Responsiblity will still be there, though, of course.

Anyway, this is just a thought, nothing more, nothing less. Chances are, I'm way off.

I think this is appropriate for the coming easter sunday.  It really moved me; I don't know how to explain the Christian experiance in more detail then what you see below:

 

 

 

Everything - Lifehouse

 

Find me here
And speak to me
I want to feel You
I need to hear You
You are the light
That's leading me
To the place
Where I find peace again

You are the strength
That keeps me walking
You are the hope
That keeps me trusting
You are the life
To my soul
You are my purpose
You're everything

And how can I stand here with You
And not be moved by You
Would You tell me how could it be
Any better than this
(Ahh Yeahhh)

You calm the storms
And You give me rest
You hold me in your hands
You won't let me fall
You steal my heart
And You take my breath away
Would You take me in
Would You take me deeper, now

And how can I stand here with You
And not be moved by You
Would You tell me how could it be
Any better than this

And how can I stand here with You
And not be moved by You
Would You tell me how could it be
Any better than this

Cause you're all I want
You're all I need
You're everything, everything
You're all I want
You're all I need
You're everything, everything
You're all I want
You're all I need
You're everything, everything
You're all I want
You're all I need
Everything, everything...

When how can I stand here with You
And not be moved by You
Would you tell me how could it be
Any better than this

Oh And how can I stand here with You
And not be moved by You
Would You tell me how could it be
Any better any better than this

And how can I stand here with You
And not be moved by You
Would You tell me how could it be
Any better than this

Would You tell me how could it be
Any better than this....

 

In this farewell
There’s no blood
There’s no Alibi
‘Cause I’ve Drawn Regret
From the truth
Of a Thousand Lies

So let Mercy Come
And Wash Away
What I’ve Done

I'll face myself
To Cross out what I’ve Become
Erase Myself
And let Go of What I’ve done

Put to rest
What you Thought of Me
While I clean this Slate
With the Hands of Uncertainty

So let Mercy Come
And Wash Away
What I’ve Done

I'll face myself
To Cross out what I’ve Become
Erase Myself
And let Go of What I’ve done

For What I’ve Done
I start again
And whatever pain may come
Today this ends
I’m Forgiving What I’ve Done!!!

I'll face myself
To Cross out what I’ve Become
Erase Myself
And let Go of What I’ve done

What I’ve Done
Forgiving What I’ve Done

 

****

Here we go for the hundredth time,
Hand grenade pins in every line,
Throw 'em up and let something shine.
Going out of my f**king mind.
Filthy mouth, no excuse.
Find a new place to hang this noose.
String me up from atop these roofs.
Knot it tight so I won't get loose.
Truth is you can stop and stare,
Bled myself out and no one cares.
Dug a trench out, laid down there
With a shovel up out to reach somewhere.
Yeah someone pour it in,
Make it a dirt dance floor again.
Say your prayers and stomp it out,
When they bring that chorus in.

I bleed it out,
Digging deeper just to throw it away.
I bleed it out,
Digging deeper just to throw it away.
I bleed it out,
Digging deeper just to throw it away,
Just to throw it away,
Just to throw it away.

I bleed it out.
Go, stop the show.
Choppy words and a sloppy flow.
Shotgun opera, lock and load,
Cock it back and then watch it go.
Mama help me, I've been cursed,
Death is rolling in every verse.
Candy paint on his brand new hearse.
Can't contain him, he knows he works.
F**k this hurts, I won't lie.
Doesn't matter how hard I try.

Half the words don't mean a thing,

And I know that I won't be satisfied.
So why, try ignoring him.
Make it a dirt dance floor again.
Say your prayers and stomp it out,
When they bring that chorus in.

 

****

 

AND HERE IN THE NIGHT
AS I FEEL THE INFERNO
I STARE IN THE DARK
THINKING WHAT IS ETERNAL

THE MAN OR THE MOMENT
THE ACT OR THE REASON
THESE THOUGHTS FILL MY HEAD
AS I CONTEMPLATE TREASON

OF DREAMS I HAVE HAD
AND DREAMS I HAVE PONDERED
WHEN LATE IN THE NIGHT
MY MIND IT WOULD WANDER

TO THINGS I HAVE DONE
AND THEN QUICKLY REGRETTED
WHILE DENYING VICES
MY LIFE HAD SELECTED

AND I THINK WHAT I'VE DONE
OR HAVE YET TO BEGIN
AND THE MAN I'VE BECOME
AND THE MAN THAT I'VE BEEN

NOW CAUGHT IN A WALTZ
WITH THE ETERNAL DANCER
I'M COURTED BY DEATH
BUT DEATH ISN'T THE ANSWER
I SAY

ALL I WAS
MEANT TO BE
COULD I
SUDDENLY
JUST DECIDE
NOT A THOUGHT
WOULD SURVIVE
COULD IT BE
MY LIFE'S WORTH
ENDED THERE
WITH MY BIRTH

IF I COULD SEE SOMEONE
WHO'S BEEN THERE BEFORE ME
AND TRADED HIS SOUL
FOR A MOMENT OF GLORY

HIS PENANCE OR MERCY
BY SPIRITS DEBATED
WHILE JUDGED ON A SCALE
THAT'S BEEN HEAVILY WEIGHTED

AND WHAT HAVE I DONE
COULD THERE BE SUCH A SIN
IN THIS MAN I'VE BECOME
IN THIS MAN THAT I'VE BEEN

NOW CALLING TO GOD
FROM THE PIT'S VERY BOTTOM
I PRAY HE FORGIVES
EVERY SIN I'VE FORGOTTEN
THIS DAY

AND WHO WOULD HAVE THOUGHT
THAT MY FATE IT WOULD CONJURE
THIS TWIST IN THE ROAD
ON WHICH I HAVE WANDERED

EACH VISION AND DREAM NOW
COMPLETELY DISMEMBERED
TO GIVE ONE'S WHOLE LIFE
AND FIND NOTHING'S
REMEMBERED

AND WHAT GOOD IS A LIFE
THAT LEAVES NOTHING BEHIND
NOT A THOUGHT OR A DREAM
THAT MIGHT ECHO IN TIME

THE YEARS AND THE HOURS
THE SECONDS AND MINUTES
AND EVERYTHING THAT
MY LIFE HAS PLACED IN IT
BETRAYED
BETRAYED
BETRAYED

THE THINGS I HAVE DONE
THE PLACES I'VE BEEN
THE COST OF MY DREAMS
THE WEIGHT OF MY SINS

AND EVERYTHING THAT
I'VE GATHERED IN LIFE
COULD IT BE LOST
COULD IT BE LOST IN THIS
COULD IT BE LOST IN THIS
NIGHT