{"id":184,"date":"2017-03-11T21:06:31","date_gmt":"2017-03-11T21:06:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/disciple4.com\/?p=184"},"modified":"2023-04-09T12:11:35","modified_gmt":"2023-04-09T12:11:35","slug":"in-mcgees-words-i-lost-everything","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/disciple4.com\/index.php\/2017\/03\/11\/in-mcgees-words-i-lost-everything\/","title":{"rendered":"In McGee\u2019s words, \u201cI lost everything.\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"

Christianity and forgiveness<\/span><\/p>\n

The story began in 2005 in the city of Benton Harbor, Michigan. On that day, Jameel McGee was, in his words, \u201cminding his own business,\u201d when he was stopped by a policeman, Andrew Collins. The encounter did not go well for McGee. Collins accused him of selling drugs and arrested him. At the time, McGee insisted that the charges were \u201call made up.\u201d As CBS noted, \u201cOf course, a lot of accused men make that claim,\u201d and the outcome in McGee\u2019s case was pretty much the same as in other such cases: He wound up serving four years in prison.<\/span><\/p>\n

In McGee\u2019s words, \u201cI lost everything.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Making matters infinitely worse was that McGee was telling the truth: He was in fact an innocent man.<\/span><\/p>\n

We know this because the policeman, Collins, was subsequently \u201ccaught, and served a year and a half for falsifying many police reports, planting drugs and stealing.\u201d Among the falsified police reports was the one concerning Jameel McGee.<\/span><\/p>\n

While exoneration is sweet, it doesn\u2019t make up for the four years spent behind bars. As McGee told CBS, \u201cMy only goal was to seek him when I got home and to hurt him.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

He appeared to have gotten his chance when both McGee and Collins ended up working at a caf\u00e9 run by Mosaic Christian Community Development Center. As CBS put it, the \u201cbad cop and the wrongfully accused man had no choice but to have it out.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

And that brings me back to what I said about Christianity\u2019s unique emphasis on forgiveness. Collins told McGee \u201cHonestly, I have no explanation, all I can do is say I\u2019m sorry.\u201d McGee\u2019s response, \u201cThat was pretty much what I needed to hear.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

But McGee did not stop there: He befriended the man who wronged him, so much so that he eventually told Collins that he loved him. As Collins tells the tale, \u201cI just started weeping because he doesn\u2019t owe me that. I don\u2019t deserve that.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Thankfully, forgiveness, and the healing it brings in its wake, has nothing to do with \u201cdeserve.\u201d As McGee, a Christian, understood, we forgive one another because, as Paul told both the Ephesians and the Colossians, God in Christ has forgiven us.<\/span><\/p>\n

The power of forgiveness transcends personal relationships. Think of the reaction to the Amish forgiving the man who killed ten young girls back in 2007. There was a power at work there that even the most hardened skeptic could not deny.<\/span><\/p>\n

Today, McGee and Collins share their story with others. At least one person seems to have taken its message to heart. The CBS reporter ended with the following question: \u201cIf these two guys from the coffee shop can set aside their bitter grounds, what\u2019s our excuse?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

The answer, especially for the Christian, is \u201cnone.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Christianity and forgiveness The story began in 2005 in the city of Benton Harbor, Michigan. On that day, Jameel McGee was, in his words, \u201cminding his own business,\u201d when he was stopped by a policeman, Andrew Collins. The encounter did not go well for McGee. Collins accused him of selling drugs and arrested him. At […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[8],"class_list":["post-184","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-quotes","tag-occasionals"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/disciple4.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/184","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/disciple4.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/disciple4.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/disciple4.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/disciple4.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=184"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/disciple4.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/184\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1452,"href":"https:\/\/disciple4.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/184\/revisions\/1452"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/disciple4.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=184"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/disciple4.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=184"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/disciple4.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=184"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}