In 2005, Benton Harbor, Michigan police officer, Andrew Collins,
arrested Jameel McGee for dealing drugs. In reality, McGee did not
commit the crime; Collins had falsified the report. McGee, however, was
convicted and spent four years in prison for a crime that he did not
commit. When Collins’ lies were exposed, he, too, spent 18 months
behind bars. He had actually falsified many police reports, planted
drugs, and stolen money from the city.
“I took money from people. I took money from the city that I worked
for. I was the lowest of low. In my mind now, as I look back, I was as
low as you can get as a police officer,” Collins told The
Herald-Palladium.
McGee was fully exonerated but was very bitter toward his lying
accuser.
“I lost everything,” he
said on the CBS Evening News segment “On the Road” with Steve Hartman.
“My only goal was to seek him when I got home and to hurt him.”
Both McGee and Collins returned to Benton Harbor and ended up working
alongside each other at the Café Mosaic, a faith-based employment
agency. They had to face each other and their troubled past.
Collins told CBS Evening News that he apologized to McGee. “I said,
‘Honestly, I have no explanation, all I can do is say I’m sorry.’”
McGee stated that that apology was “pretty much what I needed to hear.”
He forgave Collins and the two have become friends. Collins is grateful
and amazed at McGee’s willingness to forgive. “He doesn’t owe me that.
I don’t deserve that,” Collins said.
Now the two of them have been spreading the message of forgiveness to
others. “We have this joint mission, now, of letting
the world know that if you owe an apology to somebody, put your pride
down and go apologize,” said Collins. “And if you’re holding something
against somebody, let go of the bitterness because it’s like drinking
poison and hoping it’s hurting them.”
“And clearly,” Steve Hartman reflects,
“if these two guys from the coffee shop can set aside their bitter
grounds, what’s our excuse?” *
Our sins created
“bitter grounds” with our relationship with our Creator and God. Our
sins separate us from Him (Isaiah 59:1-2).
But God loves us
so much that He gave His one and only Son to die on the cross for our
sins (John 3:16; Romans 5:8). Through Jesus, God’s Son, we can have
forgiveness of our sins and receive the gift of eternal life (Ephesians
1:7; Romans 6:23).
We don’t deserve
it; we deserve the “wages of sin”: death (Romans 6:23).
But God, because
of His great love and mercy, has provided for us what we don’t deserve:
forgiveness. And if we accept His offer on His terms, we can live with
Him for eternity in heaven.
God will save and give eternal life to those who
place their faith
and trust in Jesus (Acts 16:30-31), turn from
their sins in repentance
(Acts 17:30-31),
confess
Jesus before men (Romans 10:9-10), and are
baptized
(immersed) into Christ for the forgiveness of sins (Acts 2:38). He will
continue to cleanse from sin those who continue to walk in the light of
His Word (1 John 1:7).
Jesus died for us
so that those “bitter grounds” can be thrown out, we can be reconciled
to God, and live eternally with Him.
Won’t YOU
accept His offer on His terms?
~David A. Sargent
* Information gleaned from “Crooked
cop pairs up with man he framed” by Steve Hartman as viewed on CBS
Sunday Morning and published on April 17, 2016. See the video at
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tKE4qeX5EIA&t.
David A. Sargent,
Minister
Church of Christ at Creekwood
1901 Schillinger Rd. S.
Mobile, Alabama 36695
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