As Archie Williams took the stage for his two minutes to shine on America’s Got Talent, my heart began aching as I gasped, hoping, “Please don’t fail.” While I had yet to hear him sing, and I was unaware of his story, I just saw what appeared to be a broken man take the stage. He wore a light blue suit that hung on him; actually it wore him more than he wore it. He walked with a bent knee, almost struggling as if he was carrying the weight of the world on his shoulders. The truth is, he was.
Simon Cowell began the interview. Archie survived thirty-six plus years in the brutal and bloody Louisiana State Penitentiary in Angola, often referred to as the Alcatraz of the South. But he was innocent. Sure, he was convicted, not only of rape, but also of attempted murder of a woman in 1983. But he had witnesses saying he was home. His fingerprints didn’t match the ones at the crime scene. The woman couldn’t identify him in a picture array, at least not at first. But the public was crying for “justice,” and no one really cared if the right man was caught or not. So Archie was innocently walking down his street when the police arrested him. And since he was poor – and since he was black – he couldn’t afford a lawyer and get proper representation. He was found guilty and served a life sentence plus 80 years in hell. The woman and victim was white.
Redemption, though, came from two sources. He threw himself into Jesus, praying and singing gospel songs with other prisoners, until DNA evidence exonerated him from his sentence. Sure he lost thirty-six years of his life. But in his own words, and in the spirit of Nelson Mandela, “Freedom is of the mind. I went to prison, but I never let my mind go to prison.”
So the music began with a simple piano, and I was hoping beyond hope that he wouldn’t fail. With courage in his heart, his soulful voice began to sing Elton John’s, “Don’t Let the Sun Go Down on Me.” He slowed the tempo and uttered the words in new and refreshing tones. Listening to his song, it was like hearing it for the first time. It wasn’t long before the audience, stunned in reverent silence, had given him their hearts. When he finished, he brought the crowd to its feet in cheers and me to tears. In one moment he was offered redemption. The weight of the world was lifted. And in that same moment he shared that redemption with love and mercy.
I looked at my phone. Social media had blown up, not about Archie Williams’ performance, but about George Floyd. The news reported that four Minneapolis police officers were fired from the force for their role in the death of Floyd. Following reports of a forgery, they found Floyd sitting on his car. Suspecting he was guilty, they placed cuffs on him, then claimed he was resisting an arrest. Soon he was on the ground with one of the officers, one of the white officers, pressing his knee on the neck of Floyd, a black man. The move violated police protocol and ignored standard apprehension procedures. The white officer took a knee on the neck of a black man, while Floyd was pleading for his life. “I can’t breathe!” “I can’t breathe!” “I can’t breathe” were the last words spoken by George Floyd.
We are losing everything while fading to black and white, and the Son is going down on me.
To say “we’re struggling to “’love our neighbor’” is an understatement. At present, it’s clear we don’t even know who our neighbor is. Anger. Hatred. Resentment. Pride. Prejudice. Denial. A festering cancer is metastasizing in our society, destroying the very fabric of our own humanity. At best we’re looking the other way as another story appears on our newsfeed that a person of color suffers at the hands of the privileged. At worse, we’re the guilty throwing shade on someone because of their skin’s color. Our actions continue to betray our words. We claim, “Man was made in the image of God,” then disqualify our truth with, “just not that man.” So John reminds us that if we can’t love the people of color, how can we say we love the God who made the people of color (1 Jn. 4:20)?
If we don’t turn the tide toward racial reconciliation, then we’ll lose everything while fading to black and white, with the Son going down on me.
Soli Deo Gloria!
(i.e., only God is glorified!)