A Matter of Life & Death
It took a good 30 seconds to sink in. Then he looked at me and said, "In your case it's probably a good thing because everyone was saying about you, If you carry on the way you're going you will either be dead or in prison for the rest of your life."
I watched, sitting at the dining room table as the men in my house carried something out. I was only four years old at the time and had no idea what was going on. It was only later that I realised that it was my father that was being carried out of the house and that was the last time I saw him. I was too young to understand what was going on and I don’t recall anyone speaking to me about it. It was simply a statement of fact. Once there was a man in the house and then there wasn’t. I don’t really remember anything about him.
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Several years passed by. I must have been about 10 years old when my mum broke the news to me and my sister that my grandfather had passed away. This was very different. I was older. I distinctly recall him talking to me and seeing him. Sure we had seen the ambulance coming for him when he was ill. We had visited him in hospital. He had come back home but in my young mind he was always there. I knew that people died but it was like the saying, “Death is a distant rumour to the young”
It was a rumour no more.
We are born, we live, we die. That may be so. Nevertheless, I was determined that this span of inevitability would be as long as possible.
It was my grandfather's passing that momentarily interrupted my youthful view on the immortality of life. In my mind everything that existed had always been that way. My few years on this earth were my forever. By this age of course I knew about the concept of death but I guess I believed in my own immortality. As the saying goes, "Everybody is immortal til they die".
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Another couple of incidents were to awaken me to the myth of my own immortality. I grasped at a fairly young age that some people were proud of the reputation of our housing estate. Not for any reason of virtue mind you. The estate was notorious for crime. Some of the residents were certainly proud of that. There was a culture of violence as well. They were very proud of that. Twice by the age of 10 I was threatened with a knife by older boys. They didn't seriously try to actually do anything with it. It was more a matter of trying to intimidate me. It was pretty scary nonetheless.
I knew one day it would be my 'now'. I was hoping that day would be as far away in the future as possible. As the comedian Woody Allen once said, "I'm not afraid of death. I just don't want to be there when it happens."
When it comes to the subject of death I'm pretty sure you have your own opinions on that and what happens, if anything, afterwards. As a young atheist I considered death to be the end...and I was scared of that. The idea of not existing anymore, no more experience of life or even being aware of anything, was abhorrent to me. I resolved that if it were possible I would, through sheer willpower, live as long as possible. We only have one life and to see that come to an end was irredeemable and the worst tragedy of all.
Fast forward to my early adulthood and I was a very angry young man with a lot to prove. The people I looked up to were the ones that were feared. I was never one of the hard cases on the estate but I wanted to be feared. That's when things really started to go downhill.
William Shakespeare once wrote of death, "Thus conscience does make cowards of us all" I made a pledge I then forgot about once the danger had passed. But it did not go unheard.
By the end of my teens I was hanging around in a gang, getting into trouble, looking for trouble, picking fights, carrying a blade and carrying a mindset that I wanted to be known as a bad man. I was getting worse and worse and this was getting attention. It got to the point where I was making enemies and it was getting more and more dangerous for me.
On one occasion a couple of complete strangers saw fit to advise me that it was hard to walk without any legs. On another occasion a guy came for me with an axe to make good on that threat. Thankfully I saw him coming before he could get near me. There was another occasion where I was just in the wrong place at the wrong time. I saw four guys. I didn't back down because I didn't want to be seen running. It ended up with one guy holding a knife to my throat. When one of them went for me I ducked him and ran for it, somehow managing to get away.
It got worse. There was a well known psycho called Connor {name changed}. He could be quite normal but then it was if a switch had been flipped and he would go mental. He once marched into a pub in broad daylight with a sawn off shotgun looking for someone and when he found him Connor put the gun to his head and screamed that he was going to kill him. I made the very grave miscalculation of threatening to give his brother a good hiding. One night Connor heard where I was.
I ran but it wasn't fast enough. I was sent sprawling across the road as he caught up with me. I ducked into someone's front garden and as he came for me through the gate I went to run out of the other gate. Back and forth we went as Connor had a head fit. People came out of the local pub to see what the noise was about. Connor was shouting the place down. I heard one panicky voice pleading with him to leave it but Connor was beside himself insisting that I was going to die. I had to do something.
In a moment when the hedge blocked his sight of me I vaulted the garden door leading to an alleyway behind me. In the pitch dark I charged through a bramble infested garden getting the living daylights scratched out of myself. I didn't look back. I ran and ran and then ducked into a group of bushes hoping that I'd lost him. I have no idea how long I was there. Connor was local and it wouldn't take him long to find out where I lived. How was I going to get out of this? I was a dead man walking.
Eventually this atheist decided to pray. I had no idea whether there was a God or not but I was knee deep in trouble and didn't see any way out so I prayed.
"God, if you get me out of this I promise I will behave myself"
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Hours later I sneaked through the streets to make my way home, paranoid that at any minute I was about to be jumped or shot. For a few days I kept a low profile but I was still wandering the streets with my friends. I didn't want to show that I was scared or backing down. I was a very arrogant and stubborn young man. I only hoped I would see Connor before he saw me.
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I ended up being thrown out of home. My mum couldn't take the stress of the police and others knocking on the door. That move probably saved my life. I was too proud to run away. I was more concerned with where I could get a gun to deal with any trouble if it flared up. I was in a very dark place both inside and out.
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Of course I forgot all about that prayer. I forgot about my promise and went back to my knife carrying, petty crime committing ways. God, however, did not forget and, as it turned out, held me to that promise.
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Fast forward several months and the night came where, by divine design, I ended up in a meeting where I first heard the gospel message. It was as if God himself was there and looking right through me. Nothing was hidden from him. That night I responded to the appeal to turn from all I knew to be wrong and follow Jesus. Something happened at that moment of decision. All of the violent hatred and anger seemed to disappear. I was changed from the inside out.
The fear of dying had gone too. It's was a strange and unexpected side effect. Not only am I glad to be alive but there was a calming peace that filled me. I didn't fully grasp the effects of it at first but there was no more fear of death. I knew exactly where I would be if I were to die right there and then. As that fear of death faded actually felt more alive than I ever had before.
Several months after my dramatic conversion experience I met up with someone whose words have stayed with me ever since. One Sunday afternoon I was walking down the road when an old 'partner in crime' spotted me. Vinnie {name changed} was passing by on one of his 'liberated' motorbikes {His specialty was relieving motorbikes from their owners.}. We had a lot of experiences together but I hadn't seen him since I moved from the area. We got talking and then Vinnie laughed and said "You'll never guess what people are saying about you. People are saying you joined the 'God squad.' But don't worry Steve, I stood up for you. I told them no way, Steve would never do something like that."
Well that became an interesting conversation right there. I told him straight that I'd become a Christian and that I was going to church. Vinnie looked at me for a moment then laughed. "Hahaha, nice one. Sure Steve, pull the other one." "No, I'm serious." I said. I'm telling you it took a good 30 seconds for him to stop laughing and realise I wasn't joking. I'll never forget his face as it sunk in. He stood there shocked for a moment as the truth sank in and then he said something I have never forgotten. Vinnie looked at me and said...
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"In your case it's probably a good thing because everyone was saying about you, If you carry on the way you're going you will either be dead or in prison for the rest of your life".
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Those words stayed with me. I had changed. I had radically changed. No longer was I running around the streets with a blade. No longer was I involved in the wave of crime that I was previously engulfed in. But those words struck me. It struck home just how arrogant and blind to the truth I had previously been. I always thought I was one step ahead, that I was always too smart to face the consequences of my actions, that I knew just how far to push it. The reality, however, was that Vincent and others had seen it all before so many times. The people that were on that downward spiral either ended up dead or spending the rest of their lives on the inside. When I look at the near misses {and I've only shared some of them here} and the circumstances that got me out of that lifestyle I can only say it's a miracle I'm here to type this at all. Left to my own devices I probably wouldn't even be here.
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As I look back on my life there are interesting twists and ironies. I experienced knife crime at a young age and ended up carrying one. I feared death yet invited it with the life I was leading. I thought I was smart yet pride had blinded me to the risks. I thought I was one step ahead yet the consequences of the lifestyle I chose had me surrounded. Indeed, it was favourable circumstances and divine providence that kept me alive and free. In the name of living my own life I lived in the constant shadow of death itself yet when I relinquished authority over my own life to a higher power I found a life more worth living that ever before. Ironically the kind of life that leaves me in no fear of death whatsoever.
Over the subsequent years I have attended a few funerals. One of them was Vinnie's. No-one really talks about it but when it comes I find we don't really say very much. It sobers all of us. When we do say something it is an attempt to make sense of it or, understandably, lessen the pain and shock. We try our best guess at it but in all honesty that's all it is. It's the one thing we all are guaranteed to experience and the one thing we seem to know so little about, especially about what happens on the other side.
For me the greatest answer in the face of our greatest and final enemy is in the story of the man who faced death and kept walking forward, knowing that he was not only going to die but rise from the dead as well. It's the story of one who faced death for all of us so he could take us through it safely. It's the story of Jesus. Now, his story has become part of my story. For me, it is more than an matter of faith. It is a matter of life and death.
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Steve Johnson
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"In that moment, hiding in the dark, not knowing if I would get out alive, I prayed to a God I hitherto didn't believe existed. I said "God, if you get me out of this I promise I will behave myself."
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