I found a tape (remember those cassette thingies?) today as we searched the storage room boxes. The message on the tape was dated 2004 and contained the funeral service conducted in Naples, Florida by a former pastor for a dear friend. I hope I never forget either of these great men.
Don Johnson, not the Miami Vice one, was a man who had been addicted to alcohol most of his life, ruined his family, tortured his body, and died much younger, in my opinion, than he would have had he lived free of the abuse.
Thankfully the alcohol was not Don's true or final identity. During his 5th program to beat the alcohol, Don came to faith in Jesus Christ at Dunklin Center in the everglades region of south Florida. He broke free from the "god of alcohol", that he'd worshiped most of his life, and switched to worshiping the Lord Jesus Christ. As the taped message progressed, I heard the pastor Dr. Hayes Wicker, that other great man I mentioned in the opening paragraph, reminding all of the last 2 decades of Don's life. I was struck by the power and love of God and listened in awe to the testimony of our Lord Jesus and His power to redeem, heal, renew, and resurrect a life. Don's. Mine. Yours?
Don ran from the very God who loved Him well and wanted to give him a life of abundance. Don tried for 50+ years to live a life worth living on his own terms and would have failed and died a lonely, isolated man; but our Jesus - His Lord and mine - found Don and continued to reach out a hand of love to Him though Don had slapped that hand away time and time again. I guess the hand that took the nails of the cross is not thwarted in its work by a slap from you or from me. Jesus really loves.
Don Johnson, the man I knew well from 1999 to 2001 and conversed with sporadically after 2001, was a man filled with love and acceptance. He got forgiveness from God and from those he'd wronged, especially his own family. Don and I had true spiritual fellowship with each other around the things of God. I have known many great men in my life, and Don Johnson is one of the greatest.
He didn't die wealthy or leave much behind except a powerful legacy for his family quite different from the one he'd begun years before. He left a heritage of investing in the lives of men whose lives were as lost as his had been, of loving the unlovable rejects of our society, and of watching God miraculously restore others in the way He had restored Don.
I hadn't contemplated Don's life to this degree in several years, and the exercise gripped my heart as I remembered how I loved him and he loved me, and as I realized what an impact Don Johnson had on my life for good and for eternity.
May I suggest that the ordinary man who places his life in the hands of our extraordinary Savior Jesus Christ will live an extraordinary life of accomplishment, impact, and personal peace. The high calling of God is on you and me to live a life of abundance so others will know we love as Jesus, obey God as Jesus, and produce lasting fruit in this life for eternity by the power of the Holy Spirit. Don Johnson did that and today is with His Savior and mine. Yours?
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