Brad and Everyone,

Perhaps I was a bit harsh in my message. I do know of people in prison who
have given their hearts to Jesus, and they do deserve to live.

Several years before I met Vernon, I tried once to lead a prisoner in
prison to Christ. after several visits to him, almost for a year, He was
very bitter and I told him how important it was to give his heart to Jesus.

This was Kelley Marshall. Do you all remember reading about him in the
early 70's? He was first a bank robber, and then while in prison, he
stabbed a gard 21 times. This was a horrible crime. He was put in a federal
penetentury, and there, him and another friend, you guys, they drank
duplicating fluid, and his friend died, and he went blind.

Later, he was taken to the Oregon State Penetentury, and there he met My
brother, Ron Charpentier who introduced me to him when Ron was in the
Oregon State Penetentury. I tried to help Kelley, but he became so angry, I
couldn't handle his anger. He asked me to stop visiting him, so I did. He
had written me the most horrible letter I had ever received in my life. It
had words in it that we don't use. One of my co-workers at GTE had to read
it to me. I prayed for his salvation. I pray that he did find Jesus.

Like I said, I'm not God, and only God can judge and if a person truly
repents, and gives their heart to Jesus, they do deserve to live.

God Bless all the prisoners that they would give their lives to Jesus and
lead others to Christ.

Lovingly,
Pat Ferguson

At 05:12 PM 11/5/03 -0600, you wrote:
>What can one say to victims of crime but to console them and help them in
>any way  we feel might be of service to them. I remember when I was a
>younin', one of my cousin's cousins from the other side of the family was
>shot in the head from a distance after  a few words, as kids do with other
>kids. I guess a racial comment was made and someone decided to go past
>settling the score. It devastated the family.  I look at the evening news
>and we hear about moms killing their kids, dads killing their families and
>then themselves, other people doing unspeakable things to other human
>beings and I scratch my head in wonder of how they can do that and not feel
>remorse. How can one even bring themselves to doing such horrific crimes?
>Some is mental desensitizing, some is lack of chemicals or something in the
>brain, and some is brainwashing or growing up in areas where survival of
>the fittest goes beyond what you and I might consider to be to be able to
>start a fire by rubbing two sticks together. I look back at God's directive
>to David to wipe out entire tribes of people, their animals and everything,
>and where that use to puzzle me of why God would do that, I now understand
>a little bit more. I know why perhaps Samuel was so livid with Saul when he
>did not wipe out all God told him to, but brought back the animals and took
>captive the king of that tribe. Yet God in turn told Jonah to go to
>Nineveh, which was known to be quite an atrocious place, and why? To preach
>to them that they might subject their lives to God. And then we see Paul,
>not our Chocopaul, but Paul of the New Testament, and had he been killed
>for the just desserts he had coming, we'd be much poorer a people. I knew
>of a man,  a friend of my friend, who was a murderer, spent time in prison,
>much time, and was just not a good person. He was abused as a child and
>took the wrong road to life because of that, but later found himself
>believing what the preacher was telling him there in prison. He got out of
>prison believe it or not and started Loving Hearts  ministry, and reached
>those who average folks would be scared to death to preach to. Had he been
>killed, there would likely be less Christians in the wake of his path in
>life. Incidentally, this man known as Mad Dog in prison, later known as
>Bear short for Teddy Bear after he recieved Christ into his heart,
>and  whose given name was Richard Morgan, lost his battle to a brain tumor
>a few weeks back and is praising the Lord in person as I type I suppose. It
>looked like he was doing good for a while but finally he asked for prayer
>to be released from the pain and to go home to God, and he soon then did.
>He affected many people. Who is in authority to  put lights out on
>someone's life? I know there are situations in which I could see myself
>doing just that out of revenge, or at least feeling like I ought, but that
>is not my job, and I'm glad of it. God is soverign and sometimes we just
>don't understand why things are the way they are. But we've read the book
>and we know who wins, the best we can do is to get others to come on the
>winning side.
>
>Brad