All posts ‘Their thoughts accuse them:’ A (sort-of) death-bed murder confession
11/12/2012 9:10:59 AM
By Carmen Fowler LaBerge with Scott Lamb
“Wicked people know that their sin is wrong, at least in large measure.” – Wayne Grudem, Systematic Theology, p. 122)
Chew on that sentence from theologian Wayne Grudem. Then, pick up the Word of God and reflect on Paul’s teaching about the moral conscience existing in the heart of every person:
“[14] For when Gentiles, who do not have the law, by nature do what the law requires, they are a law to themselves, even though they do not have the law. [15] They show that the work of the law is written on their hearts, while their conscience also bears witness, and their conflicting thoughts accuse or even excuse them [16] on that day when, according to my gospel, God judges the secrets of men by Christ Jesus. (Romans 2:14-16 ESV)
Again, from Grudem: “The consciences of unbelievers bear witness to God’s moral standards, but at times this evidence of God’s law on the hearts of unbelievers is distorted or suppressed. Sometimes their thoughts ‘accuse’ them and sometimes their thoughts ‘excuse’ them, Paul says.”
Sometimes their thoughts accuse them…
To find a real-life illustration that a person’s thoughts can “accuse” them of sin, you needed only to listen in on Nashville area news last week. James Washington was convicted for a 1995 murder which investigators had considered unsolvable due to a lack of evidence – a “cold case.”
So, what changed in the case?
In 2009, Mr. Washington who was a prison inmate, suffered an attack of seizures and went into the hospital. Although he wasn’t going anywhere, the law required that he be under the watchful eye of a prison guard.
The guard assigned to Washington’s room found himself in the unusual position of being called upon to hear the man’s confession. Washington, considering himself to be near death, called the prison guard over to him and confessed to a 1995 murder.
“He kind of got as best as he could, motioned, and said, ‘I have something to tell you. I have to get something off my conscience and you need to hear this.’ He said, ‘I killed somebody. I beat her to death,'” Tomlinson [the guard] told the court last week.”[i]
Prosecutors took the confession to the courts, and Washington now stands convicted of the murder. Though justice does not always get meted out here on earth, we know that the omniscient God sees all – perfect justice will reign in eternity. In the case of this murder, however, earthly justice also has its say.
In alignment with Scripture’s revelation about the human conscience, it was a murderer’s own guilty heart which exposed the evidence that convicted him in the courtroom. Mr. Washington’s conscience “accused” him. We pray that in addition to being convicted of his sin, Mr. Washington has repented before the throne of the ever just and evermore merciful God, who stands ready to forgive and receive even the vilest sinner.
Ultimately the only real answer to the problem of a guilty conscience is a guilt-bearing Christ:
For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God’s righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins. [26] It was to show his righteousness at the present time, so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus. (Romans 3:23-26 ESV)
[i] “Inmate James Washington Convicted After Death Bed Murder Confession” (ABC News)