JAMES BROWN, GERALD FORD, AND SADDAM HUSSEIN MEET THEIR MAKER

(12/31/06)
by Pastor Harry Weidenaar
www.seattlecrc.org

 

Acts 4:12	“Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved.”
2 Corinthians 5:10	“For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may receive what is due him for the things done in the body, whether good or bad.”
Hebrews 9:27	“Just as man is destined to die once, and after that to face judgment….”

Gerald R Ford, James Brown, and Saddam Hussein find themselves on the same day in the anteroom of heaven.   James Brown lets out one of his signatures whoops, lifts his right leg, and skitters across the marble floor on one dancing foot.

“Whoowee!  I finally made it.  Heaven at last!”

“Mmmmummmbblle, mmmmummmmbble,” groans Saddam.

“Whaddesay?”  Brown shouts as he dances on.  “I can’t understand him with that rope around his neck.”

“Say,” Brown stops his preening, “How’d he get in here anyway?”

“How’d any of us get here?  How’d I get here?  After all, I’m a Ford and not a Lincoln,” the former president answers.

“Mmmmummmbble, mmmummmbble,” groans Saddam more loudly.  Then he points his finger all around the room.

Brown rolls his eyes. 

“Is he speaking Iraqi?” the singer asks.

“Probably,” agrees the president.  “But I think I know what he’s saying.”

“And they said you couldn’t chew gum and walk at the same time.  You’re a bright guy, prez.  What’s he saying then?”

“I think he’s saying that we’re not there yet.  You know, in heaven.  We’re in a kind of waiting room.  Maybe we need to be interviewed before we finally get the official okey-dokey.”

“I gotta audition for the job?!  I’m James Brown, doggone it, the godfather of soul!” the singer says indignantly.

Saddam eyes are opened real wide and he shakes his head enthusiastically.

“Yeah,” says Brown, “it seems, Mr Prez, you heard him right.”

Suddenly there is the sound of a brilliant trumpet.

“Man, that cat is good, he could play in my band,” says the singer.

The massive doors open and a small man enters.  The three men fall silent as he approaches.

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“Mr Ford, will you follow me, please.”

Without a word the former president of the United States, the most powerful man on earth at one time, follows obediently.  Strangely, he feels a burst of joy in his heart as he follows.

He finds himself in a room full of light.  The light is warm and comforting.  It is all around him.  A man steps out of the light and speaks to him.

“Gerald Rudolph Ford?”

“Yes.”

“Tell me something.”

“Anything!” the president responds quickly.

“What was it like representing all those Christian Reformed people in East Grand Rapids for twenty years in Congress?”

The president is dumbfounded.  He has never imagined that the first question he would be asked in heaven would be on the Christian Reformed church.  What kind of pull do these people have anyway?

 “I’m just busting your chops, Jerry.  Come on, Bob Hope told me that you can take a joke.”

“Hah, hah, hah,” the president laughs weakly.

“You know why you’re here?” asks the man in the light.

“I’m dead,” the president answers.

There is a pause in the conversation as if the man of light was revising his opinions of the president, as if the man of light was thinking that maybe this wasn’t such a good idea after all.

“No, that’s not it,” he says finally.  “You’re not here because you’re dead.  Nor are you here because you were an all-American football player at the University of Michigan.  Hardly anyone from the maize and blue makes it here, to tell the truth.”

The president looks crestfallen.

“You’re not here because you were a congressman from East Grand Rapids or became the minority leader in the House or were appointed vice president by Richard Nixon or became president when Nixon resigned.

“You want to know the irony of your life, Jerry?”

“Chevy Chase made fun of me for being a klutz even though I was very athletic?” the president answers.

“Chevy who?  No, no, no, that’s small potatoes.  The irony of your life, Jerry, is that you were never in the right place at the right time, although it seems as if you were.

“You see, Jerry, my master arranged it all.  He ordered your whole life.  He extended his grace to you and you never disappointed him.  You always used his grace well, to benefit as many other people as you could.

“You’re a dinosaur, Jerry.  The last decent, honest, civil, elected official to serve in the United States Congress.  Since you, all senators and representatives have been smarter and smaller.  Bigger brains, tinier hearts.  Not a good omen for the country if you ask me.

Yep, you’re a dinosaur, all right.  Why, Gerald Rudolph Ford, you are the last center-of-the-road Republican in existence.  Everyone else in that party is way to the right of you now. 

“Anyway, I’m getting sidetracked.  You’re not here to hear me preach.

“You’re not here because you did a really difficult thing, something very few people would have had the courage to do.  You’re not here because once you sacrificed your political career to grant a pardon to Richard Nixon, although I got to tell you that pardoning scoundrels is really dear to my master’s heart. 

“So, too, is sacrifice, Gerald.  You gathered your political life in your hands and laid it one the altar when you pardoned Nixon.  You knew when you did it you probably wouldn’t get elected president, that you would go down in the record books with an asterisk behind your name as a man who was appointed but never elected president.  You did it for the good of the country.  Unlike your advisors, you saw that the country couldn’t be healed and grow together without that pardon.  It’s was a gutsy move, Gerald.

“But you’re not here for that.  Or for a thousand other good things that you did while you were alive.  You really did live your life, didn’t you, Jerry?”

“I tried.  Besides, mostly my life was a lot of fun.”

“That’s because you chose to retire in Rancho Mirage and not Grand Rapids, Jerry.  Smart move.  Smart move.”

“I love the people of Grand Rapids.”

“Jerry, trust me, you don’t need to politick anymore, you’re political career is over.

“But your life is not.  I’ve got really good news for you, Jerry.  You’re going to go on to meet the Lord and all his brothers and sisters.  Do you know why, Jerry?  Sure you do.  You’re here because at one time you let Jesus into your life.  You said that you believed in him as the Lord and Savior of your life.

“Your life in its own way was an expression of this commitment.

“You know what the Lord has said?  ‘Him who comes to me I will in no way cast out.’  Because of Jesus, you have a terrific future, Jerry.  Welcome, brother.  Heaven is yours.

“Oh, did I tell you, there is no golf in heaven?

“Just kidding, Jerry, just kidding.”

---

The man of light entered another room in which James Brown was waiting for him.

“James,” he began.

“You can call me Mr Brown.”

“I beg your pardon.”

“Mr Brown, you can call me Mr Brown.  I insisted on it when I was alive and I insist on it now.’

“You are a proud man!”

“Is that a fault?” the soul singer bristled.

Then he answered his own question, “I don’t think so.  I was born into poverty in Barnwell, South Carolina, in 1933; abandoned by my parents at the age of four to the care of relatives and friends, and grew up on the streets of Augusta, Georgia, in an area of “ill repute,” if you know what I mean.  I learned to wheel and deal.  Whatever I became, whatever I got, I earned.  I earned my respect.  So it’s ‘Mr Brown’ to you.”

“Your life is a mess,” the man of light shot back.

The verbal shot to the chops had an instant effect as the man of light knew it would.  The singer’s backbone stiffened.  He was ready to fight.  The kid who had been scratching and clawing since he was kindergarten age, who had served 3 ½ years in reform school when he was in 8^th grade for breaking into cars, got mean.  His eyes narrowed to slits and he hissed out his next words.

“Who do you think you’re talking to?” he stepped forward threateningly.

The man of light noticed that Brown was not a big man physically, which no doubt fueled his desire to seem menacing.  Brown wanted above all to be taken seriously.

“I do respect you, Mr Brown, understand that I do.”

Brown relaxed somewhat.

“But I am duty bound to speak the truth.  The truth is, your life is a mess.”

“Mess!”  the singer exploded, “my life is not a mess.  It’s a masterpiece!

“Don’t you see, I was nothing and I made myself something.  I did it with talent and hard work.  Man, the motto, ‘the hardest working man in show business,’ wasn’t jive.  I worked harder than anybody else to get what I got

“Man, I had 119 hit songs.  119!  I won a Grammy in 1965 for “Papa’s Got a Brand New Bag.”  It was the best R&B recording of the year.  I won another in 1987 for “Living in America.”  And they gave me a lifetime achievement award in 1992.

“When they opened the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, I was one of the first artists included along with Elvis Presley and Chuck Berry.

“I may not have invented soul.  Ray Charles and Sam Cooke did along with me.  But there wouldn’t be any rap or disco or funk without me.  Man, disco is James Brown, hip-hop is James Brown, rap is James Brown, you know what I’m saying?  You hear all them rappers, 90% of their music is me.

“Let me tell you something, Mr Light-Man, whoever you are.  I’ve known trouble.  In the 60’s in the southern United States there was a brutal system of racial segregation.  A black man had to fight for his civil rights, for his respect.

“What is it that Dick Gregory said at my funeral service, ‘We didn’t get this respect  out of the goodness of America’s heart.  We didn’t get it because they sent the Marines in.  We got this because with love for one another and willingness to die, we said, We’re gonna change it.’

“I was one of those who changed it.  In 1968 when I released the song ‘Say it Loud (I’m Black and I’m Proud),’ it became the anthem of the civil rights and Black Power movements.  Overnight, black folks stopped referring to themselves as ‘colored’ or ‘negroes’ and began to call themselves ‘blacks.’

“I changed the way a whole people thought about themselves.  So, yeah, if I seem proud to you, it’s proud in a good way.  My pride carried a whole people.  It bred a sense of self esteem in a whole race.”

“Mr Brown, Mr Brown, you’ve done some admirable things, I must say.  But here’s the thing.  There seems to be a discrepancy between your public life and your private life.  A real divide, a Grand Canyon of the soul-singer, so to speak. 

“Publicly, you’ve become a famous and able man, much celebrated, indeed much loved.  Privately, you’ve ricocheted from one bad experience to another.  You’ve abused drugs and alcohol.  You’ve gone through wives like costume changes.  You assaulted your third wife, Adrienne, and your attorney turned your fourth wife Tomi and your son out of your home, saying that legally she’s not married to you, her being a bigamist and all.  You led police on a high speed chase in and out of Georgia and South Carolina.  If I remember the arrest report, you were high on PCP and brandishing a shotgun at the time.  You did 15 months in a South Carolina prison for that one.”

“So what’s your point draggin’ up this old history.  It’s water over the dam.  South Carolina even pardoned me for my crimes and misdemeanors.’

“That’s my point exactly.  You need to believe that you’re pardoned from all your crimes and misdemeanors.

“Remember the family that took you in after reform school?  They made you part of their singing group, the Gospel Starlighters, didn’t they?  You heard the good news, Mr Brown.  In fact, every weekend, every time the Starlighters had a gig, you sang about it, the good news of how Jesus was not proud enough, Mr Brown, but humble enough to carry the sins of a whole people, so that they might be right with God.  Why didn’t you let that sink in more deeply?  Has it been so hard in your life to allow yourself to be really loved by another?  Why are you always scratching and clawing and fighting people off? 

“Here’s an easy question.  What’s the name of your band?  Okay, okay, I’ve insulted you with this question.  I apologize.  ‘The Soul Generals’ is the name, right?  Funny thing is none of you has proved to be the general of his or her own soul.  Why is it that you in particular, Mr Brown, didn’t govern your soul better and allowed Jesus to come in more freely and fully than you have.  Why didn’t you trust him more?

“You’re all justice and respect, Mr Brown.  I wish you had been more mercy and kindness.

“We’ll see, Mr Brown, we’ll see.  Heaven’s door is open even for people of little faith.  That’s the mercy and kindness of the real soul general.”

---

“Allahu achbar,” said the man in the three piece suit as he bowed low before the man of light.

The man of light said nothing.

“Allahu achbar,” the man repeated as he stretched himself out on the ground, his face to the marble floor.

Again, the man of light made no reply.

“Allahu achbar,” once more, with less conviction this time.

Silence.

The man on the ground said nothing.

The man of light said nothing.

Time passed.

“You’re not going to say anything to me!  You’re not going to speak to me!  I demand that you say something.  I’m the president of Iraq!”  Saddam had gotten off the ground and was shouting at the man of light.

It was pure Saddam:  defiant, self deluded, theatrical, full of bluff, empty of truth.  This man had gone through difficult, embarrassing times at the end of his life.  With many people hard times, trying times, which wring out the last ounce of psychic energy to stay sane and sober, are purgatorial.  They purge people of their pride and independence and make them pliable to self reflection, repentance, and grace.  But with others, like Saddam, the fire of conflict only make them more defiant, willing to shout curses on their enemies even as they walk to the gallows.  Saddam will burn in hell a thousand years and still be defiant.  He is sold into sin, mustache and all.

 Finally, quietly, inquisitively, the man of light asked, “Whatever became of Saddam Hussein?”

“I’m here,” the dictator shouted.  “You talk like crazy man, like Georgie Bush.”

“Let me take you back to your past, Saddam, please, and you tell me why you didn’t respond to the pressure of the good whenever it impinged upon you.  Tell me why you pushed it away, murdered it if you could.

“Ever since Adam and Eve’s fall into sin, human beings have been born broken, so to speak, fractured, with a lurid fascination for evil and a desire to do it.  You were born in Tikrit to the village fortune-teller, your mother, and a father who soon died.  Your step-father got the nickname in the village of “Hassan the Liar” and he beat you at the slightest provocation.  A sorcerer and a prevaricator, a witch and a liar – hardly fit parents for a impressionable child, why you could fairly claim to be the spawn of demons.

“But you weren’t.  You always have been a human being who chose to shut his heart against the good.  Remember your cousin with whom you lived for a time and how he impressed you with his integrity and dedication to Islam.  In fact, for a while you wanted to be just like your cousin, an honest man serving a cause bigger than himself.

“Your cousin was a light to you, Saddam, showing you a better way.  Agreed, he wasn’t a bright light, couldn’t even begin to compare to the true light that gives light to every man, yet in his own feeble way he was a pointer to the good.  For a while you acted like him, like your cousin, but you couldn’t sustain it.  In your heart you found integrity too difficult to manage, wanted no greater cause to serve than your own career.  By the light given you, you chose.  You chose for yourself.”

“Saddam is the builder of modern Iraq, a fighter for the cause of all Arabs against the Persians, Jews, and flies,” burst out the dictator.  “Saddam is….”

 “Out for number one,” the man of light continued.  “Always has been.  As a young man you joined the socialist Ba’ath party.  Here you ran into many positive influences, men and women of intellect and moral fiber, who called you to new ways to serve the people of Iraq.  Again, Saddam, these men and women were lights to you, showing you how to be a decent human being who might help his fellow men and women.  And again, Saddam, you turned your back on their ideals.  What you discovered in the Ba’ath party was not principle but the pathway to greater influence, in fact you found here the key to your later success:  you found the pathway to power.  Cunning, ruthlessness, dissimulation, these were the things you used to gather power, and once you had the means of power, you never relinquished them.  You used power to feed your ego, to keep yourself dominant.  You did to others before they could do to you.  You took pride in your first name:  “Saddam,” “one who confronts.”  You would confront and kill anyone who dared oppose you, even whispered opposition to you.

“This is the reason you assassinated the village of Dujail, why you gassed to death the town of Halabji, invaded Iran and Kuwait, and arbitrarily arrested and killed your own people.  In some way they confronted you, and you, Saddam, the Great Confronter, had to prove you were the stronger, more ruthless, Power.  You had to confront and eliminate them all.

“Why George H.W. Bush dared to confront you in the 1991 Gulf War, think of it, Saddam, who is this infidel to insult you, to confront you!  So you confronted him, you sent your assassins to kill him, again to prove you are the Great Confronter.  No one is as defiant and conflict-driven as you!  When President Clinton rained down Tomahawk missiles on Baghdad in 93 in retaliation for this attempted assassination, you kept your defiance although your people died by the thousands.  You kept you defiance until the end, until the moment the rope jerked your life away.  Your dying words were confrontation, curses, defiance, conflict.

“Now you know the truth finally.  The greatest power is this world is the power of the risen Lord Jesus Christ.  His pathway in life was not the pathway of confrontation and conflict but the pathway of obedience and service.  He didn’t take from others to fill his own lust for power, he surrendered his life as a ransom for sin that others may have life abundantly. 

“The strong man is the man of the cross.  Sacrifice, not the scimitar or the sword, is the pathway to an influential and satisfying life.  How many different times didn’t the Lord Jesus tug on your sleeve, suggesting a better way for you to act that would have really benefited your people, but you rejecting these times, sloughed off these tugs as signs of weakness, until finally they came no more.  You weren’t bothered by conscience any longer.  You hardened your heart to sympathy and fellow feeling.  You became Saddam, all push and shove, all tooth and claw, without hope in this world and the next.

“You’ve condemned yourself forever.”

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