THAT VISIT TO DEATH ROW

THAT VISIT TO DEATH ROW

Every time he got the chance, Dr. Mike Adams used his break between semesters to take a trip through Mississippi where he was born, and then back to Texas where he grew up. Visiting friends and family and seeing his old childhood homes gave him a chance to think about where he was going by reflecting on where he’d been. That year’s road trip happened to end on December 30th, which was the 20th anniversary of an important milestone in a larger personal journey. It was the day he interviewed John Paul Penry on Texas’ death row just a few miles from his parents’ house thirteen days before his scheduled execution.

John Paul Penry was a rapist and killer. His first conviction put him in prison, but he was paroled after only two years. While on parole, he committed the same crime, which concluded with the murder of the young victim, beating her so that he burst both her kidneys. He killed her by shoving a pair of scissors into her heart. He was later convicted and sentenced to die.

After Penry’s case went through the justice system for twenty years, his execution was reset for the third and what appeared to be the final time. When Adams expressed interest in interviewing Penry prior to his execution, it wasn’t hard to make the arrangements.

His goal was simple when he arrived on death row on that second to last morning of the 20th century. He wanted to gather information so he could do a better job of teaching the case to his students. He had been teaching the Penry v. Lynaugh ruling for several years because it addressed constitutional and philosophical questions. He had no idea that the interview would affect him so personally.

After he gathered the information he was seeking, he stood up and placed his hand on the glass in order to do the death row handshake with Penry – as he placed his hand on the other side of the glass. Then something odd happened. Shortly after telling Adams he was scared of being executed, he recited John 3:16.

Adams asked Penry if he had read the Bible. He said that after learning how to read and write on death row, he had read the entire Bible over the course of his years as a condemned man.

It was difficult for Dr. Adams to feel at ease knowing that a convicted murderer and rapist had read the Bible while he had not. Adams was already a tenured professor. How could he call myself educated having not read the most important book in print?

He decided that he was going to go home, buy a Bible, and read it from cover to cover in the coming year, taking 6 months off to read six apologetic books as he worked his way through the KJV. When he finished, he was convinced of its truth, converted, and became the only Christian in a department full of tenured Marxists. He had gone there on a mission to help save John Penry from death but ended up being the one who had his death sentence commuted.

He concluded that if John Paul Penry can be used by God, then so can we. He advises other believers: "Don’t wallow in self-pity. Get over yourself, and get to work. Know that you are still valuable, and you are still needed in doing the work of reaching lost souls."