Man Wrongfully Imprisoned 31 Years Can Finally Travel to Share the Gospel: 'God Can Turn Bad Into Good' (VIDEO)
In July 1978, Lawrence McKinney, 22, was sentenced to 110 years in prison in Shelby Country Criminal Court in Tennessee. He and another man were convicted of raping a woman in Memphis. However, McKinney was an innocent man.
The man imprisoned with McKinney contacted The Innocence Project, an organization dedicated to exonerating wrongly convicted people, to finally find justice for him. DNA evidence proved he had nothing to do with the crime, and McKinney was released in July 2009 after serving 31 years.
If anyone could be allowed to harbor anger and bitterness over an injustice, it's Lawrence McKinney. Thirty-one years of the prime of his life were unfairly taken from him, but he doesn't carry any negative feelings because of the transformation he found in Jesus Christ.
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"If you find Jesus, he can do the things you need him to do," McKinney told the Lebanon Democrat. "When I found Jesus, I put all my problems in his hands."
McKinney works three jobs and attends seven Bible studies a week between two churches. But despite his release in 2009, he couldn't truly experience freedom because the wrongful conviction was still on his record. It kept him from finding a stable job, and forbade him from voting and traveling for a mission trip.
On Monday, with pressure from WSMV, the Memphis district attorney finally expunged McKinney's record.
"It was done in 15 seconds. Thirty-five years of wrongfully labeling this man was undone in 15 seconds," Rev. John Hunn of Immanuel Baptist Church, McKinney's home church, told WSMV. "There really is a sermon there. It was very emotional. It's like a family member's been freed."
Rev. Hunn got him a job at Lifeway. And now McKinney can get a passport and start traveling the world to share the Gospel. As for where, he's open to wherever God leads.
"It don't make no difference, just as long as I can spread the message about Jesus Christ."
Watch and SHARE the inspiring story of a man who has chosen Christ above all else.
WSMV Channel 4
