THE MYSTERIOUS BIBLE ON DEATH ROW
As told by Chaplain Ray
Jack Orr, a veteran crime reporter and news photographer in Columbia , South Carolina
This Bible was kept on death row for condemned men to read, and many men under a sentence of death had read this Bible, searching for some ray of hope for the future life, even though none might break through into their present dark condition. In reading this Bible many condemned men had found Jesus Christ, or more accurately been found of Him, for the Son of Man came to seek and to save that which was lost.
As the day of their execution approached, each man would write in this Bible his name, his death date, and his favorite Scripture, or a word of testimony to his faith in Jesus Christ. Jack Orr told me that though men were allowed to take nothing with them from their cells on death row down to the death house where they spent the last week before their execution—after each execution this Bible would be found under the mattress that lay on the floor of the death cell, or on the mattress. So famous did this Bible become that a national magazine published by a Bible Society carried a feature story on this Bible and the stories of some of the men who had read it before they died.
Now it was Frank Logue’s turn. The Bible was given to him in his cell up on death row where he would spend some months while his legal appeals were being carried through the courts of South Carolina
Then as he read the fifteenth chapter of St. John
Frank saw that his responsibilities were threefold:
1) He must abide in Jesus.
2) He must fill his heart with the Words of Jesus.
3) He must ask God for the desire of his heart.
God’s responsibility was clear.
Frank was so determined that he would master this verse of promise and power that he secured from the guard a piece of chalk, and in bold letters he wrote that verse of Scripture on the back wall of his prison cell. Then he told the prison guard that he was not going to die, that Jesus Christ was going to deliver him from the electric chair. He told this to his lawyer, and to Chaplain Kelly. Also, Frank took hold of this promise, not like a good luck charm, but as his total way of life. He read the Bible diligently to discover what it meant to “Abide in Jesus”. This had to be a reality, a living experience. He had to learn how to abide in Jesus
In the book of Isaiah 26:3 he read, “Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace who mind is stayed on thee: because he trusteth in thee. That was a start, but it was not enough. then in Ephesians he read the emphasis that the Apostle Paul gave to our relationship to Jesus, “We are in Christ, “In Him”—and he knew that this was not only positional, but also experiential. He found it so. He found that as he filled his mind and heart with the Word of God, other things of less importance gave way, and soon his whole life, his thought, his emotions, his attitudes, his everything were under the control of God. it really was possible for a Believer to “Abide in Jesus.” In Him we live, and move, and have our being. Now Frank was aware of Jesus as a person. The Holy Spirit that had filled his life in his jail cell in Edgefield County
Frank discovered that being filled with the Holy Spirit and being conscious of Jesus as an ever present person does not reduce our need to study the Word of God. Just the opposite. The Spirit within directed him continually to the Word of God. Frank memorized Scriptures by the hundreds. He became so fille with God’s Word that even to this day he is a living legend in the mountains of South Carolina Columbia , South Carolina to a small home in the mountains of South Carolina
SEVEN HOURS TO LIVE
Just a few weeks before he was scheduled to die in the electric chair, Friday, February 25, 1944—Frank’s lawyer came to see him, and said, “Frank, it is no use. The State Supreme Court has turned down our plea, and the Governor, Olin D. Johnston will not even talk to me on the telephone, much less give me an appointment to see him in prison to plead for clemency. Frank, it is no use fighting any longer. Face the facts. you are going to die, and it is better for you to set your house in order. Get ready to die, and stop tormenting yourself with this delusion that you are going to escape the electric chair.”
But Frank simply pointed to the Scripture, John 15, written on the back wall of his cell, and said, “God cannot lie. he will deliver me.” A few days later Frank was moved from death row in the maximum security cellblock down to the death house where he would spend his last week of life before being electrocuted at seven a.m. on Friday morning. February 25, 1944. There are six small cells in that little death house. These are in groups of three, back to back with a solid wall between the rows, and between each cell. There are bars only across the front of each cell. Then there is a narrow walkway, and a heavy grilled door that opens into the corridor that is next to each outside wall. In the wall there are several small windows, one opposite each cell, and these are barred.
In each cell there is a metal plumbing facility, and on the floor a small mattress that lies on the cement floor—no bedsprings. The condemned man is placed in this cell. His shoes and any other items such as neck ties are taken from him. he wears only his socks, underwear, pants, and shorts. The state does not want any suicides to frustrate the wheels of justice.
Frank was allowed to carry his Bible with him from death row down to the Death House. When the prison chaplain stopped in to see him, Frank said, “I am guilty, and according to justice I must die, but I am begging God for mercy, not for justice.” The days of that last week passed very quickly, and though there was some activity in the Board of Pardons, nothing was expected that would change the death sentence.
On Wednesday night a member of the board of pardons went down to the prison and spent two hours with Frank in his cell, asking him if there was anything that Frank had not told them before but that he might now recall which could give the board and the governor a logical basis for commuting his sentence. Frank told him that he had told the whole truth, and that he would not fabricate any lies, not even to save his own life. As he life Frank’s death cell, the man said, “I am sorry, but I cannot give you any hope. So far as I know you will die on Friday.” This was a very dark hour for Frank Logue because without a recommendation from the board a governor very selfdom acts to set aside a death sentence.
Frank laid down on his little mattress to sleep. It was midnight. He slept only for two hours, and then he woke up with the realization that it was two a.m. on Thursday morning. he had just 29 hours left to live before his appointment with death at seven o’clock on Friday morning. he noticed that there was a small square of light on the floor of his death cell where the light from the moon shone in from the window in the outer wall. Frank took his Bible, laid it open in that patch of light. Then he placed his knees on the Bible, each knee on one page, and he looked up to heaven, and prayed. “ Lord, I have believed your word. I have filled my heart with your words, and I have lived in you day and night from the time that I discovered your promise in John 15:7. Now Lord, he I am on my knees, begging you to save my life even as you have saved my soul. I will not stop praying until you hear my prayer and save me from the electric chair.”
When the sun came up in the morning, the death house guard found Frank on his knees, on the Bible in prayer, calling on God to deliver him from death. Frank prayed on through the morning, and into the afternoon, but still there was no word from the Governor’s office. he was offered anything that he wanted to eat for his last meal on Thursday evening, but he answered, “I am not going to eat my last meal, because God is going to deliver me.”
Between seven and eight o’clock Chaplain Kelly went to the death house to see Frank. The prisoner stood up, put his Bible under his arm. When the chaplain asked him how he was, he answered, “I feel as good as could be expected, but it seems that man has turned me down. But even now, God is able.”
As the chaplain left to return to the front office, Frank called to the guard, “Tell me, have you heard anything?” The guard said, ‘not a word, but when I hear, I’ll let you know.’ Frank resumed his prayer vigil, quoting back to God the Words that he had learned in God’s Holy Word, and reminding God that as the “One who cannot lie, He (God) would have to do something real soon, or else he would have failed to keep His Word.”
Thursday afternoon there was a meeting of the Board of Pardons, meeting with Governor Johnston at the governor’s mansion, but there had been no word of any change of mind. Then as the hour of midnight drew near, Frank counted the hours, and knew that he only had seven hours to live. Seven, God’s perfect number. Would that be the time that God would choose to break His silence and intervene to save his life? As Frank prayed and mused on these things he heard a commotion outside the outer door of the death house. he heard a man’s voice say with authority, “Open the door warden.” And the warden replied, “Yes, Governor.”
Then the governor stepped into the death house. He stood in front of Frank’s cell and asked, “Frank, do you have anything new to tell us?” Frank answered, “Governor, if I have to tell something new to save my life, I will have to die, because I have told the whole truth.”
Then Governor Olin D. Johnston said, “Frank, I’ll not keep you in suspense any longer. I have commuted your sentence.” Frank fell to his knees, and cried, “Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, I thank you for saving my life.” Then the governor said, “Let Frank out of that cell, and let him walk around outside on the grass. As Frank stepped out of his death cell, he said, “Governor Johnston, in a minute I will be back to thank you for saving my life, but first I must thank the one who really did this miracle.” Joe Frank Logue stepped out into the moonlight, walked off the footpath onto the grass, lifted his hands toward heaven, and with tears streaming down his face he cried, “Thank you Jesus. Than you for saving my life. I knew you could not lie. I knew you would answer my prayers.”
Then Frank turned to the Governor and thanked him and the Board of Pardons for commuting his sentence to life in prison. The governor said to Frank, “Preacher, you give your story to the newspapers. Tell them that some supernatural power entered into this case.” The secretary of the Board of Pardons said, “I left here Wednesday night at midnight convinced that Frank Logue was guilty, and determined that he must die. I went home and went to bed, but I could not sleep.” (that was when Frank started his twenty two hour vigil of prayer, on his knees, on his Bible.) The secretary continued, “My mind was never changed, but my heart was changed.”
The same God of heaven who would not let the King in his palace sleep while Daniel was in prayer in the den of lions, did not allow Governor Olin D. Johnston sleep in the governor’s mansion, nor the members of the Board of Pardons have their rest until they had acted to save the life of Joe Frank Logue.
Wow! interesting!
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