Burning Ring of Fire

Most of you know that I am huge, sincere Johnny Cash fan. I don't know where my initial interest began, I've always liked his music since I was a child but my interest/love is much deeper than the music, it is in the man. I wrote two term papers on Johnny Cash in high school and began reading more books by him and about him and became intrigued. Most people know that Johnny Cash was the "Man in Black", that he struggled with drug addiction and that he loved June Carter. Most people also believe that he spent time in prison. That's not true. My love for this man grew as I learned more about the soul of the man. He loved all types of people, he was complex yet simple and he had a deep passion for God's word. I could write for hours about the studies he did in theology, the lives he touched and so on but I will just share this. Johnny Cash's last albums were produced by Rick Rubin (wikipedia him, it's worth it) an unlikely pair, as were a lot of Johnny's friendships; Bob Dylan, U2. Bono, the lead singer for U2 once said of John "he makes you want to know more about Christ without ever mentioning His name". WOW, isn't THAT in fact how it should be. Words are empty, actions are priceless!




John Schneider was a great friend of Johnny Cash as well and he appeared on Huckabee this weekend. BTW he is worth googling as well, what an amazing man he is. This is what he had to say about John:





The only time God made sense to me was seeing how a firm belief in God kept Johnny Cash together. It was the first time I saw Christianity not as a mamby-pamby religion. God became real to me with his religion. See, Johnny and his family loved The Dukes of Hazzard. When we did a movie for CBS, I got to know Johnny and June. Johnny asked, "Where you going to stay while you're in Nashville?" He said, "It's fine with me if you want to stay with us." I told him while he watched The Dukes of Hazzard, I watched his show in the late 60s. When it was happening it made sense, but when I look back it does feel pretty strange. Larry Gatlin lived there, Kris Kristofferson lived there. So Johnny was a collector of mutts at this point. I remember when I first walked in the door he was wearing a uncharacteristically white shirt. He said, "Welcome. If you treat the house like it's not yours, you're not welcome." Take that and his drug history and the wreck he pulled out of through grace of God and June Carter Cash

. A man with as many scars as he had. If a man like him can say there is a God, then there is a God. I never believed it from a pastor or a TV show, but I believed it from Johnny Cash