"The most famous mutiny in history was the rebellion aboard the HMS Bounty in April 1789. That incident inspired five motion pictures and numerous books. Three weeks after the Bounty left Tahiti with a cargo of breadfruit trees (a cheap food source for Caribbean slaves), the crew mutinied. First Mate Fletcher Christian, the leader of the mutineers, forced Captain William Bligh and eighteen loyal sailors into a small open boat and set them adrift.
"The mutineers took the Bounty back to Tahiti. Sixteen crewmen chose to stay there. But Fletcher Christian and eight other men took some Tahitian islanders with them and set out for a safe hiding place. They chose a lonely, uninhabited island called Pitcairn.
"One of the sailors made whiskey from the native plants, and the resulting drunken orgies quickly turned to violent brawls. Though the island looked like a paradise, the mutineers began to view it as a prison. One by one, the mutinous crewmen were either killed in fights or murdered in their sleep. Even Fletcher Christian died violently.
"Finally, only one of the mutineers was left alive, a sailor named Alexander Smith. As the last man living, he felt responsible to look after the women and fatherless children who remained. Smith regretted the sinfulness of his past, and he knew he lacked wisdom to care for the women and children. He needed guidance from beyond himself.
"Looking through a sea-chest, Smith found a Bible. Over the next few weeks, he read it from cover to cover. Then he asked God to take control of his life. He also taught the women and children to read the Bible. Fathered by various mutineers, those children grew up, married, and had children of their own.
"In 1808, the American whaling ship Topaz stopped at Pitcairn. The Americans were the first visitors to the island since the mutiny on the Bounty, eighteen years earlier. The sailors from the Topaz were astounded to find an orderly Christian society in which there was no crime, no disease, no alcoholism, and no illiteracy.
"Pitcairn had been hell on earth under the reign of Fletcher Christian and his fellow mutineers. The people had suffered under something called "the wrath of God" - the inevitable result of human hearts filled with murder, envy, lust, rebellion, and drunkenness.
"But when the last man on Pitcairn turned his heart over to God, the wrath of God was replaced by the love of God, and Pitcairn became a paradise on earth. The transformation of that tiny island is just a glimpse of what could happen in our own society. If we would choose to receive the love and mercy of God, we would escape the wrath of God now being revealed against the godlessness and wickedness of our age."
'Reason to Rejoice: Love, Grace, and Forgiveness in Paul's Letter to the Romans'
by Ray C. Stedman
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