Freedom Through Forgiveness
Carjacking victim finds the path toward healing

The Rev. Ronald K. Austin was in a hurry on the morning of January 14, 1998. He had just left the real estate office where he worked part time and was off to tend to his 84-year-old aunt when two young women approached his car and asked for a lift. The weather in Washington, D.C., was cold; temperatures near freezing. He hesitated — his aunt was waiting — but finally decided to help them out. They were only going to a bank six blocks away.

But they wanted more than a ride. They wanted his car. The woman seated beside him pulled a knife. "I'm sorry to have to do this," she said, and stabbed him — mainly wounding his wrist and arm as Rev. Austin attempted to defend himself. Then the second woman — seated in back — caught him in a chokehold. Suddenly they shoved him out the door and sped away, dragging Austin, tangled in his seatbelt, for five blocks at highway speeds before stopping long enough to cut him free and speed off again.

There on the pavement lay Rev. Austin, pastor of the Spirit of Peace Baptist Church, bleeding from stab wounds and road burns. His left foot, caught in the wheel of the car as it raced through the streets, was mangled beyond repair.

His attackers were arrested within the week. One pleaded guilty to armed robbery, and the other pleaded guilty to carjacking. Both were sent to prison.

Rev. Austin began the slow process of adjusting to life with a disability. Doctors had to amputate his left foot and part of his leg. The disability severely hampered his work at a real estate office. Showing properties, especially those with steps, suddenly turned burdensome. Previously an avid athlete — he'd gone jogging just the day before — he struggled to regain his independence.

Yet he knew from the beginning what God called him to do as a Christian. He had to forgive the women who broke his body and altered his life.

"I tell everyone to pray for them," he told the Washington Post shortly after the crime. "I have prayed for forgiveness for them. If I'm going to be true to my faith and my God, I need to forgive them, just as God forgave me."

Starting the Process
Getting to the point of forgiveness was no easy trip, however. Not for Rev. Austin, and not for the congregation of the Spirit of Peace Baptist Church.

"He was very candid about the fact that he was struggling emotionally with what happened to him," says Neighbors Who Care's Don Lewis, who visited Rev. Austin after the attorney general's office called NWC's Washington, D.C. chapter for assistance. "He thought he would lose his life. But at the same time he was so clear … that he knew God had been with him all along. [His attitude] wasn't something I was looking for — I have room in my understanding for a Christian who was assaulted like that to be ravenously angry," Lewis says," I have no problems with that. But he was not that kind of a person. He was soft-spoken, very composed. And he talked about the fact that he was forgiving them. That was important to him — he wasn't trying to impress me with his spirituality."

Lewis prayed with him and offered him NWC's assistance. "I had been blessed by being in the presence of such a person," Lewis says.

Both of Austin's attackers wrote to ask him to forgive them. High on drugs and alcohol that morning, they claimed their addictions had turned them into monsters. They insisted they never intended to hurt him. He has not yet responded to them directly, but he plans to — to tell them he has forgiven them.

But the congregation at Spirit of Peace Baptist Church — as well as a number of other people in the community — let the judge in the case know that these women had victimized an innocent man, and deserved to be held accountable for it. Nearly 700 either wrote personally to the judge or signed petitions seeking prison terms for the women who attacked Rev. Austin. One is now serving a sentence of 25 years to life; the other is serving 8 to 24 years.

"The church was very shaken by this," Lewis said. But the denomination raised funds to cover Rev. Austin's medical expenses and "rallied around him."

Providing a Helping Hand
Rev. Austin noted that his church, NWC, and the community at large encouraged him as he struggled with the aftermath of the crime. But his was an unusual case — a heinous crime that got a lot of press. A lot of crime victims are left to suffer alone, he says. "There are so many other victims of crimes who go unnoticed, and there's no one who will call and say, 'We know what you're going through' or 'Can we help you in some way?' It just doesn't happen for so many people."

That's where the Church can step in and assist the victim in his path to forgiveness and recovery.

"There are lot of things the church can do to help," Austin says. "The church sometimes can provide someone to talk to — many times people just need to release — just to tell what's going on in their lives and what has happened as a result of their victimization. The church can provide food, clothing, transportation, many things like that."

Lewis continued meeting with Rev. Austin, who soon became an advocate for NWC. He traveled with Lewis last spring to Lancaster and Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, to speak at a NWC event. "He has a strong message on the importance of forgiveness," Lewis says, "that until you forgive, you're not free yourself. You're still the victim."

"Forgiveness, first of all, is not something that is very easy for people to do, "Austin insists. "It's something, though, I feel is totally necessary. If a person is going to be completely healed — not just from the physical victimization, but spiritually we have to be healed also — it takes letting go. Because as long as you hold on to a grudge or ill feeling about the victimizer, you're still in bondage to them."

Forgiveness is "something that God wants us to do, and I don't want you to think that everybody's ready to do it. Everybody's not ready to do it that is victimized. Some people may never do it. But it's something that needs to be done. We are all responsible for what we do and must suffer the consequences for what we do. But there is a point at which the victim must say, 'I do not hold this against you and I will, in my own personal life, not hold any grudge or ill feeling toward you,' knowing that as I forgive, God is able to strengthen me and to use that as a sense of bridging gaps."

Used by permission. From January 2000, Neighbor to Neighbor newsletter from Neighbors Who Care, PO Box 16079, Washington, D.C. 20041. NWC is a national nonprofit organization that mobilizes and equips local churches to serve victims of crime in Christ's name. NWC is an affiliate of Prison Fellowship Ministries.

For more on this theme, go to www.thirdway.com/Rad/For/