I’m Glad I Didn’t Kill You – Forgiveness and Restoration

If you were to see Steve Watt and Mark Farnham together, you’d observe the interaction of Christian brothers who are the best of friends. But their friendship didn’t begin that way.

The first time Steve Watt and Mark Farnham met was twenty years ago on a lonely highway. Steve, a Wyoming highway patrolman, stopped Mark who had just robbed a bank. Mark, wanting to get away, slammed on the breaks, jumped out of his car with a pistol, and started firing. Five out of the six shots hit Steve, and one of Steve’s hit Mark.

Mark was given a life sentence, and Steve went back to the patrol, but he had changed. He nearly shot one motorist as he pulled out his billfold: Steve saw a revolver. He needed to leave the highway patrol, and he grew angrier and angrier.

Finally Steve’s wife, Miriam, a policewoman, gave him some hard counsel: forgive. Since the shooting Steve had become a Christian, and he knew Miriam was right. He needed to confront Mark and forgive him. Unless he did, he’d never stop being a victim.

In 1986 at an prison evangelistic meeting, that confrontation occurred. Steve walked across the stage and hugged Mark, who had also come to faith in Christ. “I’m glad I didn’t kill you,” he said, and a deep friendship began.

Next week is Restorative Justice Week. Justice Fellowship, Prison Fellowship’s criminal justice arm, was founded, in part, to help make the kind of reconciliation Steve and Mark found a reality for many more prisoners and victims.

Restorative justice, like retributive justice, holds offenders accountable for their actions under the rule of law. The difference is that restorative justice looks at crime in the context of community, offers offenders the possibility of transformation, and seeks healing for victims, relationships, and the community. You see, crime isn’t only about breaking society’s laws; it’s about breaking relationships and disrupting lives. And justice that deals with the law, but not the interpersonal damage, is incomplete.

Prison Fellowship pioneered restorative justice through our Sycamore Tree Project. The name is taken from the type of tree Zacchaeus, a tax collector, climbed to peek at Jesus. Jesus saw him there and had lunch with him. As a result of that encounter, Zacchaeus repented of his dishonest tax collecting, but he agreed to do more. He agreed to pay back his victims. Jesus then commented on the reconciling power of restorative, that is, biblical justice.

Throughout the world, Prison Fellowship and other groups are using the Sycamore Tree Project to bring about the relational healing between offenders and victims that Steve and Mark now know.

Steve recalls how he, the victim, felt after he was reconciled with Mark: “It was just like God just picked up a semi-truck right off me, and I actually started living.”

To find out more about justice that does more than just punish, but restores, call us here at BreakPoint (1-877-322-5527). We’ll send you information for you and for your church.

The criminal justice in this country is broken. Prisoners leave prison more inclined to crime than when they entered. Restorative justice meets this urgent need by applying a Christian worldview to criminal justice and makes a world of difference. It makes that difference for thousands of people like Steve and Mark.

FOR FURTHER READING:

• “Forgiving and Living,” Billings Gazette, 18 August 2002.

• Learn more about the Sycamore Tree Project.

• BreakPoint Commentary No. 031112, “Idle Hands and Helmets.”

• Donna Harman, “Crime and Forgiveness,” The Christian Science Monitor, 29 October 2003.

• “Restorative Justice Makes Dollars and Sense,” Justice Fellowship, 11 November 2003.

• Visit Justice Fellowship’s Restorative Justice Week webpage for materials on restorative justice that churches can use during Restorative Justice Week, November 17-21.

• Justice Fellowship offers a free weekly e-newsletter on justice issues — subscribe today and let others know about it.

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