wfn.org | Love & Forgiveness are Stronger Than Evil

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18-June-1998 
GA98093 
 
    Love & Forgiveness are Stronger Than Evil 
    Church Provides a Lifeline 
 
    by Allison Politinsky 
 
CHARLOTTE, N.C.--For Commissioner Joel Jones from the Presbytery of the 
Cascades in Oregon, coming to Charlotte for the 210th General Assembly was 
more than a mission to represent his church-- it was also a mission to 
continue to make peace with the violence that changed his family, his life, 
and his role in service to Jesus Christ. 
    Three years ago to the day of his arrival for GA, Joel's wife Patricia, 
only 36 years old, was shot in a car jacking in broad daylight in suburban 
Charlotte.  "I was stuck at the airport when I got through to the police 
and they told me she died in surgery," Jones said. 
    His voice still catches as he recounts the hours after he heard the 
news. "The whole flight to Charlotte I had time to pray, to come to terms 
with reality, and to figure out how I was going to handle it when I got 
there . . . I had to identify her body. As soon as I saw her, I fell on my 
knees and asked God to forgive her killers. You know . . . they just don't 
know what they did." 
    Shortly after the shooting, Patricia's killer died in a shoot-out with 
police.  Several other youths were arrested for being accessories. 
    The Jones' had two children when Patricia died. Daughter, Jennifer was 
12 at the time, and son, Jared, just 11 years old.  Patricia had been in 
Charlotte for a training session with her banking employer. Even though 
they plea-bargained, the court case dragged on for a year and a half, 
bringing Joel back and forth to Charlotte.  "Every time I come back here I 
think about it.  It's not easy." 
    What happened next gave him a lifeline from the church to hold onto. 
The advocate he was assigned for victim assistance happened to be a 
Presbyterian.  When she found out that Jones was too, she started a prayer 
chain and brought in her pastor, the Rev. John Earl from Avondale 
Presbyterian Church in Charlotte. 
    The bond that would last for years between a grieving family and a 
congregation of love and support began.  Jones says Avondale's outreach 
proved to him that Presbyterians really are a family.  "I got about 5,000 
letters from all over Charlotte," he said.  "God has a plan and maybe he 
intends to use me. I'm open to that. It was very clear to me that the 
church was present with me in Charlotte." 
    Harry Greyard was a youth leader at Avondale when the Charlotte news 
was dominated with the story of Patricia's death.  He recalls how the 
congregation tried to reach out to Joel.  "We saw the various news stories 
and knew Patricia was Presbyterian," Greyard explained.   "Her murder was 
particularly horrific. Our congregation simply felt that if connectionalism 
means anything, we needed to respond." 
    Greyard led a work group to Oregon where youth from Avondale Church 
spent several days doing mission jobs for Jones and other members of the 
Medford, Ore. community. "The first thing we noticed about Joel was his 
grace," Greyard said. "He started counseling at-risk teenagers after her 
death. I think most people would have a lot of bitterness. I've never seen 
that in him." 
    Greyard said the partnership with First Presbyterian Church in 
Jacksonville, Ore., where Jones attends, allowed them to connect with 
people who needed new fences, new roofs, and a new walkway for the church 
itself.  The youth and their supervisors spent hours repairing the hot, 
black, asphalt roof on the Jones' house.  The act of repairing the roof 
provided a symbolic healing to the family that had been torn apart by 
violence. 
    The experience was a formative one for the youth of Avondale as well. 
"Our congregation does believe that youth and children really can lead the 
church," Greyard said.  "The theme we tried to reinforce was that the best 
way to fight evil is to do good.  I hope the example they set for everyone 
will live on . . . and it will." 
    Jones plans to visit with Avondale congregation members before he 
leaves General Assembly, enjoying a social gathering Saturday night and 
worshiping with the church on Sunday morning.   His children are coming to 
join Joel in Charlotte after a mission trip to Mexico, and then they return 
to Oregon to rejoin his new wife, Kathi, whom he married recently, and his 
stepson, Matt.  Kathi and Joel met at baseball practice for their two sons 
and now have committed their family together to the life of the Church. 
Daughter Jennifer is active in youth ministry and meetings nationwide.  The 
boys regularly read the Bible and participate in youth group projects. 
    Patricia had been a committed leader and educator at First Church in 
Jacksonville, so Jones was committed to helping her work live on.  The 
outreach of Avondale Church in Charlotte also helped him to reach out to 
others.  He is now an assistant to the chaplain at a juvenile detention 
center in Oregon.  There, he counsels youth, about the same age as his 
wife's killers.  "I forgave the kids and gave them up to the Lord," he 
explained.  "I've just had faith and tried to see what God was going to do. 
I've done things I never would have.  God uses bad things for good." 
    In his counseling, he tries to help children from broken families and 
dangerous neighborhoods learn that someone cares about them. His goal is to 
help them turn their lives around.  "I can see how God has used the 
incident to change me.  Now as a commissioner in leadership, I care more 
about others views, I sense what they are feeling, and I try to apply it to 
the word and how to use it in life.  When [these troubled youth] see 
Christ, it changes their lives." 
    Jones asks his friends in the church nationwide to keep praying for the 
family and for God's guidance in his leadership in the church.  But if it 
is one lesson he has learned from the evil and grief of three years ago, it 
is that love and forgiveness are stronger . . . especially in Christ. 
    "Promoting and living forgiveness overshadows revenge," he concluded. 
"There is no greater joy than serving another." 

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