Learning the new developments of the Rae Carrutth story have taught me nothing more than this one conclusion; forgiveness is truly a gift for those who have studied and learned it thoroughly.

A couple of days ago, you may have seen an article or two come out about a 15-page letter that Mr. Carruth penned to Rae’s girlfriends mother, detailing how he is now a changed man and how he has now had time to contemplate his mistakes and now wants a chance to fight for custody of his 18-year old son, Chancellor Lee Adams, who has been raised his entire life by his grandmother, Saundra Adams. His mother, Cherica Adams was killed by gunshots wounds inflicted by men who were said to be hired by Carruth to shoot and kill Ms. Adams, who were sentenced to 40 years in prison. As a result of the shooting, Ms. Adams died, and Chancellor suffered brain damage and has cerebral palsy. He has suffered several challenges from birth into his teenage and young adult life.

Rae is due to be release in October 2018, after serving 17 years in prison for his crimes. Mr. Carruth still strongly desires a relationship with his son, and even wants the chance at having custody of him, his argument being that Ms. Adams being older in age and not being around long enough to take care of him. Ms. Adams counters that argument, being confident that there is no way that he will ever have custody of Chancellor, being that he is the very person that wanted him murdered in the first place; and there are several viable family members in place that are willing to take Chancellor should anything ever happen to her.

What struck me to be quite surprising, is that Ms. Saundra even considered the idea of allowing Rae to even allow visitation to happen with Rae and Chancellor after he was released. I read an article that stated that upon his release, she was open to allowing the two to have supervised visitation. She stated that, “I’ve forgiven Rae already, but to have any type of relationship with him, there does have to be some repentance,” Adams said. “And I think this opens the door”

Girl, that’s strength; a strength I wouldn’t know I would have.

I personally have to applaud Ms. Adams in this moment, because I don’t know how many of us would have the qualities to dig deep enough to find it in our hearts to believe that a man has repented their sins, and trusted their own faith to forgive a man who murdered our child, disabled our grandchild and allowed them the opportunity to have a relationship with their living parent. I cannot say right now on this day in 2018 that I have developed that level of forgiveness yet.

I have to say that I believe that Rae most believe that Rae doesn’t deserve the privileges that he’s being given from Ms. Adams. I believe that in my spirit. He’s responsible for her murder and responsible for the dams he done to their child and its even a surprise that he’s being released from jail to see the light of day. In the letter he wrote, even Ms. Adams stated that she can tell that there are parts of him that she can read that are still the same him that she knew so long ago, but still parts of him that she can tell have matured and grown; parts of him she can see may have actually been changed throughout these years of being in prison. He states that’s he’s found God, he’s realized that he needs to take ownership for what he’s done and that he also needs to take responsibility in raising his son; however, one would beg to argue, do you deserve that right after the damage you’ve done to him?

How many of us face situations where we are not mentally, emotionally or spiritually prepared for? I believe this happens on more occasions than we’d like to admit; and we are caught in circumstances where we tend to forgive or make amends with people or compromise in situations where in our spirits we are not particularly ready to. I feel in reading these articles, although Ms. Adams may not have agreed with what Rae did to her daughter, she was ready to forgive him for what he had done, if he had truly done the work within himself to know that what he had done was wrong and he had repented his sins. That is a woman who truly believes in her Word.

Based on further things I’ve read, there is a lot of back and forth about him wanting custody and things of that nature, and I agree wholeheartedly that he should NOT receive custody of his child for many reasons; so I pray that whatever is done is done respectfully and in the best interest of this young man’s safety and well-being because at the end of the day, the focus needs to be on what will be for him and not end up being a fight and mud-slinging contest in the media between his grandparents and his father.