Hoarding and the Inmate

"There's so much to clean out of this house. Truckloads!" Shelby moaned. "I'm not exaggerating. How can we move? How will we ever get past the piles of...stuff?"

Hoarders. We see them on the television and our eyes widen. How do they live like that? How can they not see their clutter is holding them back from a well lived life?

I have a neighbor who cleans out her garage about once a month. She says she is determined to live a better life. She pulls everything out of her garage, rearranges it, then returns nearly all of it to the garage. If something doesn't fit her new arrangement, she piles it by her front door or has a garage sale. Most of it slowly returns to the garage until the next time.

In prison you don't have a lot of stuff. There may be a few possessions you have collected during your stay, but, your job income of 75 cents an hour in the prison only allows for  necessities.

Hoarding is still a problem. Even in the prison. Not the hoarding of physical stuff, but the hoarding of sins.

Inmates do not have the luxury of ignoring their sins. They are offenders and their sins must be punished. A prisoner who longs for a better life must not only do the time, but redeem the time. Change that results from sorting through the clutter of sin is their only hope.

Many of us are in prisons of our own making. We make an effort to get rid of sins, to clean out the garage of the heart. But sin clutter mostly gets moved around, hidden behind walls or disguised with pretty words.  If we can laugh about the sin, we lessen its importance. In the end, like my neighbor in her garage ,most sins receive a little more time to continue cluttering our lives.

It's easier to consider sin by the truckload. "I'm just out of shape" is somehow acceptable clutter so that we don't have to exercise or take good care of the body, God's dwelling place. Hiding anger, pride or laziness behind words like "I'm just tired" or "All moms yell sometimes" somehow makes it easier to walk past the sins rather than removing them.

Some hoarders recognize the problem, but, like my neighbor, merely rearrange their possessions. The possessions look valuable, helpful. It makes them feel prepared for a future day.

Pride can seem valuable. Greed can seem helpful. Selfishness can make us feel prepared for a future day. The rich young ruler walked away sad because he had many possessions. His "stuff" kept him from living by faith not sight. He had much but did not live well because his choices kept him from giving God first place in his heart.

Less of me and my stuff opens up room for more of Him.

"Just tell me what to do and where to start," a young prisoner said to me. She has seven children and one on the way. She's a new Christian and ready to rid herself of piles of sin clutter. We start the same way I unload my own truckload of junk. One sin at a time.

Deep Fried Prison Ministry

They came every year to our church camp. A green pick up truck pulled up to the mess hall, giant black iron kettles were unloaded and men donned white aprons. Every Thursday of camp, year after year, they deep fried chicken under the hot summer skies all morning. That fried chicken was a highlight in the summer of every kid and volunteer at camp. Their presence changed our world, but I don't even know their names.

Lucille Chamberlain is remembered for her years of work in a school kitchen, but I remember her for being our cook at church camp. She could have had her summers free, but instead she worked hard in the hot summer camp kitchen. The scent of freshly baked melt-in-your-mouth cinnamon rolls filled the air welcoming us to a new day of learning about God's love.

Every Sunday, nestled in the back corner of our church, you will find Mary and Shirley and Cynthia and Peggy. They are our cookie ladies.  Every year at Vacation Bible School they show up to pass out little cups of Kool-aid and oatmeal chocolate chip cookies. For decades, they have greeted little children and for some of those children, they have been not only a highlight of VBS, but the only grandmotherly women some of the children know.

The contributions these Christians, and people just like them, have given to children change the world every day. Love seeds and deed seeds scattered on rocky soil sometimes take root and begin to grow long after they have been forgotten.

What you do for Jesus matters. It matters very much. Just ask any group of prisoners in our weekly services at the prison chapel. Most of them visited a church camp, a Vacation Bible School or a Sunday School at least once. Someone gave them an oatmeal cookie, a piece of fried chicken or a cinnamon roll along with a hug or a kind word.

In the prison, Lila looked at me and smiled, remembering a kind lady who once taught her in Sunday School. "I was so naughty and she was so patient with me. I wish I could thank her. It's so horrible being pushed to the ground and hand cuffed. I felt like my life was over when I came to prison. Then I remembered that lady teaching me the song, "This little light of mine", and I kept thinking about it. And I came to chapel because I wondered if maybe I still have some light in me somewhere. Maybe she could see it. Do you think so?"

I assured her the teacher did see a spark of light in her as a child. Every Monday at the prison I continue to fan into flames the hope a Sunday School teacher planted in Lila's heart. Lila will spend many years in prison, but her chains are gone. She's been set free.

Every time you love a child you participate in prison ministry. The child you love today will need hope on a dark, ugly day when they're pushed to the ground by sin and shackled by a heavy burden. Tuck a spark of hope in the pocket of their jacket to light their way.

Saddle Up

"Please pray for me," Andie said softly. "I'm not okay. I'm so scared. I hurt so bad."

Recently released from suicide watch for the second time, desperate for someone to walk alongside her, this sweet wounded soldier came to me for counsel in the state prison.

Medical attention in the prison can be slow moving, overcrowded. Enduring pain in the wait can become excruciating, terrifying. Death seems preferable when fear overwhelms a broken heart and a body wracked with suffering.

Life hasn't always been this rough for Andie. But when comfort is hard to find, when a person is wounded and broken, a future and a hope grows dim. I heard her silently begging for help as she limped her way toward me, her arms reaching, her hands trembling.

Come for me. I've lost my way. I'm wounded and bleeding, come for me.

"I feel like I'm going down for the count," Andie shared. "Like I will never be happy again. I can deal with my stomach pain, but the pain in my gut, this fear...I'm a mess. I can't fight it any more."

Crisis in a dying world has become commonplace. Reports of bad things happening to good people is a mere tweet away. We turn from the brokenness and pain, escaping into our own interests, into that which is easier to endure. But, our Savior came to seek and save the lost. We need to consider the interests of others, the needs of others, before our own.

My mission as a soldier is not complicated. It's not gray. It's black and white. Good versus evil. The God of angel armies gave His marching orders. He designed the rescue mission and sent us to bind up the brokenhearted, the wounded who lay dying alone, face down, bleeding out on the battlefield.

Storms of life are raging, blinding us to one another. This is enemy territory. Do you hear the faint whimper on the wind?

Come for me. I've lost my way. I'm wounded and bleeding, come for me.

Choose a side and saddle up. Ride deep into the battlefield or ride away.

Prisoners of War

"I only have 2 more weeks to go," Jill told me. "Prison has been the best thing that ever happened to me, but I can't wait to go home."

We pray to be spared hardships and trouble. We want abundance and freedom, not brokenness and prison.

I have an imaginary prison cell in my mind. Jesus paid my ransom and opened wide the steel door. I am free to leave my prison cell.

I can remember what it was like to be in bondage to the evil one, to believe his lies and accusations. My chains are gone and I am free, but it doesn't mean I'll never face pain and brokenness again. My freedom does not spare me from hardship or being taken captive by the evil one.

Job didn't sit in a prison of grief and loss because he was sinful or because God was harsh.

Prisoners of war suffer even though they are trained, courageous soldiers.

"I just want to go home," Jill continued. "I'm so tired of living with joy in the storm, being free inside these prison walls."

In a prison, locked into the ugliness, the weakness, pain and brokenness can be overwhelming. Held captive, the taunts and accusations of the evil one shatter hope and manipulate thoughts.

We all find ourselves beaten down, in prisons of our own. Maybe you are in a prison of financial hardships or terminal illness. Perhaps you're locked in a difficult marriage or have a life that is harsh and unfair.

Some prisons we enter because of a bad choice and some are prisons we enter through no fault of our own.

Prison is a dark, ugly place to be, regardless of the reason you're there. Even freed from guilt, living each day with joy, the dark night of the soul is exhausting. It takes everything you've got to endure. You just want to go home.

But being in prison is the best thing that ever happens to us. It is in our brokenness that we are healed, in our weakness that God becomes strong. No one is as grateful for water as he who is thirsty.

Jesus came to set the captive free.

It's not true that time heals all wounds, but it is true that there is a God who sees and is able to bring you out of your prison. He knows and meets you where you are in your brokenness. It doesn't matter to him how you got there, only that you need to be rescued.

Look! A Hero!

"You're one of my heroes," I say, knowing Marjorie will burst into loud, infectious laughter.

She's a plain woman, stooped from nearly a century of hard work and disappointment. Though sometimes she appears at my doorstep looking a bit odd,  gray hair straggling about,  sans glasses and teeth she often misplaces, she is always a welcome sight.

"Good morning, my dear one. How are you today?" she always greets me, collapsing  into a chair, ready for her piano lesson.  She hands me her books and begins to play an old hymn. Arthritis and age have twisted and gnarled her hands, but the music comes from her heart.  Her fingers become a part of the instrument as sweet music fills my home..

"I love those old hymns. Never forget them." she laughs, after a hymn or two played by ear. "Alright, Girl! Now, teach me how to play this piano right. I've spent hours in practice. You're going to be so very proud of me."  

She studies diligently, learning  the names of the notes she has been playing by ear for well over half a century. It's her way to rest from work. For a couple of hours each afternoon she plays her assignments over and over again.

Most of her days are spent raising a grandson and caring for an elderly neighbor who is twenty years younger than Marjorie. She studies the Word of God long past midnight, preparing sermons for her church on Sunday.  Besides cleaning her house, mowing her yard and working with people who live in poverty and weariness, she visits a prison every week.

"I don't have a real big ministry," she explains. "I just go around seeking out the lost and seems like I always find some. I just encourage folks. That's all."

It is common to believe we must have an opinion on every issue and tragedy in our news focused world. People complain about the world around us, about the weather, the cost of food and gas, or how often we all complain rather than give thanks. 

When we stop wasting time wondering where the heroes have all gone, we find them. And, more importantly, we are inspired and motivated by them. 

Dangerous Women

"Aren't you afraid to be in the prison with all those dangerous women?" my neighbor asked.  "Do you have to be around any serial killers?"

The truth is that I am safer behind prison walls than I am on the highway or walking around downtown. My movements are on security video. I carry a body alarm. My husband carries a two-way radio. Armed prison guards would immediately be available if a situation was dangerous.

Prisoners we meet in the chapel have murder, child abuse, prostitution, rape and drug crimes in their pasts.  But they look like any other group of women, except for the way they're dressed. With hands clapping and feet dancing as they sing, they sound like any other group of women praising God. Leaning in to hear my teaching, they take notes and ask questions, diligent in their study of God's Word.

They are not dangerous women because of their crimes. They are dangerous women because they are Jesus Followers, because they are becoming women after God's own heart.  They dare to be the hands and feet of Jesus in a fallen world.

Sierra, a Jesus Follower in prison, grips my hand as she tells me her story. She will die inside the prison walls. Society has rightly sentenced her to multiple life sentences. She smiles through tears of compassion for her fellow prisoners, women who live in darkness, slaves to their sins and wrong choices.

"There is so much power in God's love! I'm much more dangerous with a Bible than I ever was with a gun. Satan should be afraid. Very, Very afraid."

And Satan is indeed afraid. He knows his time is almost up. He holds no power over the truly dangerous woman, the princess-soldier who lives courage, gives wise counsel and goes about doing good. His name is defeat and the battle belongs to the Lord.

The most dangerous women in the world write Bible verses on the hearts of children. They act out Bible stories, making it fun to be in Sunday School. Pots of vegetable soup and loaves of fresh baked bread sit on their counters ready to be taken to the sick and weary. They have time to listen, to bind up the brokenhearted, to stretch loving arms to the needy and to change the course of history with their prayers.

They wage war on selfishness, divorce, abortion and cruelty. Dangerous women send notes to young wives encouraging them to love their husbands and children.  They babysit for young moms when rest becomes long overdue. They care for the widows, the orphans, the homeless. Dangerous women counsel alongside the Holy Spirit. They love people deeply from their hearts, changing the world one step at a time.

Just how dangerous are you?

Sarah's Freedom

Photo by Fernando Silvera

"Guilt is not a feeling. You are guilty or you are not guilty. Either way you can live a grace-filled life."

I scattered the word seeds onto the hard fallow ground of the women prisoners.

The Holy Spirit had these women in the palm of His hand and they were listening with a depth of hope I had seldom witnessed in my years of teaching.

Tears of hope began to soak wearied faces as I began to explain. "If you are guilty then you can be forgiven," I told them softly.  "If you are not guilty then you can stop beating yourself up."

Guilt shackles us whether we dwell in a cottage, an apartment or a prison. For years, even decades, many Christian women suffer under a burden of sin already forgiven and removed as far as the east is from the west. Their prison doors have been unlocked. Freedom from guilt has been bought by the redeeming blood of Christ's sacrifice.

Sarah is leaving prison this morning. She has been given her freedom because her debt has been paid. It is a freedom that has come after unimaginable sacrifice. She carries with her the scars of guilt for her wrong deeds as well as the scars of wrong deeds done to her.

Sarah could choose to remain shackled in chains even though she has been offered freedom. But, why would she do that?

Awake In Prison

photo by Steve Rotman flickr.com

Loving women to Jesus inside prison walls is surreal, yet it's there that I am most awake.

My husband and I spend each Monday night in a women's prison. The room looks much the same as any chapel with a stage, instruments, a grand piano, a whiteboard and microphones. The women look much the same as any group of seekers, except they are dressed in khaki and gray.

Murder. Abuse. Rape. Greed. Prostitution. Neglect. Drugs. Behind each face is a story, a story that now includes me.

As years pass inside the prison walls, some of our regulars come week after week. We are their home, their family, their church, their soft place to heal.

In prison some women determine to stay alert, awake to their surroundings. Other women disappear behind a mask, walking in their sleep for years. Ordinary days sometimes find me walking in my sleep, too.

As a writer it is my job to notice things, but there are times when I seem to notice nothing at all. Times when every moment is concerned with daily routines and tasks, the business of survival.

Moments have a way of sliding past quickly whether they are noticed or not. Weariness keeps me from seeing a broken heart. Fear keeps me from loving a shattered soul. I sleepwalk through a world that is alive with opportunities to meet people, to celebrate nature, to experience history as it unfolds.

I step through the security gate of the prison, pick up my body alarm and walk into the air lock. The sound of the heavy metal doors slamming closed awakens me. Even the air seems charged with anticipation and excitement.

As I walk across the prison yard, greeting the guards and prisoners, my heart is wide awake. Every moment is an opportunity to be fully aware of the presence of God walking alongside me.

Every journey is an adventure. Every step is a step of faith. Not because I must carry a body alarm or because guards watch over my every move, but because the God of all creation said if I will go to the prison, He will go with me. He says if I follow where He leads, He will show me the way through the wilderness. If I die to self, I will be alive in Him.

The Bible is true. God is real. Jesus is alive. He is awake. Every day He is walking with me on my journey over uncharted paths. And I would choose to sleep through such an adventure?

Not Just a Number

"I don't remember what I like and what I don't like," Letisha whispered. "In prison," said the inmate, "I'm a number. Out in the world, I'm not sure I was even that."

Photo by Frej Leilund (flickr.com)

I had noticed a hummingbird tattoo on her arm and I smiled. "You like birds, Letisha, especially hummingbirds," I began. "You like writing things down. You like making your hair look pretty."

"Yeah," she agreed. "How did you know? You just met me!"

"You like being organized, neat and tidy. I noticed you like to sing. You especially like rock rhythms. You like bright colors and feminine clothes."

She laughed. "And jewelry. Oh, and lilacs. I had a teacher who kept some on her desk when I was a kid. Hadn't thought of that in ages!"

I smiled. Her face lit up with hope. Then I used the only few minutes I might ever have with her to say, "You're not just a number here in prison or out there, Letisha. You are created by God for big dreams and amazing adventures. God gave you unique gifts. You matter in the world. God made you unique for a reason."

"Is that in the Bible?" she asked, eyes widening, hugging her new Bible closer to her heart. "That God made me unique. Is that in the Bible?" I nodded yes, and through tears she asked, "Will you pray for me?"

I took her new Bible and placed a marker in it. Blue ink quickly circled Psalm 139. I wrote, "Letisha's Song" in the margin, then jotted several other scriptures in her note book.

I will probably never see Letisha again unless she comes back into the prison. I trust the God who is faithful to watch over His young ones. I trust God's people to draw Letisha into His Church, to walk alongside her as she takes the first wobbly steps in her newborn faith. God will know exactly how she's doing because He will grasp her hand through every step of her journey. No, she's not just a number to Him.

You're not just a number either. You are created by God for big dreams and amazing adventures. You have unique gifts. You matter in the world. God made you unique for a reason.

Motherhood and Messy Moments

"I have spent years trying to study and grow and change.  It's hard to keep going.  I'm just so tired," Maggie said.

I sat down beside her and she took my hand. "Please pray for me. Sometimes I don't think I can keep going another day. It's not just being in prison. It's being a mother and a grandmother and knowing my family is not okay. No matter how much I know about God it's too late to change the past."

"She's depressed," added Rachel, her life partner. "I don't know how to encourage her. And we sure don't know what to do to help the kids."

I prayed with these women, so very dear to me. I was proud of the changes I had seen in each of them. Out of the ashes of two completely shattered lives had come healing and deep repentance. I had seen treasured photographs of their 3 adult children and 2 teenagers. Their grand-daughter was only 2 and would be 7 by the time either of them was out of prison and able to meet her. Their family was devastated by the past, broken in dozens of ways in the present.

Motherhood isn't something that just happens to you. It's a choice you make every day to put someone else's happiness and well being ahead of your own, to teach the hard lessons, trying to do the right thing even when you're not sure what the right thing is. Motherhood is forgiving yourself, over and over again for not having everything figured out.

But what if your mother sold you into prostitution and drugs before you were 8 years old?  What if your mother had never known any other life besides cruelty? What if every man you had ever known had violently hurt you? Where do you go to learn motherhood?

Maggie sighed so deeply that we all three laughed. She shook her head as if to shake away her discouragement, then sighed again. "You always say God will meet us exactly where we are in a messy moment and love us toward truth," she repeated back to me. "When you said that I wrote it down."

Rachel grinned at me. "It's on her mirror and on my lamp."

Maggie continued, "All we can do is meet the kids exactly where they are in a messy moment and love them every day until things get figured out and cleaned up."

I smiled and squeezed her hand. "It's what all the best mothers and grand-mothers do. The rest of it can be washed clean by grace."

Sweet Potata Girl

Photo by Wally Hartshorn
flickr.com

"My roots go back all the way to slave trade," she said softly. "I don't be knowin' all 'bout what that was like, but I knowed 'bout hard times in my days. I learned 'bout makin' it through 'gainst all odds."

Swollen crippled feet had propelled her through the market. Her arthritic hands dropped a 2 page shopping list as she struggled to move a box of produce.

I picked her list up from the floor and moved the box.  "Could I fill your list for you? I'd be glad to do that," I offered.

"Oh, my, no, sweet potata girl," she laughed. "The good Lord gave me 8 kids and more grandkids than I can be countin' any more so I guess He'll just keep me spinnin' on forward. It's a long line of hungry folks I need to be feedin' and you got your own work. God will get me through."

She was collapsed with exhaustion on a bench, her cart piled high with food bags when I left the store. Rubbing stiffness from her hands, eyes closed, her silent tears trailed down wrinkled brown cheeks.

"I care about you," I told her, sitting down on the bench beside her. I handed her a handkerchief.

"Oh my, sweet potata girl! That's a lovely old hanky! Now I'm just fine. I'm too tuckered out today is all."

As she wiped her eyes she shared her life. Divorces, custody battles, drug addictions, prison heartbreak and little children with no place to go but to their old broken-down granny. She told me how grateful she was for a country that helped with food stamps, prisons that helped folks get straight, teachers that hugged learnin' right into kids and for all the blessings found in loving people.

I helped her into my car, loaded the piles of groceries into my back seat and phoned her neighbor who had not yet shown up to give her a ride home.

"Why do you call me sweet potata girl?" I asked, once she was settled into her house.  She rested at the table taking some medicine while I put away the groceries in her kitchen and created an impromptu tea party.

"Been a lot of times with nothin' to eat but a sweet potata. It was a blessin' from the Lord on them days. You can live a right long spell on a sweet potata.  Lotta people don't see the blessin' in hard times. I learned from my own granny that hard times is blessin' just like good times. You been a blessin' to me, sweet potata girl. I was plumb done in and set to frettin', but God sends help ever' time to me. Ever' time. Ever' time. Ever' time. Ever' time. Now you be rememberin' that from an old woman, sweet potata girl. Ever' time."

Where the Heart Howls

"I don't think I love God," Ally confessed softly, drawing me aside in the prison chapel.  "He has forgiven me, but now what? I'm such a mess. My heart is black inside."

Regrets linger to taunt us. Heart howls still echo in the forgiven chambers. Forgiveness does not erase memory. It gives it value, but it does not erase it.

Be honest. Sort through heart rubble with an eye for lessons to learn, restitution to be made, sins to tackle with elbow grease.  When you seek Him you will find Him. When you draw near to Him, He draws near to you.

Be brave. You may have to endure consequences. You may need new activities and habits. Our hearts are daunting, scary places. Ask someone who is familiar with God's Word to help you clear through your wilderness. 

Be gentle.  It takes a lifetime to gain a strong, healthy, godly heart.  God is not in a hurry.  He meets you where you are in this moment.  He has a plan for your welfare and not your calamity. He knows the plans He has for you to give you a future and a hope.  Baby steps matter. Learn to love Him one day at a time, one lesson at a time. 

Be still.  In the habit of stillness, in the quiet place, continue to pour out your thoughts and hurts to Him. It is God who removes the rubble as far as the east is from the west.  It is God who inwardly renews and refreshes your heart day by day. He is the Father who sings over you. Let Him quiet your heart howls with His love.  

Live Courage

Andrea timidly raises a small hand to share her darkness. Soft blond curls frame her stark blue eyes. Her voice is soft, feminine, tired.

 "I did so many drugs.  I was afraid of everything. I thought every car coming down the street was going to run me over. There were always hidden things in the dark. I would sit curled up on the blankets, so afraid that there was someone under my bed."

A life not yet 20. A blur of no hope. An abyss of fear.

I touch her and she stiffens, sighs, tries to form a weak smile. Her eyes apologize for lack of trust, cautious hesitation. My heart breaks for this woman-child who is so terrified of life, of people, yet so eager to learn how to live courage.

"I'm proud of you for coming," I whisper to her in the prison chapel. "Coming was difficult for you. It's easier to give up, to hide under the covers."

She nods. Like the other prisoners, she knows about hard things, about giving up. "God took away a lot of the fear," she tells me. "I know He's there."

"The fear of the Lord leads to life, so that one may sleep satisfied, untouched by evil."  It is truth from Proverbs 19:23 that she is learning.  It is truth she has needed to know for a long time.

A long line of others wait to talk to me. I want to hold my breath, to hold on to this moment. To say something just for her, something to provide courage for the week, for the lifetime.

Another woman-child takes my hand. I know Janie. Have loved her in these prison walls. Monday after Monday, I walk alongside on hard days. Her husband has married another and taken her children far away. Janie is broken, facing serious surgery alone. Her mother is dying of the same cancer that is killing her young son. Tears trail down her face. She squeezes my hand, soaks up strength from my faith to keep walking strong.

Janie smiles at Andrea. Understands howling heart pain. Chokes back self tears to live courage, to be Jesus in a dark place. "Can I walk with you?" she asks the newcomer.  "We're all so glad you came. My name is Janie. You're not alone."

Prison Dreams

Every Monday night my husband and I  worship with prisoners. It takes the evening to drive an hour and a half there, spend an hour and a half inside the prison, then drive the hour and a half home. Usually we go alone. It's very difficult to find people willing to go to a prison.

Often I don't want to go either. I quote the Bible to myself: "I was in prison and you visited me. If you do it for the least of these you have done it for Me."

Sometimes, I don't want to be a person who does it for Him. We could go once a month and still be going more often than most people we know, I tell myself.  Come on, Lord, can't I have time off for good behavior? When I am so tired tears flow from a rebellious heart, I get a bad attitude. After a day crammed full of interruptions and the needs of others, I have self-absorbed "stinking thinking".

On those days I simply go because of what's in it for me. Seriously. When I am weak, running completely on empty, down in the dumps and losing my grip, that's when God has to do it all. His words come alive in my head, His love opens wide my heart and I become the feet and hands of Jesus. And that feels more amazing than anything else in my life.

The things you wish you had a camera for: Empty eyes lighting up with jaw dropping, heart stopping awestruck wonder. Hands held high, praising the God who has required complete sacrifice. Bitter meth-aged faces turned youthful and hopeful. Grace like rain falling down on captives making them free.

It's not like the movies of prison you watch from your easy chair. Indescribable amazing joy drips off the walls of heaven into the prison. Prisoners are people God is wooing to Him. When there is nothing left in me, I get to see the everything of what is Him. I want that for me. I want the insight, the strength, the wonder and the joy for me. It's a dream come true. A big dream.

 Being with Jesus in a broken place gets messy. It takes consistency and determination. It takes planning ahead. And I want that for you. No, most people don't want to go to the prison. But you could. You really could.

Patience Waits

"You  have the most beautiful hair on the planet!" I told the young woman at our worship service. (I know, right? Sometimes I am so spiritually minded it's amazing!)

On the college campus I see girls like Amy all the time. A cheery smile and sweet laugh softens already lovely features. A splatter of freckles and wavy brown hair give a Hollywood appearance of a girl-next-door. Amy looks like everyone's favorite brunette cheerleader with a bubbly personality to match.

Last night Amy sat on the front row in the prison chapel where my husband and I spend our Monday nights providing a worship service. Her heart seemed to burst with gratitude and delight as she sang and encouraged the friend she brought with her to join in the discussion during my teaching time.

Women in the prison have jobs, classes, activities and responsibilities. Amy used to regularly attend Monday Night Worship.  She loved the singing and teaching, the friendship and encouragement provided. When her work schedule changed she had to stop attending for awhile.

Ten years was a long time for Amy to wait. Every Monday night during that decade she knew we were there singing, praising, encouraging and learning together. And Amy worked and waited, missed us and hoped for the day when she could worship with us again.
 
Ten years. Sometimes I have difficulty waiting for my toast to brown before my egg gets cold.
 
Humility is having a teachable heart~Lord, teach me to be more like Amy when I grow up.
 
Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything. ~James 1:2-3

Inside Her Prison Walls

She was silently sobbing in a dark place in her innermost heart. Tears poured as if they had been locked away for years. Her young arms wrapped around her middle as if to hold herself together.

In the small prison chapel, the door to her heart squeaked hesitantly open and she peeked out from a lifetime of anguish. My husband and I ached for her as we answered her questions, shared the Words of God with her.

The voice of a rejected, damaged little girl dared to speak, "I think God is so mad at me."

"Oh, Father," I prayed, "Help me to meet her where she is."

"I love you," I promised her. "There is nothing you could say or nothing you could do that would cause me to love you any less. And if I can love you this much after only meeting you two times, know that God loves you so much more because He made you. He is real. He is the God who loves you and wants to forgive you."

Sad brown eyes looked up at me as the bare hint of a slow sweet smile appeared then quickly faded. Ashes from a lifetime of shame, torment and guilt, no longer buried, no longer smoldering, were stirred by hope.

Vulnerable, shaking with emotion, full of fear yet daring to hope, she pushed her heart's door open wider and stepped out.

"I, even I, am the One who wipes out your transgressions for My own sake; and I will not remember your sins." ~Isaiah 43:25

Love in the Darkness

"Corrie," Father ten Boom began, "Do you know what hurts so very much? It's love. Love is the strongest force in the world, and when it is blocked that means pain.

"There are two things we can do when this happens. We can kill the love so that it stops hurting. But then of course part of us dies, too. Or, Corrie, we can ask God to open up another route for that love to travel.

"God loves Karel--even more than you do--and if you ask Him, He will give you His love for this man, a love nothing can prevent, nothing destroy. Whenever we cannot love in the old, human way, Corrie, God can give us His perfect way."

I did not know, as I listened to Father's footsteps winding back down the stairs, that he had given me more than the key to this hard moment. I did not know that he had put into my hands the secret that would open far darker rooms than this--places where there was not, on a human level, anything to love at all."

— Corrie ten Boom (The Hiding Place)

A Heart for Children

A pretty young mother named Sarah dwells in the prison where I love women to Jesus on Monday nights. A few years ago while she was driving her van under the influence of drugs and alcohol, she crashed and her children were killed.

Every day in our schools, supermarkets, playgrounds and neighborhoods children and young moms live days of unseen pain and misery. My heart swells with emotion to know there are little ones who have no soft place to fall, no one who cares that they drew a picture or did their math, no one who knows they fall asleep crying each night. We are called to encourage, to love them like Jesus.

In my own city, probably in my own neighborhood, there are children and young women needing my assistance, love and encouragement. It is a call to action that weighs heavy on my heart and in my prayers. I am learning to watch for children more diligently, to notice needs in the lives of strangers.

With so many children to love, how does it happen that there are people who have the empty nest syndrome? Won't you help Jesus find the lost children and love them?

Let the little children come to us, for of such is the Kingdom of Heaven. We can bless them, know them, love them, in His name.

The Address

I left my purse in the shopping cart at the grocery market today. Rushing back to the store parking lot from across town numerous panicky thoughts zipped through my mind. Would it still be there? I had my debit card in my car with my phone, but what was in my purse?

Not much actually besides my driver's license...my voting card, a gift card to Starbucks, spare change...and then the bad news hit me.

One of our dear friends had recently left prison and her address was in my purse. Why hadn't I written to her sooner?

The only hope I have of knowing how a friend is doing once they leave prison is a letter. Most of the time I never know how they're doing. I pray and remind myself that they know the God who sees and the God who is able. They know I love them.

Letters of encouragement are a lifeline to those in prison. Life after prison release can be even more difficult for the person. Being without a home, job, friends or church is a heavy burden for anyone, but when adding to that the stigma of a criminal record, depression and frustrations are intensified. They can be haunted by temptations to return to familiar friends and places. They remember that drugs and alcohol offer temporary relief from their pain. When you're hungry and cold, you remember that in prison you had a cot and 3 meals a day.

As soon as I got home I sat down and wrote my friend a letter. She will laugh at my panic and be glad that I retrieved my purse in the lost and found, but she will also pick up a pen and paper to write a letter to someone in prison.

Prayers matter. Letters matter. Who needs your prayers and letters?

A Tea Party for Callie

Callie has lived a hard life. Smoking and poor nutrition have stolen her teeth. Meth has stolen her beauty. Cruel abuse ravaged her body and left her soul empty. Sin and hopelessness left her with shame beyond measure, a prisoner of sin before she was ever arrested and sent to prison.

And then Jesus came to the prison and set the captive free. She has been redeemed. Jesus paid the ultimate sacrifice for Callie. She adores Him with incredible depth of passion. She sings to Him with fullness of joy. She talks about Him with confidence and radical faith.

Not only has Callie never been to a tea party, but she has never eaten a homecooked meal. Not only has she never been tucked into bed at night but she's never had a home where there was a bed.

"Prison has given me everything, Karen," she told me last night. "I'm safe and I have a bed and food and friends. Most of all I met Jesus here. I was never free until I got locked up! And when I get out of here someday, you and me and Jesus, we're gonna have us a big old tea party!"

Then he said to them, "Whoever welcomes this little child in my name welcomes me; and whoever welcomes me welcomes the one who sent me. For he who is least among you all—he is the greatest." ~Luke 9:48

Callie makes that verse come to life for me. Most people would look at her as the least among us, but she is one of the riches women I know.