“I was in prison, and ye came unto Me”
I take these words of Jesus literally! I don’t think I am anything special, but I know He is!
When Saul was pusecuting the early Christians, he was having people arrested and put in prison for teaching and following “The Way”. But when Jesus appeared to Saul on the road to Damascus, He didn’t say, why are you hurting or persecuting my people, He said, “Why persecutest thou Me?”. Some how Jesus takes personally what people do to others. He takes personally what we do to others. This could be in a good way or bad!
Photos are mine
So when I see someone hungry, naked, suffering or lonely, I see Jesus! I see helping these people as ministry or service to Jesus.
James said this!
Jas 1:27 “Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world.”
All of these are great, but my focus here is prisons.
The above photo was taken here in the Philippines. When we went to this prison, there were 197 inmates and only 7 jail cells. The cells had bunkbeds 4 beds high and all of the way around the room. I used to minister in the jails in the USA and these prisons and the conditions are not even similar.
You may argue with me, but I know people, in the US, that commit a crime and purposely get caught, so the can get “three squares and a cot”, meaning three square meals and a warm place to sleep protected from the elements. I know a guy that committed the exact same crime, in the same place, on the day he was released from prison.
Basketball, TV, pool tables, a gym and library. The amenities of many jails in the West. Many of the prisons, you still can score the drugs you want. It is not all a bed of Roses, but the homeless definitely have it worse.
The Philippine Jail
Here, besides the living conditions I already described, the prisoners wash their own clothes by hand. They have to have someone from the outside bring toiletries, tooth paste, deodorant, clothing detergent and pretty much everything else.
One thing, we provided bibles for each inmate. Old and New Testament bibles in the Cebuano dialect. They have lots of time and these guys are really hungry to hear God’s Word.
The boxes are full of bibles and the rest of the folks are our team. There was also one cell that housed only women. I believe there were about 15 in the one cell.
This jail had murderers and many hardened criminals, but the large majority were young boys like the ones you see in the first photo.
At the beginning the prison staff we only letting us minister with the inmates in their locked cells, and us safetly on the outside, but later we convinced them to let us go inside so we could have quality, one on one time, with those who desired personal prayer.
Prison Ministry USA
Just a note about what it was like to minister in the prisons in the US. It seemed a little bit backwards, but they would search me thoroughly and look between every page in my bible. Then they would push me inside and lock the door. No guard, no escort!
I would go to the general population area and announce, as loudly as possible, that we were going to have a church service or bible study. In one visit I would minister in three different cell blocks. These prisoners where habitually kiting checks, thieves, and some murderers that would never be free again for the duration of their lives.
During my time in the prisons I came to realize a strange phenomenon. Some of the folks inside were more free than people on the outside. Some people are completely free, living in their homes, some with their families and are in chains that are their but cannot be seen. Bound by hatred, lust, pornography, fear, drugs and alcohol. And I have met inmates that were free, loved God, loved his fellow man. No bondage, no hidden chains, only locked inside a prison.
One of the cellblocks they named “The Born Again” block. These fellows helped each other, had their own bible studies and even evangelized the rest of the prison. People inside and totally free! People outside totally imprisoned, but free to go wherever they choose.
Mat 25:34 Then shall the King say unto them on his right hand, Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world:
Mat 25:35 For I was an hungred, and ye gave me meat: I was thirsty, and ye gave me drink: I was a stranger, and ye took me in:
Mat 25:36 Naked, and ye clothed me: I was sick, and ye visited me: I was in prison, and ye came unto me.
Mat 25:37 Then shall the righteous answer him, saying, Lord, when saw we thee an hungred, and fed thee? or thirsty, and gave thee drink?
Mat 25:38 When saw we thee a stranger, and took thee in? or naked, and clothed thee?
Mat 25:39 Or when saw we thee sick, or in prison, and came unto thee?
Mat 25:40 And the King shall answer and say unto them, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me.
He also said in the next few verses, when you did it not to these, you did it not to Him.
This is where I have found the greatest joy. Serving God, through service to others.
Mat 22:37 Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind.
Mat 22:38 This is the first and great commandment.
Mat 22:39 And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.
Mat 22:40 On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.
Thank you for reading.
Daddy William
