Dec. 21 - He said, "Your message was spot on, for the inmates and for the staff"

 

Ministry Partners,

Thanks for praying, I slept well last night and only coughed a couple of times. I could claim an old time saying that says, “I woke up bright eyed and bushy tailed.”  I was ready for the God ordained day ahead. Pastor Aaron says that in Africa they say, “The foxes dance it the moon.”

In these next five days, we will do 7 prisons crusades and in 9 days I will be heading home to the U.S. which is always so hard for me to do. Being up front, watching the Holy Spirit work so dramatically in so many of the lives of the people here is something I do not get to witness back home. I visit a local Women’s Prison where I live but I am not allowed to enter any men’s prisons, and then there is the issue of leaving my “family” here.

Harriet and Priscilla the house keepers here who keep everything so clean were cleaning yesterday and I was thanking them for taking such good care of me and that when I am home I have to clean my own house and prepare my own food. They were surprised and Priscilla said, “Then what do you do when you don’t feel well and need a cup of tea?” I told her I would fix it for myself.

 

Today at Butuntumula Prison, the team with the O.C. and a woman guard

The drive to the prison was to take us 2 hours but because of the Christmas traffic, everyone is said to leave the city for the villages at Christmas, it took us 4 hours. The O.C. was gracious and received us even though we were 2 hours late. The building we were taken to was small but almost all the 419 men inmates were inside with a few peering in two openings and more standing around the large open door-less doorway. At one point, they brought in 15 women with a woman guard and they sat on the edge of the platform and against the wall to my left.

I was glad that the O.C. and some additional guards decided to come and listen to our whole crusade. It was wonderful seeing so many respond to the Gospel and make decisions to forgive and then to apologize. At the end the O.C. said my message was “spot on” for the inmates and for the staff including himself as he had forgiven many during the forgiveness prayer.

It was a beautiful thing to see so many inmates with the new Bibles that Pastor Peace had delivered a few weeks ago. It makes me smile when the prisoners clap and laugh so when I hug those who give a testimony about what God has done in their lives today. There were two children there and I was able to give them each a new crochet cap.

The O.C. told us about a place to stay but it ended up not being so good. The windows have no screens so the widows could not be opened for air and within a few minutes of checking in the power went out so the fan was unusable. They did not provide the usual bottle of water and the cook had left for Christmas so we would need to go to town to the one restaurant. We went there and the guys were able to order “local foods” but I ordered the only thing eatable for me. Beef on plain spaghetti noodles but when it came the beef pieces were so tough they were almost un-eatable and both the beef and spaghetti had so much salt on them that I could not finish the meal.

When we got back to the hotel, the power was still out but finally they turned on their generator, which they said would be turned OFF at 10. It looks like a cold shower tonight. The glamorous life of a missionary sometimes is not so glamorous! Nevertheless, it is so worth it all when we get to watch so many receive Christ as Savior like we did today.

Tomorrow we have 2 prison crusades to do so we appreciate your continuing prayers.

That none would be lost,

Arlene