Men's prison... For the first time.

In September 2011 I joined God Behind Bars with the plan to reach youth for God. It's a very general plan, but since I had never worked in prisons before it was probably a good thing it was so general.

We are talking youth in prison or youth who have a parent in prison and need a little help staying out (statistically they are 84% more likely to end up in 'the system' themselves)

So I worked towards that goal:
* Once a month I joined another group that already goes into a youth prison
* Once a week I go to a youth court and offer services as a mentor for youth that is in trouble.
* And once a week I share the God Behind Bars youth version at the jail, hanging with 16 and 17 year old's

Those youths in the jail are being treated as adults before the law and some of them will be sentenced to prison.

Since the beginning of December now I am able to 'follow' these youths to prison and continue to share with them about Jesus! It's one of the most exciting things ever!

In jail they have nothing to do and are quite happy to come to my program. But in prison this 'church thing' is part of their free time. And so far I still had more than half the unit show up to our program every week!

Would you pray with me...?

* Some of the youths in jail and also in prison are only there for a short time. I keep on telling them to find me at church, but they are unsure of church and other Christians. Pray that they come and we can help them on the outside.

* Some of them want to help their families. But they have some really crappy ideas that will get them right back into jail. Pray that they can find a legal job!

* The most repeated question I get is 'Can Jesus fix murder'. And while I have the best answer ever, it takes a while for that truth to settle. Pray for them to find Christ and be radically changed on the inside

* And a prayer request for myself: I need lots of prayer, clarity and strength! I love what I do, but you can never relax when you're inside. Also, a practical request: The prison is outside town and adds 100 miles weekly. That's a bunch more on my car, but also my gas money budget. Pray that God would provide for me!! :)

Conversations in Jail - Jesus

How do I help my juvies understand how much Jesus loves them?
How do I make them understand how blessed I feel because I can spend time with them every week?

Their understanding of Jesus and Faith is basic at best. 3 months ago one of the worship songs had the word 'Hosanna' in it and they asked 'Miss, who's Hosanna?'

Every time I tell them that I KNOW people who would want to spend time with them and help them be successful they say 'Miss, who would want to spend time with us? We are criminals?'

There are so many things that make it hard to talk about Jesus. (One is, that they keep on calling me 'Miss')

But every few weeks I lay it out there. Every few weeks it's not about living a different life, but it's about the person who gives us life.

This was one of the weeks.

We talked about sin and how ALL sin separates us from God. No matter how big or small. In that way sin is sin and we are all the same before God.
We talked about the difference of consequence for some sins. Stealing a car and running a red light are a little different in consequences.
Then we talked about how God says that there is not one righteous person.

This was to lay the ground work. To help them understand that ALL sin separates us from God.

Then I moved on to what God has done for us. How He sent Jesus for 'WHOEVER'. I talked about who a whoever is.
We talked about what love is and that God loved us first. And how He's not insecure, so that if you don't love Him right now, He's not gonna sit in a corner and cry. But He's still gonna love you.

And then we talked about the 'now what?'. The fact that God wants to change their lives NOW and not when they get out. That is the hardest thing for me to explain and for them to get. I don't speak from experience here, but I know that they can do it!

They CAN do the hard things instead of just coasting (not swearing for a day!)
They CAN be an example in speech, in conduct, in faith in purity.. (1. Timothy 4:12).

You know what was weird? Usually during my talks (they are a bit of a hybrid between a talk and a small group) there are lots of interruptions. Comments, tangents, jokes.... There are a lot of things going on and often I have a hard time keeping their attentions.

But when I did this talk the room was eerily quiet. They all seemed to listen. There was no joking, no questions, no tangents. They just listened. They looked at me and listened.

And suddenly I had that hope again. The hope that God HAS a future and a hope for them. And that it's good. The hope that I will see some of them on the outside and see them succeed. Hope that I am not alone in this. But God is always right there.

I needed that.

Borthwick - May he rest in peace... Part 5

Half the town seemed to show up to our departure. First of all we had to choose any extras we were gonna take. Everything else was gonna be left in this small town (together with Borthwick - may he rest in peace).
Then came the packing. At first we all helped, but then we placed people into the car and loaded them up with stuff. Added another person and loaded them up, until we were all in the car with all luggage and camping equipment. It's good to have played tetris a lot.


That trip I hardly remember. We all slept a lot and finally got to Katherine. You'd think that would be the end of the story. But it's really not. There's more. And there was a reason for Borthwick's death!


In Katherine we were able to shower, eat and sleep and then go to church the next morning. Katherine is about 300 kilometers south of Darwin and we kind of had to be back in Darwin soon, since we had tickets to fly to Indonesia in a couple days.


So while we are prepping for church we are also trying to figure out how the heck we can make it back to Darwin with no money and no van.


When we got to church we were surprised to find some YWAM Darwin staff that had taken a weekend to hang in Katherine. We told them our story AND were able to pile our camping gear in their car. That way we were travelling a lot lighter.


To read the conclusion of 'Borthwick - may he rest in peace', check back April 2! :)

Borthwick - May he rest in peace... Part 4

We rode back into town and delivered Borthwick to the mechanic. He promptly pronounced him dead. The whole floor underneath the driver's seat and steering column had disappeared. Apparently Borthwick had a bit of a rust problem, so when we collided with the cow we left half the van in rust on the street.


The time in this town was interesting. The bad thing: no rental car company at all. The good thing: everybody knows everybody. So the cousin called his wife, who knew a friend who had a van and nothing to do that day. So he said he would take us the several hundred kilometer trip to Katherine.


You see, we kind of were scheduled to appear in church that day. Since that wasn't gonna happen, we cancelled that day's performance and said we'd definitely be there the next day in the morning. (This is generally known as a faith statement)


Couple things you might not have considered:

• We didn't really have much money
• Most of that non existent money went to the tow truck and our new van driver (who also had to drive several hundred kilometers back)
• Borthwick was dead and not really our car. It belonged to the YWAM base, which meant several phone calls with them just to sort that thing out right. Not like we wanted to come back to this town.
• We were 8 people with one piece of luggage each, plus guitar, plus camping gear for 8, plus food. I think the van we were taking to Katherine was maybe a 12 seater without a roof rack???

To read about the next part of the 'Borthwick - may he rest in peace' adventure check back tomorrow.

Borthwick - May he rest in peace... Part 3

The first road train pulled Borthwick off the road. By then we had a closer look at what had happened. The horn of the cow had popped out the radio from behind and deposited it on the front seat. The front seat was EXACTLY the size of Lisa now. No wiggle room. If it'd been me, I would have been crushed a bit. All she got was a scratch. And you also couldn't move Borthwick anymore. You know, without the help of a road train.


The second road train that came by was going the right way. I'd also like to mention that this was in 1998. Cell phones were rare and well, we were in the middle of nowhere anyway. the next town was 70 kilometers away. Oh and road trains are not allowed to take passengers. So for all intents and purposes, we seemed pretty stuck.


But the second road train driver helped us out. He took Lisa on and drove her to the next town. (Looking back, maybe that was a bit scary, but at least we didn't send a student!)


I stayed back with the students, Borthwick and maybe 4 liters of water in the dessert with no way of knowing when she'd be back.


But she came back. With a towing truck. Let me tell you what she told us what happened. So they got to the town (still pretty early in the morning). They found someone who was awake, who then found the mayor/town leader, who's cousin owned the towing company and woke all these people up. And then she came back with the tow truck... Sounds easy? Well, maybe you should ask her for her side of the story!


We were just hanging out in our broken van, trying not to die. (Obviously we survived!)

The tow truck got Borthwick on the flatbed and then there was the question on how to get all of us back as well... Only one or two people would be allowed to ride up front in the tow truck... But the tow truck driver made another exception from something completely illegal and let us all ride INSIDE Borthwick on the back of the truck. One of those rides you wish you had photos of.




To read part 4 of 'Borthwick - May he rest in peace' come back tomorrow. 

Borthwick - May he rest in peace... Part 1

Ok, no need to be sad or anything. Borthwick was a van. An Australian van that was totaled in an unfortunate incident with a cow.
I thought it was time to tell the story...


Once upon a time sometime back in the nineties when I was on staff with Youth With A Mission Darwin, we were crossing Australia in our trusty old van 'Borthwick'. (The photo has the same model, but ours didn't look that nice)


The name Borthwick was a name I had heard from one of my friends (Donka, to be precise. remember, this is in Australia). We baptised him with cordial (it's like kool-aid) which made his rear view mirror sticky (which we didn't clean forever).


'Trusty' is also a very generous word to describe Borthwick. I learned early on that if visiting friends I was never to leave last. That way there were always gonna be enough people left to help push-start Borthwick. We even tried in reverse once. (This is also the reason why I'm a CHAMP at letting the clutch come slowly)


So Borthwick had it's problems and already during the trip down (from Darwin to Adelaide) - a mere 3,000+ kilometers - Borthwick tended to be temperamental. Since we were a Discipleship Training School with YWAM and on outreach, that just meant we had lots of opportunities to pray for the van. LOTS of opportunities.


To go up the hills in Adelaide we had to stop and take a break before we'd attempt it. Just so that Borthwick wouldn't overheat.


The overheating was a real problem.


But we also had other problems. Running out of gas was a regular problem as well, but we always filled the billy can and were good on that. And so we usually took those stops to make sure everything else was secure.
One of our guys would climb up on the roof and check all the ropes. The leader of the school, Lisa, and me would make sure that Borthwick was doing ok and getting petrol back into it.
And then we'd all climb back into the van and get going again.


Except one time.


Somehow we didn't quite count and had forgotten Bill on the roof. Luckily his wife remembered that he was missing and stopped us from going so that he could climb back down and into Borthwick.
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For part 2 of 'Borthwick - May he rest in peace' come back tomorrow.