Why is it that the last night of ministry is always one of the best. We did Pan y Chocolate one more time last night before leaving for Guatemala today. We started at the prison. I wanted to cry I was so happy. Last week I talked to one guy for quite awhile. I couldn’t understand a whole lot of what he was saying in Spanish, but I had him fooled into thinking that I did and so he just kept on talking. I kept on nodding and saying little Spanish sentences when I could. I stayed engaged in conversation for awhile and in the end I told him to read Ephesians 6 before he went to bed because it’s one of my favorites. He promised me that he would.
I got there tonight and talked to a guy handcuffed outside of the cell drunk. I finished praying with him and meandered over to talk to mi amigos from last week. One guy in the cell spoke English and translated for me after I handed out bread to all of them.
I asked my “translator” to ask my friend from last week if he read Ephesians 6. He said that he kept his promise to me, he studied those verses and preached on them for me! I had a really cool conversation with them about Eph. 6. He thanked me a lot for coming and talking with him and sharing with him. We talked like we’d been friends for years. I told him it wasn’t me, it was God. He said that he was extremely thankful for God putting me in his path and asked if I had more verses for him. He already had his bible in hand waiting for me to come. I gave him some more of my favorite verses that I’ve been studying all Race and he made me another promise. He is so young and so sweet and I pray that he continues to follow Christ after jail. God has big plans for that boy.
I know that the people are in prison for a reason, some for murder, some for drugs and what not. HOWEVER, I loved them. They were so sweet. Some of them even gave me bracelets. If you know me at all…you know a quick way to my heart…make bracelets!!
These jails and prisons were not like ones in the States that’s for sure. The first one I went to was basically one big cage outside. It was divided in half by a wall. One side men, one side women. There were only 5 women in when I went so we were blessed to be able to have really solid conversations with them. I even argued with my translator a little bit trying to get him to tell them what I wanted him to tell them. We disagreed a little bit!! haha. The men’s cell, was jam packed with arms and legs dangling outside of the bars. Security was high, only a few of us were allowed in and we had to take off watches and necklaces and anything in our pockets. There were sooooo many men in there and I have no idea how they all sleep in that little space. I thought we had some tight living conditions…yikes. The second place we visited had 4 cells. One for the girls and then had a little tiny bit more division for the men. I’m assuming for gang purposes…but that is just my assumption. This place also had one main cell for the men where they were jam packed. When we would serve them bread, I swear they just kept coming, I had no idea where they were coming from, the walls?
After the prison last night, we went to the streets to hang out with our homeless friends. Sometimes when you drive up to the street you can already smell the alcohol. We had a CRAZY conversation with a few of the guys. They were new to this street, we hadn’t seen them before. One of them spoke some English and kept trying to get us to speak to him in Spanish anyway. He told us that he was there that night to check out the spirits. He’d been told by some of the others that every night they see three ghosts. One girl and one woman who sit across the street and watch them. They are the good ones they said, they aren’t scared of those two. The night before one guy threw rocks at them to see if they were real. They weren’t. Then there is the third one that comes every night at the same time. He is dressed all in black and last night the new guy got up to punch him and he had no head. That’s the bad one that they are scared of. So we got to have some long conversations with them about all of this and we got to pray over them. One imparticular. He chose me to pray over them because he concluded that I spoke the best Spanish out of the three of us…how he concluded that I have no idea. I prayed, and I prayed boldly over them and the street. When I finished, Edgar asked what happened and he had his hand over his heart. He started crying. I started crying with him and as I held his hand and sat face to face with him, I began telling him that He was experiencing how much God loves him. As I kept talking to him about Jesus, he begged me to stop talking. I didn’t. Last night, Edgar felt God.
Praise the Lord. Amen.
