Dying to Self, Putting on Christ

Fourteen inmates came to the session. That's enough people to split the large group into 2 smaller groups after prayer and song, but I forgot to do it. If the group gets too large, some people won't talk hardly at all. So if you have enough volunteers, and room space, it's worth considering.

An inmates offered prayer, asking God to join the group. We sang some hymns then read Psalm 69 around the room, each person taking a verse at a time.

We then read John 14 through 16, skipping around a bit. Centering on the points that have God working, showing through Jesus. Discussion question: has anyone ever looked at you and seen God working through you?

We talked about how, especially when I am ill, my husband's voice is sometimes the voice of God to me. He is the head of our household, and is God's representative to me. And at times, I am God's representative to him. May we take this charge seriously. May God work through us, like the plant through the vine. Apart from God we can do nothing.

Some folks seemed to get what I was trying to illustrate and some did not. How much will we actually suffer for God? When our spouse needs assurance or comfort, like from illness, can we stifle our own complaints enough to minister to each other for God? As his representative? I encouraged the inmates to show forth God to each other on the block this week.

Talking is one thing, action something very different. I asked the inmates if any of them would agree to pray for one hour each day in the coming week, as I intend to try to do. That started an interesting discussion. What, exactly, were we considering "prayer"? Would the time need to be spent in one full session? And so on. Pretty funny how quickly we get to specifics. Anyway, I opened it up and suggested everyone would have to decide for themselves what actually constituted an hour of prayer a day. Several guys said they would try.

There is a prayer service being planned for our community on July 17, 2005. I'm pleased that there are inmates in the county prison praying too. The guys express every week how much they worry about their families on the outside. Prayer is something for us all to do, spending time listening and talking with God.

I attended a seminar recently on "Building Godly Resilience" by Mark Basinger of Diakon (a Lutheran Social service organization). He pointed out early on that people do better when they have a sense of purpose and meaning in their lives. Certainly, inmates are limited in what they can do while serving their time. Prayer offers a specific activity that they are able to do and in fact may be better suited (time wise) than people outside of prison.

I gave the inmates an assignment - read the book of Galatians for next week.