An Invitation to Join God in His Work Equipping Christian Inmate Leaders

An Invitation to Join God in His Work Equipping Christian Inmate Leaders

Henry Blackaby in his Experiencing God series of books has told the Church to “Watch to see where God is working and join Him in His work”.

Scripture teaches us that we are “created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand” (Eph 2:10).

Any Christian who has been involved in prison ministry in Oklahoma can testify that God is working inside our prisons and jails. In fact, I have heard reports from volunteers that they can’t imagine not serving inside because of the difference it made in their own life as they served in prisons and jails. My own testimony is the same. As I joined God in His work inside prison I discovered the meaning of Ephesians 2:10. God had prepared this ministry for me to serve in; all my life experiences, all my training, all my desires are fulfilled in what God has prepared for me to do, not what I deemed most fulfilling.

The Need.
Christ is at work. The Holy Spirit is sending men and women into prisons and jails to preach the good news of Jesus Christ. Many come to Christ in prison, many return to Christ in prison. Volunteers go inside prisons and jails on a weekly basis preaching, teaching, and encouraging. This is an ongoing process, but discipleship in the prison context is impossibly hard on just a weekly or monthly basis. Jesus called the twelve disciples to be “with him” 24/7. The need is to train inmates to become fishers of men, disciplers making disciples within their environment. Equip them so that they can independently carry the Gospel into the prison gangs, into the lost, into their prison culture. This is what any missionary society would want, indigenous Pastors, Teachers, and Evangelists growing churches within their own people group. Prison is it’s own culture. Christian inmate leaders inside the prison system need to be identified and trained. The baton must be passed. Disciple makers must make disciple makers. Dependence on Christian media and volunteer programs is short changing the body of Christ inside prison. Missionaries travel to foreign countries to plant churches for Christ’s Kingdom. Their ultimate goal is to train up and release into the ministry the indigenous people they have converted. Until the indigenous people can succeed at the work of evangelizing their own people the work of the missionary is not done.

The Vision.
In order to equip the inmate Church inside the prison walls of the Oklahoma Department of Corrections a Seminary Program needs to be established. This might sound like a radical idea. Why should we provide this kind of education to inmates? The the answer is because they have trusted in Christ and are sincerely living as model inmates. All over the world Churches have started Seminaries to better equip leaders for their communities. God is today calling our nation’s Churches to establish Seminaries inside state prison systems. It started twenty years ago in Louisiana. New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary began to teach seminary level classes inside Louisiana’s Angola prison. Since that time many other states recognizing  the benefits to the prison system have allowed similar programs to begin (see Fig. 1). There are documented tangible benefits to the prison system in adopting a seminary program (see Fig. 2). God is indeed working in the prison system, for the inmates and for the institutions. Will you join Him? 

Fig. 1

Global Prison Seminaries Foundation has been up and running since June of 2016. In just a very short period of time, we gratefully report the current activity in the following states:

Tier I: Louisiana, Texas, New Mexico

Tier I is defined as a prison seminary that is in good standing with all of the four key players; graduating on a yearly basis; students are lifers or have extremely long sentences; accredited, biblical, convictional, Bachelor-level curriculum and four-year degrees; AND systemically sending out Field Ministers in a joint effort with the prison system on a yearly basis and in a timely, well-planned manner with full support on the local prison level.

GPSF’s Role: to continue to touch base with key players in these states and address and on-board transition changes in these key player positions is essential. A state is strongest when it has all four key players in place and accredited, quality, convictional, biblical instruction delivered to lifers with a vision toward active Field Ministry started during their four years of classwork and moves to full-time Field Ministry access upon graduation.

Tier II: Florida, Michigan, North Carolina, West Virginia, Wisconsin

Tier II is defined as a prison seminary that has started and is in good standing with all of four key players but has not yet graduated a class and due to that, has not yet sent out Field Ministers. Global Prison Seminaries’ role in this state.

GPSF’s Role: to advise, educate, and advocate all four key players in their separate roles all toward the same Field Ministry vision. GPSF is uniquely qualified to assist those in the Corrections arena by educating them about moral rehabilitation and how to actually carry out the Field Ministry vision in Corrections — giving lifers access to the prison and to fellow inmates to do peer-to-peer ministry.

Tier III: Arkansas, Illinois, Missouri, Oregon

Tier III is a prison seminary that is up and running, but needs strengthening in the areas of leadership, funding, communication, increased number of graduates, OR has no systemic vision for Field Ministers inside of the state’s prison system.

GPSF’s Role: to strengthen this states effort by offering assistance in identifying the key player or players who need support to fully execute the Field Ministry Vision that is the prison seminary movement. The yellow category status is totally dependent on having two key pieces: 1.) the Prison Seminary Model, 2.) Active Field Ministry. If the second piece is missing, the yellow status simply clarifies to us at GPSF that this is a state and prison system that needs strengthening. We believe we can offer strong assistance to a state’s prison system for how to carry out Field Ministry based on the overwhelming success in Texas, proving this is a replicable model.

Tier IV: Georgia, Mississippi

Tier IV is is a state that is showing significant interest in beginning a prison seminary in their state and moving into real development and substantial planning stages for a prison seminary in their state WITH Field Ministry as the vision for the end goal, but has not yet held its first class.

GPSF’s Role: to stay with each of the state’s key players through each phase of development celebrating with them their first day of class. GPSF does not raise funds for the state, rather counsels and supports and encourages the identified non-profit key player in the state who will become the state’s advocate.

Tier V: (not included on this map) – Global Prison Seminaries Foundation has identified a Tier V, not included on this map, but taking place in the following states: Alabama, Illinois, Maryland, Ohio, South Carolina, Texas (two that are not Darrington).

Tier V is a program within a prison often referred to as a prison seminary that has started but is not using the same essential elements of the model that we would subscribe to nor requiring the four key-players. These essential elements are Lifers, Equipped with a four-year accredited bachelor degree anchored in sound Christ-centered doctrine, Transferred to other prisons upon graduation, Living in the prison, Access to the prison given to do ministry, Peer-to-peer inmate-led ministry. The four key players being leaders in the following four arenas: Executive or Legislative elected positions (Governor, Senator, Representative); Corrections; Seminary, and Non-profit catalyst or champion (the project manager).

Fig. 2

Point of View: An innovative solution for Oklahoma's criminal justice impasse

By Joshua Hays, Published: Sun, February 12, 2017 12:00 AM

Just three months after Oklahoma voters approved criminal justice reforms through ballot initiative, state legislators have filed bills to roll back the changes. Despite Oklahoma's prisons operating at 109 percent capacity, these bills would revoke public funds from treatment programs aimed at reducing recidivism. If passed, these bills would directly counter the public's wishes and exacerbate already dangerous prison crowding.

But there is a compromise available to preserve programs while limiting public expense. Oklahoma could learn from its neighbors and allow faith-based, privately funded programs to offer education to inmates, training them for roles of service to one another. Louisiana has operated such a program for over two decades, and Texas has followed suit since 2011. In both states, inmates who volunteer to participate receive a fully accredited, four-year bachelor's degree at no cost to themselves or to taxpayers.

In return, graduates commit to apply their education to serve their peers. Designated “field ministers,” they work as caretakers in a variety of roles including grief counselors, academic tutors, mentors for new arrivals to their units, and instructors for courses on substance abuse, anger management and victim awareness. In other words, these college-educated men replicate as volunteers many of the rehabilitative services that Oklahoma's Legislature seems so loath to finance.

An intensive four-year study by a team from Baylor University found overwhelmingly positive outcomes at Louisiana's Angola Prison. Program participants had the prison's highest levels of mental and emotional well-being and stability, positive attitudes toward staff, and sense of meaning and purpose in life, even while incarcerated. Perhaps even more striking, other inmates who participated in religious congregations with these field ministers but without the same educational advantages outperformed the rest of the general population on these same measures. Preliminary findings from the newer program in Texas have been similarly encouraging. (italics added)

Faith-based education programs also make fiscal sense. Angola's program launched as a response to austerity aggravated by Congress's revocation of Pell Grant eligibility for prisoners. Kris Steele, former Republican speaker of the Oklahoma House and now executive director of The Education and Employment Ministry, a justice reform group, stresses the importance of “positive return on investment.” Angola's inmate ministers show the financial return that allowing faith-based service invites.

The prison employs 30 inmate ministers as “re-entry mentors” for men serving shorter sentences; ministers provide mentees with social and vocational support as they prepare for parole. Wages for these 30 ministers cost the state $34,000 annually, compared with an estimated $1.45 million to replace them with comparably qualified civil service employees. This single program saves Louisiana taxpayers over $1.41 million in direct costs, not to mention the savings and tax revenue generated by parolees who succeed thanks to the influence of a mentor

Rehabilitative services are the right choice for prisoners and the public, but Oklahoma legislators seem unwilling to foot the bill. Why not then allow faith-based schools to offer voluntary education to prisoners and train them for caretaking service

Hays (william_hays@baylor.edu) is a research associate with Baylor University's Institute for Studies of Religion and co-author of "The Angola Prison Seminary: Effects of Faith-Based Ministry on Identity Transformation, Desistance, and Rehabilitation" (Routledge, 2016).