My wife and I have set out on a new ministry
together. Being an Assistant Chaplain at the Elkhart
County Jail I have been listening to many inmates opinion of the church and
have some of the same reservations that many of us do with the church. I have
consistently told these men that there is no such thing as the perfect church.
Recently I was asked to come to Elkhart and start a
Bible study with an inmate that had been released. I thought it over and I had
decided that I was unable to set another time to start a Bible study with all
that I was involved with at the county jail. One Monday night at my regularly
scheduled Bible study, a couple of the inmates asked me if I had a church that
I pastor. I told them no because God had not opened those doors for me but had
instead opened my doors at the county jail. I had a vision that one day of
starting a ministry for inmates, possibly a church, but had never had any of
those doors open. I continued this discussion with those inmates to see why
they thought that it was something that had been on their minds. I took
everything that they were saying and decided that I would consider it and pray
about it. That night I saw my pastor at a banquet that we were attending and
mentioned it to him. He looked at me and said, "Why don't we just do
it" I was in a little shock but decided to explore this further. He
mentioned to start this as a house church, missional
community. I talked it over with Staci and proceeded to find a house. I started
with the ex-inmate that had wanted me to come to Elkhart
and do a regular Bible study with him. Things fell through with that plan to
use his place so I turned to another ex-inmate named John*. He agreed to use
his place and with a little help from my church, we have launched a gathering
that meets every Friday at 7pm in John's house. I have read on how to lead a missional community and am starting a
book on how to develop am discipling community.
We divide the evening between a time of fellowship while sharing a meal and
Bible study. We had three people the night of the launch with just me, my wife,
and John. The second time we had a couple more people show up to see it. I had a great conversation with Cory who is
trying to move to this area and is struggling with walking the right path. I
encouraged him to continue to come on Friday's and to participate in everything
we do. The other person Matt does not want any part of God and was afraid that
we would say something to him if he just ate and decided not to participate in
the Bible study. His experience with Christians in the past has lead him to
believe that they are judgmental. That night we all showed him that we were
there to share Christ's love and he was in the room where we were doing the
study for a while and when he got up to go to another room no one said
anything. I later got the chance to tell him that I enjoyed meeting him and
invited him to have a meal with us each week. There are seekers in this world
that have had some very bad experiences with what they perceive to be the
"church". Our goal as a ministry right now is to provide a place for
ex-inmates to come and participate in fellowship and Bible study (if they want)
in a place where they never have to worry about being judged. I am so grateful
for what God has done already. This ministry is in God's hands and we are just
going to see where it takes us. It is my hopes that it will grow and multiply
and that the ex-inmates will be leading other groups. The vision that I have is
that one-day inmates and their families will be able to be ministered to by
those that have gone through the same experiences. I hope to start writing in
this blog about those experiences on a regular basis.
* - I will be using first names only and at most first names and first letter of last name in cases where there are multiple people by the same name to protect the privacy of those I write about.
