Author: Jim Carmichael

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Our New Format for Prison Apologetics

Thank you for you patience during this transmission period. We are in the process of building a new site that will include prisoner sermons, and lessons. The address to that site is https://theparkprisonministry.org

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Children of Jehovah

By Jaumon Okyere Sr.

Are all humans’ children of God?

To answer that question, we need to go back to the beginning, Gen 2:7 says “Jehovah God proceeded to form the man out of dust from the ground and blow into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living soul”.

Have you ever had a new car? I bet you called it your “baby”, you probably even named it. How about a new idea? Most people, when they have a new idea or creation refer to it as their brain child. And, they patent it to say, “this is my creation; I own the rights to it”.

In most civilizations and societies, it’s common to say that when you are the first to create something or have an idea you are named as the father, mother, brain, or creator, and the patent belongs to you. Since Jehovah “was and is” the first to create “everything” we’ve known and will know, makes him the father to “all things”, we are his patent, made in his own image, his brain child, his children.

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Commitment

by Jim Carmichael

A few months back God put it on my heart to study, and teach about How to Get to Heaven from Here. So, I have been working on a series of lessons and this is the forth in that series.

I started with a lesson on how to develop greater faith, the kind of faith James says we need for God to hear us. In the following lesson, I talked about the principle of becoming what we think, by totally believing we are what we are, not someday, but now.

In the last lesson, I used quite a bit of John Bunyan’s book “The Pilgrims Progress” to illustrate how fierce the battle is, and especially how fierce it is in the village called “Vanity Fair” where the bodies of many former Pilgrims could be found.

Many people who become Christians, fall away. In fact, as much as 90% of all new Christians fall away within the first year.

I believe there are two reasons for this, one is failing to teach Christian apologetics along with the bible instruction for the new convert.

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Worshiping God in Truth and Spirit

by Michael (Miguel) Caballero
Many people have a great desire to worship GOD in a way that is pleasing in HIS sight. Well, the Scriptures clearly tell us that GOD is a Spirit and those who worship HIM must worship HIM Spirit and in truth. So, In order for us to worship HIM in a way that is acceptable and pleasing in HIS sight, we need to be in the Spirit also, because the carnal man cannot please GOD.
But how can I be in the Spirit, you might ask? I’m glad you asked that question. To be in the Spirit, you need to be born again. But how can do that? Well, you can’t, but GOD can do it for you if you just let HIM. In John I : 12-13, it says, “As many as received Him (JESUS), to them gave THE power to become the sons of GOD even to them which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of GOD.
First, you need to receive JESUS. HE is the One who has the power to make you born again by the Spirit of GOD. In Acts 2:38, the WORD of GOD reads; “Then Peter said unto them, Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of JESUS CHRIST for the remission of sins, and ye Shall receive the gift-of the HOLY GHOST. ‘
So, we need to repent, which means to change our minds, change our ways of living, tum from sin, and completely turn our lives toward GOD.
Believe in JESUS, receive HIM as your LORD and SAVIOR. get baptized, and HE promises in HIS WORD that HE will give you the HOLY SPIRIT. Then, and only then, will you be able to worship HIM in the Spirit.
What about the Truth, you may be thinking? I thought that Scripture says we must worship in Spirit and in Truth (John 4:24). Well, that’s a good question.
The truth is the WORD of God.
In Psalm 119: 160, it says “Thy WORD is true from the beginning. ” In John 17:17, JESUS prayed for HIS Apostles and the believers after them in the Garden of Gethsemane: “Sanctify them through THY Truth: THY WORD is Truth.”
Other Scripture says, “when HE, the Spirit of Truth is come, HE will guide you into all Truth. For HE shall not speak of HIMSELF, but whatsoever HE shall hear, that shall HE speak; and HE will show you things TO come” (John 16:13).
So, when you are a new creation (creature), born again believer, a child of the living GOD, the SPIRIT of GOD, the HOLY SPIRIT, will teach you how to live your new life through the living, written WORD of GOD, and HE will also teach you and guide you in how to worship GOD in Spirit and in truth through the same WORD.

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This Moment in Time

by Victor Davis

At this moment in my life, the season I am in is one directed by the HOLY SPIRIT. By breaking bread with believers, not being selfish or conceited but by being like-minded, I humbly allow others to supply and share their gifts with me so that we may all grow in the love of CHRIST.

I’m not fully mature yet, but through chastening and obedience I’m learning how to apply my motives, feelings, affections, desires, aims, principles, thoughts, and intellect to HIS will for my life. By working here at the Chapel, I am gleaning wisdom from the elder volunteers who donate their time as well as offer advice from their life experiences.

By taking advantage of programs offered during the day and through study materials, through practical application of them, I have gained insight and instruction. Therefore, I am allowing YAHWEH to enable me to become a more efficient steward over HIS talents as well as HIS house.

In showing me how to keep the feast, not with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth, HE is preparing me for CHRIST, our Passover…who was sacrificed for us.

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A Purified Heart

by Victor Davis
Before I came to prison, my ego was not well formed. This fact was marked by a lack of maturity and an underdeveloped sense of responsibility; I could procreate, but spiritually, I was a child, an apostate.
I lived life according to my own philosophical values, although I believed YAHSHUA, I was my own idol, as a womanizer, substance abuser, and worst of all, an unreliable parent.
On January 10, 2014, I officially went into DOC custody, and everything I ever feared in my mind became a reality and a nightmare from which I could not awaken. It was a surreal experience.
Within a year’s time, I received the wages of my sins. Everything in which I found my identity and everyone I found security with, were taken away from me. My life was desolated.
During my incarceration, over the course of time I began to re-establish my relationship with YAHVEH, through prayer, faith, and by being a Berean.
In addition to this, HE started to answer my prayers, even if those answers didn’t come in the form I thought they would. However, YAHVEH pruned my heart through these things.
I have come to accept, YAHSHUA as YAHVEH, as well as my eternal SAVIOR. I have learned to be content and steadfast by trusting on HIM solely for all of my needs through endurance and not by relying on the things of the world that used to believe define me.
So, what has YAHSHUA done for me since I’ve been incarcerated? HE refined my heart by giving me HIS character.

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Breaking Bread

by Victor Davis

(NOTICE: AS REQUESTED BY THE AUTHOR, THIS ARTICLE WAS NOT EDITED.)

Approximately one month ago, I had the privilege of attending the evening service and listen to the instructions of Don Coleman, pastor of Highland Baptist assembly, give a sermon over 2 Timothy chapter l . Regarding our responsibility as believers to “stir up, speak up, and stand up.” in accordance with our gifts. He taught us the Greek word for gift. Which is translated charisma in the Strong’s concordance #5486. It means a spiritual endowment.

Sha’ul was admonishing Timothy his spiritual son, to exhibit his gift with character as the leader of the Ephesians assembly, during the reign of the roman emperor Nero, approximately 54 to 68 A.D. Considering the inflictions that Sha’ul, and Timothy would have undergone as the fathers of this congregations in this period of time. I pondered as Don Coleman elaborated on the future Oppression, we as believers may have to encounter for the sake of the gospel.

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The Narrow Path: Prison Sermon by Jim Carmichael

Tonight’s Lesson is about the narrow path.

Good evening and thank you for coming to this lesson on the narrow path that leads to eternal life with God, in a place where there will be no more hardships, no more tears, no suffering, no pain, no death, and no prisons.

If you choose to enter this path, which probably everyone here has, it is stepping out of our comfort zone, it is leaving what appears to be safety, and entering a very dangerous place, where you will be bloodied and bruised, but you must enter because the wide path may not appear to be so dangerous, and in fact comfortable, but it leads to total failure, total destruction, eternity in hell the eternal prison.

The choice to take the less traveled road reminds me of a poem by Christopher Logue.

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Park Plaza Prison Ministry Report 06/15/2017

Tulsa County Jail. Jim Pinkston, Francisco Davila and Zeth Parkhurst teach the men. Several ladies go to the women’s pods every Wednesday, Thursday and Friday for the last five years, to teach. Zeth is teaching with Jim each Wednesday and teaching the hearing impaired. We have baptized 173 of our students this year.
Back to the ladies: We have ladies teaching in all four ladies pods at Tulsa County Jail each week. They rotate lessons every thirteen weeks. Jan Upton, Carol Siling, Elaine Russell, and Theresa Hawkins teach. Elaine is the coordinator for the women. They just opened the fourth ladies pod Elaine is teaching there every Wednesday. Many ladies are being changed by the Gospel because of these ladies.
Dick Connors Correctional Center. Jim Pinkston teaches NLB (New Life Behavior) Lessons and CASA (Christians Against Substance Abuse). He also teaches in the faith based unit and preaches there four evenings each month. He has taught there since 1990. Jim Carmichael teaches every Monday morning and preaches when Pinkston cannot.
Elaine Russell, Jim’s wife Jean, Jim & Jody Carmichael, and Patrick Murphy help and Booker leads singing when he can. We go to the Minimum Security unit on the first and forth Sunday nights for services and to the Medium Security (behind the walls) on the first and third Tuesday nights for services.
Correspondence. 40 packages of 6 to 7 lessons mailed to many prisons in Oklahoma. Every two weeks = 260 lessons x 2 = 520 per month or 6,240 per year. Many of these are people we studied with at Tulsa and Creek County Jail and have gone on to prison or were transferred from one prison to another. This is one way we keep up with our students as they are moved from prison to prison. Elaine Russell & Carol Siling send lessons to ladies who were former students at Tulsa County Jail who have gone to a prison or gone home. On the second and fourth Tuesdays evenings we have a group that meets to grade and get these lessons ready to mail. This is one place we can use some help. We meet at 6 PM in the Ministry Center.
John H. Lilly Correctional Center. Bryan Campbell is doing Celebrate Recovery every Saturday.
Creek Co. Jail . David Stikes, Jim Carmichael and Phil Smith are preparing to start teaching there again in January.
Re-entry program. (Hope City) houses up to eight men right now. Randy Milam is the onsite manager. In the last three years over twenty men have been helped and are closer to Jesus because of the Hope City ministry. Two of these men have their own businesses today and employ several ex-offenders.
Advisory Board. The board is made up of eight men and one woman: James Ivy,(deacon over ministry), Ken Williams, Steve Stade, Scott Blackwell, Gary Medley, Mark Clayton, Randy Milam, Kevin Neiman and Elaine Russell. Jim is the recruiter for the applicants. The board decides who

is approved to enter the reentry program. They go by a set of guidelines approved by the Elders. The board also oversees the operation of the program.
Rogers County Jail. Mike Hawkins started a great jail ministry a few months ago and has been very successful teaching there. God just keeps growing this ministry along with the others.
Future Plans. To continue with the programs that are now successful and just see where God leads us in 2017.
This ministry originated with Marvin Phillips at Garnett Church of Christ in 1989. Elaine Russell brought it to Park Plaza in 2007 where Mitch Wilburn, Terry Finch and James Ivy began working with the ministry in 2007-2008, then Jim Pinkston came on board in 2010 part time for 2 years then full time after that.
Baptisms from this work
2010 94
2011 109
2012 139
2013 259
2014 406
2015 382
2016 398
2017 173 so far this year
Total 2057 Since 2010 That we know of.
To put this in perspective, 2057 would more than fill first & second service at Park Central.
The main help we need is your prayers and support and we could use some help on second and fourth Tuesday evenings grading. We start at 6 PM at the Ministry Center. We furnish everything you need to do in this work.
Impossible without your support.
“Jesus did it!!!”