What’s New!
Jim P still works as a volunteer preaching two times a month at DCCC and waiting to go back into the Tulsa County Jail when allowed. As we all know this has been very limited due to the Covid-19 lockdown in both the prison and jail systems. The county jail remains on lockdown due to the constant flow of people in and out, however the prisons were reopened to volunteers around August. Ray Vaughn is working as an assistant Chaplain for the Tulsa County Jail.
Jim P and Elaine Russell continue to attend worship services with me four times a month in Hominy (DCCC) and Jim P and I take turns preaching.
We have two men the Park COC is supporting in their Christian Education, and we now have them preaching on the two Tuesday evenings on the medium side with us (Jim P and I) overseeing. This is to give them practical experience in preparing and delivering sermons <br> <br>
Growth
When we (Jody and I) took over the prison ministry in January of 2021 we were mailing out about 175 lessons a month. We now have over 900 correspondence students, and we are now mailing out close to 400 a month, and these are complete courses, where before it was only ½ course at a time, and our in-class training at Dick Conners is growing as well.
It looks like very soon now we will hit 1,000 correspondence and classroom students.
On March 15th I will be offering a video class twice a day… I have found this is a great way to “entice” new men to come to the classes, all most all of them enjoy videos. I am just waiting for an updated list of men and their addresses at Dick Conners and will be sending each man a flyer inviting them to the classes… in the past we merely posted the upcoming classes on the bulletin board of the pods, so hopefully this will attract quite a few more men, as the last flyer did.
We now have 15 wonderful, hard-working volunteers who pick up the lessons, grade them, and return them quickly. We just had 6 more ladies volunteer to help and they will be starting to work soon, after a little training. As this part of the ministry grows, we see a great need for more volunteer graders.
They include Dave Huey, Ray, and Suzanne Vaughn, Waymon and Diane Honeycutt, Fran Thomas, Rochelle Epperson, Billy Mize, Wes Crafts, Jim Pinkston, Elaine Russell, Mike and Theresa Hawkins, Caroline Kusler, Linda Brown, Mike and Bunny Williams, Steve and Jade Harrold, Wayne and Pam Pope, Jake Schweikhard.
Two months ago, we decided we could substantially save on postage by sending the complete lessons rather than just half at a time. We expected our mail to be reduced by half… but that didn’t happen… the people are completing the entire lessons and returning them at the same rate of speed. What a blessing!!! We now see a great need for new Courses to send to our students.
These folks are hungry for the Word…
In my last report, I stated that due to the work of Jody, 1/3 of the women at Eddie Warrior Correctional Center in Taft Ok (a women’s prison which houses 900 women) are taking New Life Behavior, Bible study lessons, and Christian Apologetics lessons. Since the last report, they are at over 40%, Dick Conners is now at 9% with Mabel Bassett in a close third position at 8%.
At Dick Conners Correctional Center in Hominy OK, we have started a very aggressive evangelistic program, reaching out to every man incarcerated encouraging them to take our courses… with men in each pod who have committed their lives to Christ to be our inside contact, and inside evangelists.
Also, in my last report I mentioned one man, Andrew Williams is handling all our courses for us there, distributing them, receiving, and grading them, and letting us know who needs to receive a certificate. Andrew is one of 6 chapel orderlies, of whom most have received their bachelor’s degrees, and with the help of the benevolence ministry and at the direction of Clark Lineback, we are sponsoring a few of these men to achieve advanced degrees in ministry. All are training to be inside evangelists, with an eye on the future. When they return to their homes, they will be “street evangelists” to their neighbors, friends, and family, with some becoming preachers in local churches. This effort has become successful, and I think within the next few months we will have to revert to Tuesday evening grading sessions just for the Dick Conners Students. If it continues at its current rate of growth, the grading will just be too much for Andrew to handle.
The Angel Tree Project & Prison Fellowship
The Angel Tree Project: A few months ago, I approached Danielle Schrock to consider helping with The Angel Tree project which is reaching out to the children of inmates, purchasing Christmas presents for them, and other activities throughout the year.
We are hoping we will be able to help Angel Tree experience a fantastic growth this coming year. I stated in the last report that Danielle is a super star… no other way to put it… she has not only investigated it, but has associated with this group, has already found 13 children to help with Christmas 2021, has already raised the funds, purchased the presents, and delivered them to the children. We pray she doubles or triples this number by the coming Christmas.
I need to receive your input on another idea I have in starting a family outreach program, even if merely inviting the family of prisoners to start attending our services. three areas I thought would be perfect is The Park (of course) Contact Church, and Beggs COC.
Prison Fellowship and Outreach Program
There are a lot of parents, grandparents, and spouses out there with loved ones on the inside, and I think by reaching out to them, we will not only increase our membership, but giving the support to many people who have loved ones incarcerated.
We still need help in the following areas…
- People who would be willing to go on the “inside” with me to preach or teach classes.
- Our long-term goal is to have men and women in every prison in Northeast Oklahoma teaching New Life Behavior, and Apologetics classes.
- People who will help with grading.
- One new lady jumped into the grading “Fray” this week, Daven Fowler Tackett who is going to be a great help.
- And we have the other five mentioned earlier who will join us soon.
- People who will help with our family outreach program.
- People who could help create new courses of study for inmates.
- If any of you have course already prepared, we would love to add them to the list of courses we are offering.
- Or, if you are willing to develop courses of study, that would also be great
- Normally the courses consist of 12 – 13 lessons, and we have one that includes 24.
- People who can and are willing to help finance all the above.
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- We already have a number of contributors and as the ministry grows, as you know so will the financial needs grow.
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A Special Acknowledgment
And, finally, a special thanks to Tim Maynard, who has been a great source of inspiration, information, and guidance to me as we move forward in the prison ministry.
And a special acknowledgement of those not mentioned earlier in the report whose support of the prison ministry is awesome.
Don Millican
Phil Smith
Ken Williams
And a special prayer for Carolyn Kusler for a quick recovery
Additional Information
Luke 4:18 “The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me, Because He has anointed Me To preach the gospel to the poor; He has sent Me to heal the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives
And recovery of sight to the blind,
To set at liberty those who are oppressed.
Matthew 18:12 “What do you think? If a man has a hundred sheep, and one of them goes astray, does he not leave the ninety-nine and go to the mountains to seek the one that is straying?
This is the purpose of the Park Prison Ministry…. To restore sight to the blind… you must have had sight for it to be restored…
Many of these men (and Women) have been raised in the church.
I recently had 8 men sitting with me in the prison and I asked how many had been raised with a Christian foundation, (raised in the church) … the answer was all of them, and two of them were preachers kids.
These are the men who once had sight, were blinded by the evil of the world, and now incarcerated are having their sight restored… they are the “1” who Christ left the “99” for, so I thank each one of you for your kind hearts, and willingness to send us to the “1” who was lost….
As you know my focus is teaching Christian Apologetics in the prison system, (and to anyone who will listen to me.)
The Pew Research Center studied the effects of higher education on church raised children a few years ago and found that 50% of children raised in the Church, lost their faith while in college at the hands of a lost professor.
One of the major reasons people go astray is because they do not know how to defend their belief… not to others… nor to themselves…
Therefore, I have a passion for Apologetics… so everyone can know why we can trust the reliability of Scripture to be the truth, and our guiding light for the narrow path.
So, this is the reason for my passion to teach prisoners why they can believe, and my desire that we reach out to the children, teaching them early on how they can know all the “Bible Stories” are actually Historical Accounts recorded in the Bible, to arm them against false teachers, helping them stay on the path, and not end up in Dick Conners, or some other prison before they learn the truth.
Therefore, I consider people like Danielle Schrock and the ladies who work with her as an extremely important part of the prison ministry, for they are the people who have the best opportunity to accomplish this.
In a sense they are part of the prison ministry, not only because of their work with Angel Tree, and Prison Fellowship, but they are arming our children with the facts they need to give them that galvanized faith through knowledge they will need in the future to keep them on that narrow path that leads to life.
In Closing:
Without everyone mentioned here, and the entire congregation of The Park Church of Christ this ministry would not be possible… God bless you and thank you for all you do!
Jim & Jody Carmichael