CAPE COD, MA
The meetings went well at our
fellowship church in Hyannis, MA. The church is thriving and powering on
for God in spite of their pastor’s stroke. We spent time together and he
is recovering nicely. We are believing God for his complete healing!
Sunday it was ‘all day for
Jesus’, with my preaching in the church in the morning, leaving for
Bridgewater State Hospital immediately thereafter, and back to the church
for the evening service! It was whirlwind but worth it! We saw several
people saved in the church AM and PM. At the prison, where our team
normally has 15 men in service,
60 men came out to hear my
testimony! 30 men prayed to receive Christ, 2 were first time decisions!
Bridgewater is designated as a
prison for the ‘criminally insane’. I looked them in the eyes and told
them “You’re no crazier than I am! Start a revolution, break Charles
Manson out of jail, you’re not crazier than that are you?” That broke the
ice, and they began to smile. They knew I had broken through their
‘crazy’ game. “Now I’m just crazy for Jesus!” We had a great time and I
handed out my tract and encouraged men to write to me. “And if you’re
ever in Arizona look me up and we’ll have lunch!”
Later in the week I was invited
to minister in the prison in Dartmouth, MA. Teen Challenge has a
discipleship program there and we had 20 men in the service. Several men
recommitted their lives to Christ and the staff expressed their thanks for
my coming. I stressed the importance of ‘locking in’ to a local church
and handed out flyers for our church in Dartmouth. The men were saying
“Hey, this church is just 3 blocks from where I live! I’m going to check
it out!”
M.T.C. PRISON – KINGMAN, AZ
Chaplain Adorno has a problem.
He’s got ‘revival’ breaking out in his prison with men being ‘saved’
almost daily. A nice problem to have. If it continues, it will only take
1,380 days for every inmate to be ‘saved’! But turnover is high and many
will soon be returning to ‘the streets’. I spoke to several men who will
be getting out within a matter of days and offered to try to help them.
We had 71 men in the Sunday
afternoon service. 17 responded to an invitation to commit (or
recommit) their lives to Christ. Two were first time decisions! The
Spanish service got cancelled and the chaplain took me out to eat between
services.
We returned to the prison by
6:30 for the evening service.
We had 130 men in service. The
Spanish service was combined with the evening service so I was going to
have an ‘interpreter’ (or an ‘interrrupter’). I would say something then
wait for him to interpret. To everyone’s surprise, I opened the service
in Spanish! The guys in the front row coached my interpreter and we made
it through the evening. But what would have taken me ½ hour took us an
hour and a half! So as not to lose the crowds’ attention I had to preach
with twice my normal intensity. By the time I got back to my hotel I
thought I was going to die. But it was all worth it and thirty men
made decisions for Christ, four were first time decisions!
One inmate wrote: “I just got
back from your service. I must tell you that I was touched hearing from
someone as hard core as myself. I’m really burnt out on hearing cornpone
soft testimonies. You have given me the jolt of hope for my faith and for
the vision God has shown me.”
Pray for prisoners and their
families. Thanks for sending us.
In Christ,
Dennis Rice
