More about the Prison Ministry

I am going to write this for a couple of days to get it all in in short chapters. I don't like LONG blogs, so I will write a little bit each day. This is a picture of Emboscada. Going back a couple of years...

In 2005 Oscar started going to the prison in Emboscada, a place about an hour away from Asuncion. In August (2005), a group of Christians from several different denominations went there to preach to the inmates. Before this time, only the Catholic Priests had visited this prison, full of some of the worst convicts in Paraguay.
Some of the guys in this first group had kids at Colegio Privado Adonai and they invited Oscar to go with them, just to see it and preach there. He went once and ever since then, has loved working with these men and would go, sometimes, one or twice a week.
By the end of that year there were about 50 prisoners who received Christ as their personal Savior and Oscar, Christian and Carlos were visiting the prison almost every other day. Christian started organizing the group, the meetings, the discipling, etc. Carlos started working with the Buen Pastor (a women’s prison) and Oscar offered to serve once a week during the week and once a month on Sundays, taking a whole group from our church for praise and worship, a sermon and a movie.

For some reason, they had nine lady prisoners there, also, (which soon turned into a promiscuous situation), but while the ladies were there, I got involved. I met with them and prayed with them. Most of them had had a very hard life and couldn't break out of their addictive cycles. They knew most of the prisons around the country AND everyone in them. Being in jail (in and out and back in again) was the only life they new.

I went almost every other week mostly because of worry or curiosity of what Oscar was getting into. Deep down in...I was scared for him...or for me. All the while, I also knew that these people were only crying for attention, love, hugs, words of encouragement, gifts and most of all, freedom...and we had/have the answer...freedom in Christ!

Bible verses are written all over the walls of their cells.

The Potter

1st place poem in Wayne County Schools Literary Contest 1986
written by Karen Schley from Chippewa High School,

Sculptor of vessels,
Creator of my soul,
Mold me, suberb Potter,
into the very image that
only Your omnipotent hands
can cast.
Reconstruct the weakness
in the walls
of my thoughts and attitudes.
Place me back into the center
of Your wheel of life.
Fire the numerous impurities
out of my delicate structure
so that I may be
a pure element of
Your esteemed design.

I found this...after 22 years! I thought it was kind of cute. I still have the trophy.

Caught up in a book

I don't have time to blog. I don't have time to email. I don't have time to cook or clean. I don't have time to just "waste"...you know this...I have been writing about this way too often.
Well...Brandon was not fully understanding the "complicated" English language in the book his grade is reading and asked me to re-read to him the first four chapters so he could get it right. Tomorrow was a test day on this book and even though they were reading it in and out of class he just wasn't into it.
I was a little bit annoyed because of all things I had to do or wanted to do. I didn't really want to pick up a school book and start reading it. But, over the years, Brandon has proved to be a quality-time person and I knew how much this meant to him. So, I started dramatizing the story outloud...Till We Have Faces, by C.S. Lewis. We read the first four chapters together, talked about it, he wrote down some notes and a day later came home with an "A" at the top of the test paper. He was excited. I was impressed.
BUT...the worst part was, now I couldn't put the book down. I read to chapter 9 that first night and would have gone on, but I knew it was too late. I gave the book back to Brandon and told him to take it away from me since I didn't have time to read it. He took it back to school and for a week left it there or read it there or whatever.
Last night was "family night" and they wanted to watch a movie with us. I was totally not interested in their movie so Brandon brought me the book. I sat down to read it and read, and read and read. I read more than a 100 pages till 11 pm and tossed the book on the floor remembering my early-morning committments at the sound of an alarm. I took the book down to Brandon while reading the next couple of pages. He said, "mom, I can leave it at home with you. We aren't reading it right now anyway." I said, "no, no, no...please take it with you or I will not do what I need to do today."
So, here I am, caught up in a book...this mystery, this novel. It's kind of fun, though, to sneak off and read it even though dishes need to be washed and clothes need to be folded. I haven't had this kind of entertainment for a while, I guess it's okay.

The Prison Ministry

Pictures from the prison that Oscar visits. This is their "chapel". I've never been to this prison, but I think that the Canadian Work Team and some others (Rod, Erik, Dan?) were here.

Reasons I haven't been blogging...

1. A flare-up a school requiring intentional prayer and conversation.
2. Extremely low temperatures making the task of bread-making a priority to warm the house up a bit.
3. An adventurous science project...making a plant and animal cells out of jello and other yummy candies that look like chloroplasts and ribosomes, etc.
4. A women's conference and tea at IBA on a cold, rainy afternoon.
5. An extremely, active 22 month old kid who must explore and discover everything. Why isn't he satisfied with just books anymore?
6. Tuesday's teaching day at Adonai.
7. Baking a quick crazy cake for a friend's birthday and spending time with her while the MEN in our lives were off watching the Paraguay-Venezuela soccer game. (Oscar was at his bible study, the boys and Jose Luis were at Pastor Pedro's house watching the game.)...till 11 pm! Oh, and...Yes...Lugo and Hugo were celebrating as best buddies.
Hopefully, the rest of this week will be a little less challenging.

A Real Good Thing...

I woke up singing this song this morning. I don't know why, other than I heard it several times the other day on our family outing. But, I really like the words of the chorus...

When we don't get what we deserve

That's a real good thing, a real good thing

When we get what we don't deserve

That's a real good thing, a real good thing

By the way...Edson is still not over his cold and the weather is not helping. We jumped from 100ºF to 50ºF overnight!

Where did my time go?

I spent my "blogging" time reading other blogs and facebooks this morning, but I do have time for a short one.
Monday we took a family day off to see Tobatí, a city in the "mountains", an hour and a half away from Asuncion. We were terribly disappointed. The "beautiful" dry, rocky mountains had large brick factories in front of them blocking the view to all the wonders of creation. We had a picnic lunch in the town's plaza and only Edson's screams of delight on the huge, colorful playground made our "scenic" trip worth while. But...it was family time! Good, quality time! Tereré time! And...the best hits of Newsboys came along with us.
No pictures, nope, I didn't want to remember this desert site in my beautiful memories of Paraguay.