Criminal Justice Ministry

Criminal Justice Ministry

La. State Penitentiary at Angola, Hunt Correctional Institute, and La. Correctional Institute for Women

Sponsored by The Baptist Association of Greater Baton Rouge

The Criminal Justice Ministry is still the largest mission effort of Discipleship Training.  This year volunteers led three, thirteen-week semesters at La. State Penitentiary at Angola, Elayn Hunt Correctional Facility (St. Gabriel) and La. Correctional Institute for Women (St. Gabriel). We maintained a semester average of 255 to 300 this year (plus 120 Seminary Extension at Angola). The three ministries are greatly strengthening the Body-of-Christ, which is empowering the inmates to more effectively share the gospel with lost men and women in the various camps.

Please pray over the incredible expansion of this ministry in all the area prisons. The open doors call for at least 40 new people to be a part of this ministry this year.  God is opening doors faster than we have spiritual soldiers to invest.  The advancement will need new vision, soldiers and financing.  God is at work in Criminal Justice Reform.  We must join Him there. 

Angola Mission Target:        5000 + Men
Hunt Mission Target:          3000 + Men
LCIW Mission Target:          900 + Women         

All 8,900 need to need to be saved and discipled to rebuild their lives and families.

Strategy:

Prayer:
Bring light into a dark place.

Grow the Body-of-Christ in prisons around LA:
Lost people see Jesus when the Body-of-Christ lives out of His love and truth.

Do Sequential Discipleship:
We still need men to facilitate these courses in the prison.  We place one free person with ten prisoners for each semester, so you can see how great our manpower needs are.  Do three, thirteen-week semesters per year.

After Care:   
To recruit churches and mentors for continued discipleship and training for the men and women who have been released.

What Can Your Church Do To Help?

PRAY  for inmates and ministry opportunities to witness and disciple each in our Louisiana prisons.

DISCIPLE  your men and women in the basic discipling units.

ENLIST trained men, women and churches to teach and mentor.  Call someone who has served at one of the prisons to give a personal testimony about the experience to your congregation and train in discipleship.

Enlistment Contact:
If you are interested in volunteering, please call the Baptist Association of Greater Baton Rouge Office at 296-3943 and talk with Jan Terral.  The Department of Corrections requires a security check on all volunteers entering the prison system, so be prepared to give the following information:  name, social security number, date of birth and driver’s license number.

Praise Report:
The La. Correctional Institute for Women at St. Gabriel has nine women being trained to lead out in reaching the inmate population through Master Life.

God is at work in our prisons!

The Prison Ministry Task Force of BAGBR is blessed to be able to report to you what God is doing with your sacrifices. In the summer of 1994, Warden Burl Cain met with our Association Council to ask for help in stabilizing and developing the ministry at Angola. From that moment, God has not stopped working miracles among us. All of the chaplains were assembled and asked what the greatest needs were. The answer was simple: the church in prison needed to be unified and stabilized with fundamental discipling of the men in their vertical walks with Jesus Christ. The first unit of fifty men was taken through Experiencing God in the fall of 1994.

God’s hand has worked steadily from that point. He led this Association in investing many people, three to four nights a week in developing groups in Main Camp, Camp C, Camp D, Camp J, and Camp RC. Tracks of discipling units were done for younger believers, growing believers, and mature believers. The task force met and God led us to develop a long term plan for prison ministry. The past fourteen years have allowed us to see God work in mighty ways.

In the Spring of this year, forty-one men graduated from the New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary Extension Department on the campus of Louisiana State Penitentiary. You help underwrite this valuable ministry. These graduates are then able to be transferred to other State Correctional Facilities in Louisiana, as missionaries, to help the chaplains in their ministries. Their ministries have been of great value in getting the gospel into the lives of other prisoners.

In this past year, the Prison Ministry Task Force has been involved in organizing revivals in Angola, Elayn Hunt Correctional Center (EHCC), and the Louisiana Correctional Institute for Women (LCIW) in St. Gabriel. Many lives have come to meet Jesus through these evangelistic events. Tier visitation is being maintained and more fully organized at all three of these facilities. A college-type semester discipleship ministry, called True Freedom, has been developed through the lessons learned at Angola. Nine diplomas are available for inmates who can pick them up at the appropriate stages of their spiritual development and guide them through their next steps with God. The past five years have been invested in developing a fully operational model for this ministry at EHCC. Men with diplomas in the regional state facilities can then be transferred to Angola to go to seminary. 

As a result of the success of True Freedom at EHCC, BAGBR has received requests from both LCIW and the Louisiana State Police Barracks to come in and implement the discipleship process. In the second week of October, the first semester (thirteen weeks) will be started in the State Police Barracks and in the Spring, Henry Blackaby is coming to LCIW to do an Experiencing God Weekend for three-hundred women. Those same women will then begin their first semester in the new discipling ministry by going through the thirteen-week unit of Experiencing God with one free facilitator per each ten inmates. At the end of that semester, the summer semester of new courses will begin. Getting people to spend regular time alone each day with Jesus is the secret to the true transformation of the heart. We have also been asked by the Orleans and Jefferson parish prisons to come and help them set up a similar process.

One of the long term goals of the Prison Ministry Task Force was to develop ministry to the families of the inmates who are growing in the Lord. In the past two years God has opened the door for this ministry. A.W.A.N.A. has developed a ministry called Malachi Dads. This ministry brings the children of inmates in for a weekend of reunion with their incarcerated parent. During the following year, the inmate is led through a series of discipleship units designed to “turn the hearts of the fathers to their children.” Mature Christians from all over the state are needed to come in to help supervise during that weekend and then to follow–up with that family for the year afterward. For this ministry, churches are needed which will be open to prisoners. Also Jesus’ faithful servants are needed in ministering to these families while discipleship teams work with the parent who is in prison. These servants care for the family and try to get the children involved in an active A.W.A.N.A. ministry or an active children’s ministry. The database is currently being built of people who are called to this ministry.

Another long term goal of the Task Force was to develop half-way houses for prisoners who are eligible to be released but either have nowhere to go or are not ready to begin a “normal” life on the outside. In the past six months, God seems to have opened the door for our first one to begin. Please be in prayer for God to supply the yearly salary of a half-way house director. His job would be to coordinate teams of lay people who will come in and do discipleship units in the half-way house, teach men how to create resumes, take them on job interviews, and train them how to live responsibly in the world. He will also need help in overseeing the facility.

With God expanding the prison ministry so rapidly you can imagine that the needs of the ministry are great. Revivals need men and women who can come in for a couple of days and help in witnessing teams, cooking, singing, preaching, playing instruments and the other skills related to revivals. As different prisons ask for help, discipleship groups need men and women who can come for thirteen weeks in a row on a given night of the week to help disciple groups of ten inmates in their personal walk with Jesus. As you might imagine, the materials are expensive for hundreds of prisoners each semester (from Survival Kit for New Christians to Experiencing God to the Masterlife series). We thank you from the bottom of our hearts for your sacrificial giving to this ministry.

Each correctional facility needs men and women who will give time to be a volunteer chaplain or a volunteer secretary to help handle the large amount of paper work and record keeping necessary to consistent ministry. Especially needed are experienced pastors who can volunteer some time to help the chaplains in their ministries. Men and women are needed to work with the Malachi Dads and Proverbs Moms groups in all of the roles explained above. As the Half-Way House ministry begins, many new men and women are going to be needed to help these prisoners learn how to cope in the real world again.

Our greatest need is for those who take time to pray. Satan’s strongholds come down when Jesus’ servants’ prayers go up. Only God can coordinate His body to do the miracles we have seen performed.

CRIMINAL JUSTICE MINISTRY
2007-08 Annual Report
Louisiana Correctional Institute for Women, St. Gabriel
Joan Allred, BAGBR Representative

The ministry of Bible study classes at LCIW (Louisiana Correctional Institute for Women) at St. Gabriel was started about eight years ago. These classes have changed the lives of many inmates. Some of the women in the classes were without hope but now they have hope in Jesus their Savior.

BAGBR has classes four days a week, each approximately 1-1/2 hours long. Chaplain Gary Sumrall is the director of the program and selects and approves all materials used. Time and space for classes are limited, but we thank God for His gift to us to serve the inmates and teach them about Jesus. Our Association purchases all the workbooks for study. In addition, the ladies receive diplomas at the end of the semester, also provided by the Association.

Every year BAGBR has a three-day revival at the prison the first weekend in October. There is good preaching, singing and fellowship under a very large tent put up by Rev. Dick DeBusk. Services are Friday evening, Saturday morning and late afternoon, and Sunday morning, with baptisms Sunday afternoon. Many inmates make decisions to follow Christ and seeds of the Word are planted in the hearts of so many more. This year BAGBR was joined by the LBC Women’s Missions and Ministry organization on Saturday. They made ditty bags filled with hygiene supplies and then gave one to each inmate in the prison. This was so appreciated by the inmates. The revival, meal, and ditty bags are for all inmates in the prison which now numbers approximately 1,200.

An update on the new chapel at LCIW is great to share. God has been so faithful to provide the funds. The chapel is a 10,000 square foot building with a capacity of 600 people. It is divided into a worship center that will seat 450, a large class room, a medium sized class room and a conference room/library. There will also be office space and bathrooms. To date, we have raised and spent right at $800,000.00. It will take another $75,000.00 to complete construction. Then once construction is complete it will take $250,000.00 to furnish. The chapel is being built completely on donations, so we ask you to pray concerning this need.

Those of us who serve as volunteers look forward to having a large space for classes and individual class rooms to lead Bible studies. We believe this is a mission field God has called us to harvest and appreciate your prayer support.