USA (MNN) — A church in Bartlesville, Oklahoma, is reaching
out to prison inmates with Bible correspondence lessons.
They're discipling ministry covers 10 states, as well as in Iraq and
Saudi Arabia. If a student doesn't have
a Bible, the church supplies them with an Easy-to-Read English Bible from the World
Bible Translation Center.
In 2007, roughly $49 billion was spent on corrections.
That's up from $11 billion 20 years before. The national recidivism rate is roughly
75%, with former inmates returning to jail or prison within three years.
How does the Bible help in an arena filled with hard
hearts? Crossroad Bible Institute's
research shows an interesting fact, says CBI's
David Schuringa: "If a person in prison is engaged in sustained study of
God's Word and being discipled, the recidivism rates can just
plummet."
That dovetails nicely with WBTC's goal to develop partnerships
between churches to reach out and impact the world for Jesus. The ERV is written at a third grade reading level so that anyone with basic literacy skills
or with little or no Christian background can understand it.
Pray that God's Word
sinks deeply into their hearts. Continue
to pray too that God stirs hearts to be involved with this ministry.
One of my Pen pals Shane Jaggars from Texas Prison told me about you all, so I thought I’d email and ask what you do if an inmate writes into your ministry. What do you send them? and I was wondering if I can check them out too. God Bless sis Denise Cully