I remember being in Brazil working for Teen Challenge, and a group of us wanted to reach out to blokes in Prison. The part of Brazil I was in had 9 prisons and one was just for the corrupt police.
We got an invite to go in and lead a service for the fellas, I decided to take my brother in law with me, as he was visiting at the time. ‘It’s safe mate, nothing to worry about, we go in, do a talk and out, job done’ I told him, simply relaying what had been told to me. Error.
My brother in law and I laugh about it now, but as we entered the prison it became obvious this was a prison built for 100 and had over 1000 inside. The inmates had keys and controlled the prison from the inside with official guards holding machine guns sporadically appearing on the walls above.
As we walked in we immediately felt like we had made a terrible mistake. Greeted by the wildest looking fella we had ever seen I started to walk away quickly, head down but pretending that I was mildly confident and supposed to be there. My brother in law got left behind, and I heard a yelp like a puppy calling for it’s mum. A mixture of fear, pride and desperation reunited us and kept us going further into the complex.
Inside the chapel we prayed, read our Bibles and avoided eye contact as best we could and took part in the service. You see we had stepped so far out of our comfort zone that it gripped us both with fear but adventure, worry but then courage, an overwhelming urge to scream but a strength and boldness that prevailed.
If we want to be bold men of God, courageous, adventurous, and fearless as we go forward these are not things we can order online and wait for them to arrive. Take a deep breathe and ask God to put you in places that are going to get you trusting him, relying on him, speaking about him, calling out to him and ultimately, seeing him be glorified!
Image Credit: Christian Bardenhorst
