Imagine an ideal setting for spiritual revival. Odds are good that the razor wire and guard towers of Angola prison, Louisiana\u2019s infamous maximum-security penitentiary, don\u2019t fit the bill. Yet spiritual revival is precisely what is taking place among the prison\u2019s inmate population, most of whom are incarcerated for life.<\/p>\n
‘Dr. John Robson [who heads the seminary extension programme inside Angola] believes that spiritual revival in the United States may begin in the prisons,’ Calvin Seminary Professor Ron Nydam reports. Nydam and Professor John Rottman have taken multiple trips to Angola with students. They have seen firsthand the difference the gospel makes in the lives of men who have lost hope.<\/p>\n
‘At first I didn\u2019t want to visit Angola,’ Rottman admits. ‘But it\u2019s really an astonishing place.’ ‘You see that psychology is very inadequate in terms of explaining this kind of human transformation,’ Nydam says. ‘This is a God-thing. It\u2019s very spiritual.’<\/p>\n
Angola prison has a tough hundred-year history. The facility is the size of Manhattan Island and home to 5300 inmates carrying out life sentences. It\u2019s a place where the ‘worst of the worst’ go and never come out. Inmates used to sleep with a magazine stuffed inside their shirts, their best defence against a 3:00 a.m. knifing.<\/p>\n
That was until the mid-1990s, when Warden Burl Cain came to Angola. Cain\u2019s conviction that moral rehabilitation is the surest way to recover a prisoner\u2019s humanity has completely changed the culture of Angola over the past 20 years. Under Cain\u2019s direction, New Orleans Baptist Seminary started offering Bible classes inside the prison. The programme grew, and today a full range of seminary classes is available to qualified inmates, complete with Greek and Hebrew. The incidence of prison violence has been reduced by 73 percent. The Bible classes led to the establishment of inmate-led churches. These worshipping communities are the heart of the prison\u2019s transformation.<\/p>\n
After experiencing Angola, Rottman began wondering whether a seminary would ever be allowed inside one of Michigan\u2019s prisons. The student he talked with didn\u2019t think so. ‘Michigan prisons are locked up too tight,’ he said.<\/p>\n
‘Eight months later we got a pack in the mail,’ Rottman says. Eight inmates of the Handlon medium-security correctional facility in Ionia, Michigan, wanted to enrol in Calvin Seminary\u2019s certificate programme in pastoral care. So Professor Ronald Feenstra wrote a letter to Handlon\u2019s warden. His inquiry went unanswered for months. Then one day Feenstra spoke to the warden\u2019s secretary, who arranged a meeting.<\/p>\n
‘So we went down.’ Rottman remembers. ‘And the warden said, “You must have a lot of influence.\u201d Feenstra and I thought to ourselves, “We don\u2019t have any influence.\u201d The warden said, “I got your letter, and I didn\u2019t know what to do with it. Having a seminary teach a class in a prison is unprecedented in Michigan. Then the new director of corrections for the state came in. I said to him, ‘Dan, what do you want me to do with this letter?\u2019 He scanned it and said, \u2018Make that happen.’\u201d’<\/p>\n
And thus Handlon prison became a Calvin Seminary extension site. ‘Two or three weeks after that we taught our first class,’ Rottman says.<\/p>\n
Now in its fifth class at Handlon, the programme is bearing fruit. A small group of inmates have established a Christian Reformed congregation inside the prison, pastored by Calvin Seminary alumni Andy Hanson. Hanson was a student visitor to Angola on Rottman\u2019s first trip. ‘There are now about 50 people attending every Sunday,’ Rottman says.<\/p>\n
These stories of fellow Christians, living as Christ\u2019s church in the world through word and deed, inspire us for ministry in our own local contexts. They remind us that we\u2019re not ‘in it alone.’ Jesus is indeed using his church as organism and as institution to bring hope and help for this life, and for the life to come.<\/p>\n
Taken with permission from the <\/i>Calvin Theological Seminary Forum, Fall 2013<\/i><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Imagine an ideal setting for spiritual revival. Odds are good that the razor wire and guard towers of Angola prison, Louisiana\u2019s infamous maximum-security penitentiary, don\u2019t fit the bill. Yet spiritual revival is precisely what is taking place among the prison\u2019s inmate population, most of whom are incarcerated for life. ‘Dr. John Robson [who heads the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[],"resource-author":[5496],"topic":[5951,4907,5988],"class_list":["post-13363","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-articles","resource-author-manion-kirsty","topic-evangelism","topic-history-and-biography-2","topic-today"],"yoast_head":"\n