prayer request

This morning at Hobson Methodist Church in East Nashville, the pastor reminded us of how very difficult it is to pray for others when we don't know anything about them, and when we don't feel we have anything in common with their pain.

I ask that you remember yourself at your loneliest. The moment when you knew that no one was in your corner. I know it is painful, but remember that saddest time when you put yourself to bed thinking, "I've got nothing and no one."

Now imagine that moment, and imagine being in prison. It's not what Paris Hilton went through.

Every Monday evening, I visit the Riverbend Maximum Security Institute, where Tennessee's most dangerous, (personally, I would say most harmed by market scarcity and a former slave society), convicted criminals are housed and executed. I've been taking a class there since August and intend on auditing future classes. Most of these guys have killed people. Some have been in for 30+ years and will never see the free world. Others have been in for a long time, but hope to get out in three to five years. A few of them still have at least twenty years to go.

From my friends living on the "inside" I have learned about two things: 1) reconciliation, and 2) patience. Paul Tillich said, "Waiting is its own special destiny. Every time is a time of waiting, waiting for the breaking in of eternity. All time, both history and personal life is expectation."

This semester I have agonized - - feeling that I have very little to offer these guys. But in moments of reflection, I know that I can in fact pray intensely on their behalf, and now I ask that you pray for them too during this month. Ask your churches to pray for the imprisoned. Do it at the dinner table. Pray for their comfort. You know, Christmas time can be the loneliest of all times even while being surrounded by Aunts and Uncles in tacky sweaters and eating cookies. Christmas time is when suicide rates peak. It is when our non-Christian friends feel a peculiar sense of cultural and socio-alienation or disconnect. It is when we long for that which we have given up. It is when we drink too much red wine. It is when we think about how things should be.

Please pray for the comfort and justice of the imprisoned during this time. When class ends and I walk in one direction and these guys walk in the other, I am reminded of all the silly things I am allowed to comfort myself with simply because I live in the free world. My friends need the prayers of those who are also broken and suffering: that's you and me.