"Strange Company"

What could a man from the Congo, an Afrikaaner, a couple from Australia, a Xhosa, a German, a couple from America and a man from Switzerland all have in common?

Just another Thursday afternoon in prison ministry!

The Andrew Murray Centre is called to be a bridge between the churches and the prisons, and that mission brings a strange crew of people together in a single purpose. We are a non-denominational Christian ministry with a leadership team that draws from the full spectrum of South Africa’s racial diversity. Despite coming from radically different backgrounds, we are united in our mission:

“Raising up a new generation of Christian leaders from South Africa’s prisons—a discipleship journey that will return the churches to those they have forgotten and rejoin the prisoners with those they have harmed.

It is strange, but prison ministry is remarkably similar across social and racial barriers. On the surface a Latino gangster from Southern California would have literally nothing in common with a Xhosa ganster from Mbekweni. Unfortunately prison acts like a sociological meat-grinder! No matter where these men come from they are subjected to a similar range of isolation, bitterness, prejudice, racism and violent trauma. It is impossible to predict all the factors that will bring someone to prison, but it is easy to predict the challenges they will face as they try to make it out of the system. It’s bittersweet, but this is one of the reasons I have been successful in ministry here—even as a foreigner. My work in South Africa is very similar to prison ministry that I began doing in the States back in 2001.

The challenges we face in prison ministry cut across cultural lines, and our ministry team also defies cultural expectations. However, there is something even more important that ties everything together. The God we serve has the same loving character -- whether it is a "C-Max" in Johannesburg or death row in Texas.