This will be an intense week…
Monday June 13th begins our Restorative Justice program in Drakenstein Correctional Centre. We are going to be working with twenty-four juvenile (late teens, early twenties) prisoners. The goal of the program is to challenge these young men to take responsibility for what they have done, and begin the long journey of healing the shattered relationships in their lives. We will spend all day together for the next five days, and then everything comes to a head on Saturday when we bring their families into the prison.
(Andrew teaching a previous Restorative Justice class)
I have a dynamic team of twelve facilitators who will be supporting this project. While I will be doing much of the teaching, they have the more important job of running the small-group discussions at the tables. We are a diverse crew… American, Afrikaans, Scottish, Xhosa and even a German! We come from all different backgrounds ranging from Californian college students to South African ex-prisoners. Honestly, I feel God’s sense of humor in this! How is it that a random white American guy is supposed to reach into the lives of African prisoners? By any natural comparison, we come from different worlds that have nothing in common.
This is why you are so important! I do not want to fight my way through this week through my own charisma or intelligence (You can insert whatever joke you want here!). These young men have deeply alienated themselves from their families and from their society, and it will take a divine act to heal these relationships. Pray with us! I include a few prayer requests from my team so you get a sense for our hopes and fears.
-Pray this would not just be another program for the inmates. They need a heart transformation, not just a certificate!
-Pray for the inmates’ families – Saturday will be an intense experience for them, and we want them to be prepared spiritually and emotionally.
- Pray for concentration and focus for our students and volunteers. Prison is a very distracting place. It’s always noisy!
- Pray for clear communication with the authorities – prison is the ultimate bureaucracy.
-Pray for safety from ridicule and persecution for inmates once it is known that they have gone through this process. It’s difficult to leave the gangs, or even show evidence of a changed life.
-Pray for teachable spirits for both the facilitators and the inmates.
- Pray for unity among our team. This is often an area where we experience spiritual attack during significant times like this.
- Pray for smooth execution of all the logistics – venues, food, transportation, communication with families, etc.
- Pray that God’s justice would transcend cultural differences.
Thank you for your support! As the week progresses we will give you more information, but at the moment we go forward with confidence that can only come from an understanding of 1 John 5:5
“Who is it that overcomes the world? Only he who believes that Jesus is the Son of God.”
