"Can we have your guitar?"

We made it! It was a very intense time, both physically (13 events in four days, plus 10+ hour travel in between) and in terms of ministry. Here is a post Andrew wrote for the official tour blog, which you can find at www.hillsong.co.za/about/africa-tour-blog. Feel free to check out some of the other stories there!

Over the course of the Hillsong Africa Worship Tour we had the privilege of visiting five different prisons. Whenever we finished our visit to a prison, this was inevitably the last question we would be asked. This is not significant in itself— prisoners often ask for gifts and favours, and it wasa beautiful guitar. What made the question striking was everything the prisoners were not asking.

Many of the prisons we visited did not provide beds or uniforms for their inmates. Some did not even have safe access to water. One facility was built in 1897, and it did not look like much had changed since then. I will always remember the menu taped to the main gate of one prison. If your family was willing to pay, you could get some actual food added to the small dish of maize-meal. Malnutrition and disease are commonplace, and downright starvation was a continuous lurking possibility. Why ask for a guitar?

(Afternoon Worship Festival in Livingstone, Zambia)

The inmates are intelligent enough to realize they would have more chance of getting some food or money from their visitors than their only musical instrument, but they didn’t care. In a bizarre way they were responding to a hunger that transcended even the most basic human needs. These prisoners did not have food, shelter or even physical safety, and yet all they asked for was music. As one old prisoner said to me, “music is the language of the soul.” Maybe they were so tired of scraping together an existence like animals, that they were desperate for a reminder that there was something more to life than mere survival.

If a prisoner is willing to overlook even basic necessities to nourish his soul, maybe I need to be assessing whether all the luxuries and entertainment in my life are worth the distraction...

(The crowd in Livingstone -- several thousand strong)

Prison Ministry and Missions

Everything comes full circle!

The Andrew Murray Centre began in the late '80s as a missions training program. Everything took a dramatic turn when the leadership decided to bring this training into an unlikely setting—prison. However, prison ministry was always a means to an end. The inmates we served were already leaders… it was just a question of whether they would be leaders for the church or leaders for the gang. Behind the scars and the tattoos, we saw a new generation of missionaries who could reach into dangerous subcultures where American missionaries would have no voice.

Now our mission’s heritage is combined with the prison ministry as never before. Anne and I need to be at the airport at 4:30 tomorrow morning to leave for a nine day tour of Zambia, Botswana and Zimbabwe. The trip is organized by Hillsong Church, and they will be performing huge worship concerts in four major cities.

The Andrew Murray Centre has been asked to coordinate a series of prison visits in each of these countries. We used to do missions trips before starting local work in prisons… now this same prison ministry is taking us international again!

Here is a rough itinerary:

- Livingstone, Zambia – Saturday October 8^th

- Francistown, Botswana – Tuesday October 11^th

-Bulawayo, Zimbabwe – Wednesday October 12^th

- Harare, Zimbabwe – Friday October 14^th

A special prayer request is the prison in Livingstone. Through an administrative mistake I was unable to obtain security clearance for the team. Short of a miracle, we will not be going in there.

Perhaps the most striking aspect of this journey is that I am carrying fifteen letters from South African prisoners. They are praying for this mission, and they wanted to encourage their brothers behind bars. I will share some of these letters with you in the coming weeks.

Thank you for praying with us!