Matthew 25:36
I was naked and you clothed me,
I was sick and you visited me,
I was in prison

Archive: And You Came to Me

Larry Bogart is a United Methodist doctor who spent three years in a maximum security prison, where God led him as a servant-witness for Jesus Christ.

Jake O. has spent years at the state penitentiary at Eddyville, Kentucky. His parents are now elderly and unable to visit him. During the three years I served as a medical director, I cannot recall his having a single visit. He is buried like a forgotten man in a giant sarcophagus of steel bars and electric fences.

Scripture gives us a mandate to “Think constantly of those in prison as if you were prisoners at their side.” (Phillips).

Unfortunately, we Christians, like the world, seem to have forgotten that even prisoners are human beings, with feelings and a need to be important to someone.

Christ never forgot. In fact, prisoners are so important to Him that He accepts an act of kindness toward an inmate as if He were the recipient. “I was in prison and you came to me … as you did it to one of the least of these my brethren you did it unto me.” Try as we might, His words will not go away.

Joe was down! He knew there was no sense getting up false hopes. I’ll never get out of this place. What’s the use trying to be straight? Then a visit came from Sister Christine, a loving, radiant Catholic teacher from Louisville. Joe was like a new person. Sister told Joe about his friend, Danny, who had been “out” nearly a year. Danny was going straight now, had married, and was buying a house. “We are waiting for you, Joe. Your home is with us.”

Joe’s hopes were revived. There was something out there to live for! It was worth the effort to stay “cool.” A few weeks later, Joe received a beautiful letter from Sister Christine. It reaffirmed him as a man, as someone important to someone out there. Again, Joe’s hopes were lifted and his will to go on strengthened.

Have you ever wondered why the church is called to remember and to visit convicts? Perhaps it’s because Christ knew it takes people to change people. People who care. People who are willing to get involved in Christ’s name. People who are willing, yes, even to fail.

After working for three years as a prison doctor, I’ve come to believe no significant reformation will occur behind prison walls until Christ’s mandate to care about prisoners is taken seriously.

When we do risk ourselves for prisoners, results come. God blesses our efforts.

Billy H. was once referred to as the meanest and most dangerous convict at Eddyville. He knew what it was like to spend four years in a tiny 6 by 10 cell, 24 hours a day, with an occasional shower and rarely a visit.

Then, a miracle! Two and a half years ago Billy found Christ. A beautiful Christian layman led him to the Lord. Thank God, Joe Rose’s concern did not end after he had won a convert. Week after week, he drove 150 miles round trip from his home in Hopkinsville, Kentucky, to Eddyville State Penitentiary to disciple Billy. This was the continuation of Joe Rose’s 20-year ministry during which he had been a true friend to many convicts. I often think of Joe when I hear the words of Jesus, “I was in prison and ye visited me.” Recently I heard Billy addressing about 80 fellow inmates. He said, “You cannot take a newborn baby and abandon him and expect him to survive. Because Joe and the Doc [Dr. Larry Bogart] stuck by me these three years, I can stand here tonight and assure you that I intend to live for Christ no matter what comes.”

Billy is now a radiant, sensitive Christian with the deepest love for Christ I have ever seen. As Billy became a new person in Christ, I found my friendship with him more and more enriching. In the end, the one we had so carefully discipled was ministering to us!

Perhaps another reason Christ commanded us to “come to prisoners” is because He knew the benefit for the visitor. I’ve frequently heard first-time visitors say, “This was one of the greatest experiences I have ever had. I had no idea what prisons or prisoners were like before. Those inmates are just like us.”

Something special happens to the person who cares enough to go against the grain of his anxiety, and visits a prisoner.

Men behind prison walls are numbed by endless days, pungent loneliness, and profound alienation. A sense of unreality and of ceasing to care sets in. A visit from someone who loves Jesus Christ, treats you with respect, who is willing to come back and be a friend can literally raise a man to life again. Resurrection!

In prison, a seemingly commonplace visit can so deeply influence another person’s life that it is almost like a religious experience. A visit—a simple visit—gives a prisoner new hope. To know someone cares; that here is someone I can trust—this can be the first step back to a meaningful future.

Gerrald Fair had been on Eddyville’s administrative control unit for nearly two years after taking hostages. Now he is attending Asbury College where he is majoring in the social sciences. His transformation started, by his own account, when he realized there were Christians who cared and believed in him.

In a study by noted psychologist Daniel Glasser, most ex-cons who remained “straight” over a five-year period had been influenced not by treatment staff per se, but by persons who had treated them justly. The study concluded that the reformative influence was a change in the offender’s perception of his relationship to others in society. A lay visitor who treats an inmate with love and respect may be the first reformative influence an inmate has encountered since he began a life of crime.

Many Christians are concerned about prisoners but do nothing simply because they do not know what to do. How do you go about visiting an inmate? How do you know whom to write or visit?

Fortunately most state or federal prisons and reformatories have a chaplaincy program. Either the chaplain or superintendent of treatment can furnish you names of men who receive no visitors or who wish to receive mail. Having received the names of such inmates, you simply choose one name, write a letter introducing yourself and offering to visit. Invariably the inmate will promptly write back inviting you. He will contact his case worker and have you placed on his visiting list. The case worker will send you a brief form to fill out and return. Then, you and the inmate can decide on a time and date for your visit.

One word of caution. Don’t send any items except letters or stamps unless you check with some official at the prison. If the inmate keeps asking you for gifts and favors, confront him with this attempted manipulation. If he persists, graciously break off this relationship and make contact with another man or woman. The majority of inmates I have known are like people anywhere. If they like you they will not try to use you.

Today the problem of crime has reached crisis proportions. If Christians continue to ignore prisons, they will continue to be breeding places for more crime. In no area has the church so abrogated its responsibility. In the one area of social concern where the transformation of men is most urgently needed, the church has readily permitted the whole burden to be laid on the state. This is not the answer. The state simply lacks the spiritual resources and vision to complete this task alone.

But concerned Christians, caring enough to visit a lonely inmate, can interrupt this vicious cycle of crime. If every Christian family who is free to do so would become a friend of one inmate, the results would be incredible. The lives of hopeless men and women would be transformed, not to mention the persons who would be freed from hell. How I wish I could better convey to you the urgency of this need. May the Spirit awaken His people to their mandate to “remember prisoners as if they were prisoners at their side!”

Would you like to get involved in prison ministry?

Write: Charles Colson, Prison Fellowship, P.O. Box 40562, Washington, D.C. 20016.

Editor’s note: February 1, 1977, Dr. Larry Bogart resigned as physician at Kentucky State Penitentiary (Eddyville). Bogart said his reasons for quitting included interference by prison officials with his management of the prison hospital and “severe budgetary restrictions that left the medical department without essential supplies.” He also cited the conflict between his philosophies and the “sadistic attitudes” of some prison employees.

Prison superintendent Don Bordenkircher said he spent more time with Bogart than with any other staff member. “I consider him a friend of mine,” the warden said. “Once in a blue moon you meet a Bogart … I disagree with some of the things he believes, but he‘s refreshing because whatever his philosophy, he genuinely believes it and lives it. … ”

The following is the testimony of one former prisoner whose life was touched by Dr. Bogart.

My name is Gerrald Fair. I am 27 years old and have been a Christian for one year. When I was born my father left my mother, who had to raise my sister and me alone. My mother remarried, but this marriage never worked out for me. My stepfather resented me. This unhappy home situation influenced me to run away from home. I spent some time with my grandmother who showed some love for me.

At the age of 12 I was caught shoplifting. By the time I was in the ninth grade I was a delinquent and barred from attending any of the schools in Fayette County, KY. I was considered incorrigible. This set in motion a chain of events which put me into every correctional institution in Kentucky—finally ending up in maximum security at Eddyville as a habitual criminal. My ten-year sentence was lengthened to 11 ½ years for cutting an officer and for holding hostages.

While in solitary confinement, Dr. Larry Bogart (medical director of prison) showed some interest in me and persuaded me to attend school classes. This resulted in my taking and passing the General Educational Development examination.

When my attitude changed for the better, I was granted parole with the condition that I have a home to live in, and a job. After several unsuccessful attempts in this direction I was invited to stay in the home of an older Christian couple, Dr. and Mrs. H. A. Hanke. I was given a job at a local auto body shop.

A few months after getting out of prison I was in a serious car accident resulting in a broken hip and brain concussion. When the authorities were about to send me to Eastern State, a mental hospital, the men at the men’s prayer breakfast in the local United Methodist Church had a special prayer for me. I was restored to complete mental health but still had a badly injured hip. This condition has now been healed and I am walking well with the use of a cane. I have just successfully completed a reduced college work load, and now have a full load for this winter quarter.

Last summer I was filled with the Holy Spirit. Life has taken on a whole new dimension for me. At the Indian Springs Camp Meeting in Georgia, I gained a better understanding of what happened to me when the Holy Spirit baptized me.

Dr. Hanke and I now conduct prison services in five Kentucky correctional institutions. This gives me a chance to witness to the men with whom I was imprisoned. At my baptism a new ministry was opened up for us at the Camp Nelson home for juvenile boys. We conduct regular services there, and the boys frequently attend our United Methodist Church. I feel that this juvenile home ministry is important because first offenders (age 16-17) are taken here. If they can be redirected here, they will be spared a life of crime later. I am very much indebted to many fine Christian people for giving me a chance. I know now that only Christ has the answer to life’s problems and this is my message to those I contact.