Heartfelt Thanks

A note of immeasurable gratitude to all of you who supported me this past weekend during our Kairos team’s work at Pendleton Correctional.  I’d love to share a few things that made the time with the 42 offenders a blessing.

Moments of Joy

• Receiving 60+ dozen of baked chocolate chip cookies from a good friend and brother to take into the men.  Robert - My thanks to you and your wonderful wife for this gift.  All in, we took in 2,954 DOZEN cookies (that’s 35,448 cookies for those doing the math). Lots were eaten and we hand-delivered one dozen cookies to each inmate in their cells at the facility.  Your prayers were felt.
• Being surprised almost daily with a check in the mail from many of you.  WOW!
• Seeing your names on the prayer chart, and being able to point and say “that’s my mom/best friend from college/friend from church/aunt/uncle” praying for you right now.  It allowed me to see hardened men eyes wide, full of tears and speechless.
• Sitting down for a meal and seeing placemats with my nieces' and nephew’s names on them, or beautiful quotes and art drawn by the girls in the Junior Daughters of the King group from my church.  Many of these became keepsakes that the men took with them.
• Witnessing the prayer chain ring that ran the circumference of the gym, each ring with your names and the names of others who support this ministry. 
• Being there for the moment when God pointed all of creation over years and years in order to save one young man’s life…literally.  My Dad or I can tell you the story next time one of us is with you, and it is powerful!  Romans 8:28 in full force.
• Sitting at the closing ceremony with family and friends who were there rejoicing in seeing lives changed, souls redeemed and men with new names.

Favorite Quotes

• Whenever someone would say, “God is good!” there was resounding response of “ALL THE TIME!” from the men.
• Shortly after my Dad told the story of how much he paid for me to be born at an Air Force hospital ($1.38), one of the volunteers brought me and another volunteer, whose name was Buck Small, to the front of the room and said, “Meet my two new best friends…Buck Small and Buck Thirty-Eight!”.
• As the common misconception of The Church (buildings, organizations, religions, denominations) was set aside, and we asked the question, “Who is The Church?” and the men shouted “WE ARE THE CHURCH!"

The blessing our team was able to be for these men, and the manifold blessings we received in return, will resonate out from all those who played some role in the weekend…volunteers, inmates and you.

The weekend was heaven, God’s Kingdom here on earth, real time.

My most sincere, deepest and heartfelt thanks to each of you.  I am truly blessed to have you as a part of my life.

Scott