Designate a ministry leader who reports to the pastors or elders. This person recruits, trains, and coordinates volunteers. He maintains relationships with prison chaplains and institutional authorities. He ensures continuity when individual volunteers rotate in and out.

Train volunteers before they enter the prison. Teach them what to expect: the security procedures, the visitation rules, the cultural dynamics, the emotional weight of the environment. Teach them what not to say. Teach them about the informal economy, the prevalence of jailhouse religion, and the importance of doctrinal soundness. Role-play difficult conversations—the inmate who claims innocence, the inmate who is suicidal, the inmate who asks for money.

Commit to consistency. Choose a visitation schedule and keep it. If you commit to visiting every other Saturday, visit every other Saturday—regardless of weather, holidays, or personal inconvenience. The incarcerated person cannot reschedule. His entire week may revolve around the anticipation of your visit. When you do not come, the message is: you do not matter enough.

Provide informal economy support through a dedicated fund. Collect offerings specifically for this purpose. Distribute funds fairly, with priority given to inmates without outside support. Track expenditures and report to the congregation. Generosity that is organized and accountable endures; generosity that is haphazard and unaccounted for fades.

Extend the ministry to families. The inmate’s spouse, children, and parents are suffering as much as he is—and they are doing so without the structured routine and captive community that prison ironically provides. They are suffering in isolation, sometimes in shame, in a financial crisis. A church that visits the prisoner but ignores his family has done half the job. My wife has never worked outside the home, and without my friends and son David, she could not have survived those six years.

The Impact of Being Forgotten

I must close this chapter with a word about what happens when the church does not come—when the letters stop, the visits end, the phone calls cease, and the incarcerated Christian is left alone with his faith and his cellmates.

What happens is spiritual erosion. The man who once stood firm begins to waver. The doctrines he held with conviction begin to feel academic. The promises of God that sustained him in the early months of his imprisonment begin to ring hollow—not because they are false, but because there is no one to remind him that they are true. “Faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God” (Romans 10:17). But who will preach if no one comes?

I watched a couple of men lose their faith in prison. Not all at once—not in a dramatic renunciation—but gradually, imperceptibly, the way a shoreline erodes. A little less prayer. A little less Bible reading. A little more participation in the módulo’s vices. A little less resistance to the prevailing moral code. And eventually, the man who once professed Christ is indistinguishable from the man who never did.

Was the church at fault? Not entirely. The man himself bears responsibility for his own walk with God. But the church bears responsibility for failing to “bear one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ” (Galatians 6:2). The isolated Christian is a vulnerable Christian. And the church that leaves its members in isolation has failed in its most basic calling. “I was in prison, and ye came unto me” (Matthew 25:36). Or did you not? And on the day of judgment, the distinction will matter. Ask yourself if you have a Hebrews 13:3 perspective and attitude: “Remember them that are in bonds, as bound with them.”

Action Steps

If your church does not have a prison ministry, start one. Begin with a single volunteer visiting a single inmate. Build from there. The first step is the hardest; after that, God will multiply the effort.

Establish a informal economy fund with a monthly budget. Even fifty dollars per month directed to an inmate without family support can transform his daily existence and open doors for the Gospel being presented by you or him to others.

Write one letter or email per week to an incarcerated person. Keep it personal, specific, and spiritually substantive. Ask questions. Reference previous letters. Make it clear that you remember who they are and that you will write again.

Extend your ministry to the inmate’s family. Visit the spouse. Help with groceries. Drive the children to school. Sit with the family in church. Do not let them disappear from the congregation’s awareness.

Commit to a visitation schedule and keep it. Consistency is the single most important quality of effective prison ministry. Everything else is secondary.

Discussion Questions

Why does the church so often fail in its obligation to minister to prisoners? What institutional, cultural, and theological barriers prevent churches from engaging in prison ministry?

Read Matthew 25:31-46 and Hebrews 13:3. How does Christ’s identification with the prisoner challenge our assumptions about who deserves the church’s attention and resources?

What is the relationship between practical support (money, food, books, legal help) and spiritual ministry (preaching, counseling, discipleship) in the context of prison? Can they be separated, or must they go together?

How can a church maintain long-term prison ministry without burning out volunteers? What organizational structures support sustainability?