heaven on earth in the jail

Chris Hoke
Assistant Jail Chaplain

More and more we've been experimenting in the jail with the authority that God gives us over spiritual forces that afflict the men from all sides. Here's the latest experiment that got me thinking...

A young man with trial the following morning came anxiously into our one-on-one room a few weeks ago. He'd brought his legal papers, thinking it was a lawyer visit. He showed me the dry, all caps, official criminal charges with multiple counts that filled the first two sheets of an inch-thick stack of intimidating legal jargon. As we were praying later, listening to the words and feeling the presence God was pouring out over this man, I became increasingly uncomfortable with the hefty charges stacked beside us. They were official condemnations standing squarely against the twenty-something who was at that moment crying and relaxing into God's completely Other judgment of forgiveness. This love made the legal stack intolerable to me. A verse came to mind, and I had him read it aloud:

"And when you were dead in your trespasses..., God made you alive together with him, when he forgave us all our trespasses, erasing the written record that stood against us with its legal demands. He set this aside, nailing it to the cross. He disarmed the rulers and authorities and made a public example of them, triumphing over them in it." (Colossians 2:13-15)

We talked about how this record stood against him like a gun pointed at him on the street, and how God's forgiveness does not tolerate judgments over his children that are out of line with his will, which is to forgive and restore, not condemn and degrade.

So, not quite sure how to appropriate this "death penalty" of sorts God gives to the written record ("nailed it to the cross"), I said, "Hey man, you know how we always lay our hands on people's back pain and take authority over what hurts God's kids, and a lot of times it goes away?" So we laid our hands on the stack of Skagit County legal charges and rebuked them, broke their power in Jesus' name for violating God's forgiveness.

Later that week at jail Bible study, while we were discussing the same Colossians text, that original young man came bounding in, not knowing the Bible study was about him. He exclaimed for two minutes straight-- "Oh, Chris! The trial the next day...it was a total miracle!"

He described before all the accused men how he felt God's presence beside him at the stand, how it felt like everyone in the room looked at him differently. At his first trial, people had whispered vile things upon hearing the allegations that echoed through the room—but this time the prosecutor didn't seem to even look at the papers, and even the guard with whom he has tension cried when he got to share before the judge. One or two of the charges were completely dropped, and restitution was cut in half. He was ecstatic.

Often when we pray for physical pain, not all of it will go away immediately. But rather than be discouraged, we're encouraged and so we've learned to press in with more prayer. It makes me wonder if we can press in and confidently take spiritual authority with God's forgiveness over our accused brothers until all the pain and charges are wiped clean, nailed to the cross. It would be ridiculous. It would be like heaven's reality manifesting, happening on earth...