p. 269 | WORK AMONG PRISONERS

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Feb 27, 1893

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 19, No. 17.

WORK AMONG PRISONERS.

THE following interesting letter, received by one of our missionary workers, may serve as an encouragement to others who are sending out our publications:—

DEAR SISTER IN CHRIST: I received your welcome letter yesterday, and was happy to hear from you. I have received all of your papers and tracts, and I have taken them into the prison and missions, and I also send papers to those whom I cannot get a chance to talk with in prison. I send them out to Canada, and when the men in the prison have read the papers, one of my sons gets them and sends them to a poor Sunday school in the country. They like the Youth's Instructor very much for the children.

Nearly all of the prisoners are Roman Catholics, and they are hard to reach; yet I praise God for eight souls this year already who have taken Jesus as their Saviour. My heart goes out to them, for I know what it is to live in darkness and be blind. I was a Roman Catholic before God healed my body, and showed me the true way to the feet of Jesus. Praise his dear name! God wonderfully blesses me in my efforts to lead others out into the beautiful light of God. I can reach the Catholics in prison better than one who has never been in their faith; I know the catechism, and can repeat it and compare it with the word of God, and God helps me every time; his Holy Spirit fills my mouth. The priest has tried hard to get me stopped from visiting the prison, saying I was hurting his influence over his men, but I live up to the rules of the prison, so he cannot stop me.

I always take enough papers to go all round. When anyone is very sick, I make beef tea or chicken broth for him. The rules are never to talk to a Catholic until he desires me to. If one tells the warden that he would like me to talk to him, then I am free to say what I please, and the priest cannot help it, but if I were to talk to any man without he desired me to, and he should tell the warden, I would not be allowed in the prison any more. So I have to be careful, and watch and pray for guidance.

I take any who are sick and can get pardoned into my home. I had one young man who was an infidel. He was converted on his death bed, four days after I received him. He lived four weeks, and we had a blessed time. It brought my husband and myself nearer to God.

He was twenty-two years old; had spent nine years of that time in prison, and had five years yet to serve had he not been pardoned. His was a hard lot, yet Jesus saved him, and the Holy Spirit wonderfully taught him in his last days.

We had no money to pay the funeral expenses, but a dear sister offered us a grave by the side of her son, and my husband obtained the casket by promising to pay the undertaker one dollar per week till the debt was paid.

My neighbors were all afraid of him, a convict, and thought I should not have brought a prisoner to my house. The people in the house went away until after he was laid away. When they came back, they went to the landlord and told him if he did not put us out they would move. He came to me about it, and I told him that just as long as the Lord led me to work for him I should do what I could: Jesus gave me all I had, so my home was his or for his lost creatures. I am still in the same house, and God is with me; when I move, it will be when he is willing.

A few weeks ago I went to get a tenement with professing Christians. They said: "We know Mrs. H., you are doing a good work, and it is what God wants you to do, but we cannot let you the rooms. Your family is small, and you are good tenants, but we could not let such men into our house." I said, "I never bring any only those who have been converted before they leave the prison, excepting the one that died, and I could not teach him there, and he could not hurt anyone even if he desired; he was too sick." But my answer was of no avail.

O dear sister, I would have backslidden long ago if I had looked to professing Christians for a pattern. But why should I murmur? Why should I feel discouraged when He suffered far more than I have ever done.

Three days after we laid our boy away, a lady came in. She said: "I have heard in the prison what you did for the boy. I know it must have cost you a good deal. The Lord has sent me to help you out. Now don't say no, I must give you the amount of the undertaker's and doctor's bills. I am able to pay them." She gave me one hundred dollars, and offered me fifty dollars more for other expenses. I would not take the fifty dollars, but took the other.

When I went to pay the undertaker, he said, "I thought you said you had no money." I told him how the Lord had sent it, after we had prayed for help. He said: "Well, Mrs. H., it is strange: I had a bill to pay this morning and did not have the money to meet it; I was worried about it, and I asked God to help me to-day, so that I could meet this bill, and see, he has answered prayer." We both thanked God.

I hope this letter will not tire you. I love to try to help others to renew their strength in the Lord. Hoping to hear from you again, I will now close. May God bless you and yours. I remain your loving sister in Jesus.

P. S. I shall be glad and happy to receive any tracts, as I use a great many, and have to buy them, and I find so many ways to spend my money. But, praise God, my pocketbook never gets quite empty. It is like the widow's meal, it never gives out. My husband says the fifteen dollars a week he earns is like the loaves and fishes that Jesus blessed. I have a good deal to thank God for; my husband is saved and kept by the power of God, and just as anxious to work for Jesus. No matter what I do, he is happy and willing.