"I Don't Even Know How To Start."

Something pretty amazing happened at the jail yesterday as I was teaching Inside/Out Dad. The topic we were presenting was “Working With Mom and Co-Parenting.” Needless to say, most of the men in the class have a lot of brokenness between the them and the (sometimes multiple) mothers of their children. Tough topic to teach. Always is. 

One of the younger guys, probably mid-20s, who rarely says much, all of a sudden commented how his ex keeps his son away from him, never allows him to see him, and can’t be reasoned with. “I haven’t seen him in three years,” he said. And then I saw him drop his head and he started sobbing. 

This doesn’t happen often in jail, needless to say. Then, one of the other guys said, “You keep going, man. This class has taught us that. He’s worth it. Keep fighting for him. You got this, man.”

As class was ending, I circled the guys up for prayer as always. I asked one of the guys to pray for the young man, and then I would close. The guy said he would, then looked at me and said, “I don’t even know how to start.” I said, “Just say, ‘Dear Lord’ and then say what you need to say.”

What followed was not a flowery speech, but rather a halting, unsure-of-what-to-say, but genuine prayer where he asked God to help the guy next to him. He asked that God would look out for other man’s son, that his ex would drop the hostility, and that he would make parole soon so he could get back in his kid’s life. 

Amazing. A prayer from a jail cell. 

I have a feeling that God loved it. In Jesus parable of the Pharisee and the tax collector, two men went up to pray. The Pharisee prayed about himself and how great he was, but the tax collector just said, “Lord have mercy on me, a sinner.” That’s what pleases God. 

As I left the jail, I realized once again that people are people. The men in jail love their kids as much as I love mine. Dads are dads. Pretty amazing day yesterday.