10/26/2024
The Road to Hell and Back
To all my Facebook Family and Friends – As our Kairos Prison Ministry Team prepares to enter the Charlotte Correctional Institute this Thursday at 6 AM for a 4 day weekend of sharing the Gospel of Jesus Christ, please keep us and the inmates in your prayers. Our team has been under a relentless attack of the enemy from cancer to other crippling diseases. But with your prayers and God’s help, the gates of hell will not keep us from our appointed mission.
Below is an article about one of my experiences:
THE ROAD TO HELL AND BACK
There have been many depictions of what the road to hell might look like in both books and movies. But I am here to tell you, I have traveled that road and it is so much worse than you can imagine.
The road is a road in Southwest Florida. Traveling north on US 41 from Fort Myers it is just over the county line. As you approach it, there is a green highway sign that beckons you to turn east on to it. As you begin your journey on this hellish road, the darkness seems to get even darker. As you reach its summit; as you pass over Interstate 75, and begin your decent, it feels as if you are entering the valley of the shadow of death. The road markings that defined the beginning of this road suddenly and mysteriously disappear. It is before dawn and the fog has swallowed you up. The light from your headlights is unable to pe*****te the uncanny darkness. The evil you feel seems to be getting closer. And the darkness, the darkness is everywhere and it’s closing in on you. The speed limit is 55 mph but your speedometer is only registering 15 mph, you are almost at a crawl. You swerve to miss hitting some sort of creature that darts across the road. Other than that, there is no sign of life. You are feeling a sense of hopelessness and despair for the many a young man who has traveled this road. Your heart is pounding and your prayers are bombarding heaven. Then, all of a sudden out of nowhere, off to your left, there is a dimly lit street light on a single pole, off to the right a much narrower street taking you back south. You make the turn, travel several hundred yards and there it is, an illuminated sign proclaiming your destination, “Department of Corrections – Charlotte Correctional Institute”. As you get out of your car the fog is so thick it is hard to breath.
This is the beginning of a Kairos Weekend. Kairos, an incredible team of Christian brothers that take the gospel of Jesus Christ behind prison bars. Disciples like Mark and Paul, James and John, whose names were given to them from straight out of the bible and others with names that may not be written in the book, but all are written on the very heart of God. These are radically saved Christians who are His tried and true disciples. A special breed that are in God’s Army, Combat Christians, that go places, others wouldn’t think of going, a Special Forces Team that takes the battle of the Lord right into the very pit of hell, where the enemy himself resides. And there are many others as well, those who have answered the call, men and women who when called, stepped across that line in the sand and said “Send Me Lord”.
As you enter this maximum security prison, through the metal detectors, the electronically controlled security doors, behind the miles of razor wire fences, the darkness gets even darker and more oppressive. Hopelessness is everywhere, from the inmates to the corrections officers. The enemy of Christ is busy here, tormenting them all. As you leave the security control building and step out into the prison yard, off in the distance you see the prison chapel, and as you look closer you can see a light shining from it, a light that is piercing the darkness, a light that is flooding the souls of men, a light that will take them back up that same road that brought them here, but with a totally different destination, one that will give them hope and a new and better future. That light is Jesus Christ and He is their hope and their future.
THAT’S WHY WE’RE HERE & THAT’S WHAT WE DO
TO GOD BE ALL THE GLORY!
Steven Leftwich
Artwork by the Charlotte Inmates
Please be praying for Charlotte CCI today. The brothers in blue will be wrestling with God. We are praying for breakthroughs, forgiveness, restoration revival in the hearts of our brothers .
This was written through our brother Chaplain Steven Leftwich 10 years ago.
