I chose to sleep in today, and thankfully, I slept through all the noise. I woke up right before they locked the doors for the weekend morning count. My roommate was not in the room, he must have stayed at Education through the count, so it was a peaceful alone time. Had a few saltine crackers with peanut butter, the rinsed my face and brushed my teeth. There was peace and quiet so I sat to read my daily devotionals.
After count, Mr. Rivero was ready to head to lunch, as I see him bringing his wheelchair over to the dayroom, and as we wait, he tells a story from his past. “CHOW” is called, and we head to food service to find we are being served almost the same exact food as yesterday, scrambled eggs, potatoes, apple sauce, and today was two slices of bread and jelly packets where yesterday was two slices of bread which were supposed to have been french toast. I wheeled Mr. Rivero back to his room, put his wheelchair away, and ran to my room to put my Class A uniform, grabbed my Bible and headed to the chapel.
Sign-in sheet in place, I move the podium into position, and setup two microphones, one for the volunteer and one for me. I was asked to translate for the volunteer today since the Chaplains had to combine the English and Spanish services. I was nervous, even though I have done it several times before, today felt different. Six-O’clock move is called and inmates start walking in. As everyone settles into their chairs, I begin to translate for our Chaplain and then we listen to a Spanish worship song. After the Spanish song, I am asked to play an English song, “Lift His Name on High”, and I walk over to the front of the chapel to stand by the Chaplain and I decide to grab the microphone and sing the song aloud. My nerves started kicking in even harder than before, but at the end of it, I felt great, and received several positive reactions from inmates, and the volunteer mentioned I did a great job.
Pastor Wilder’s message today was amazing. It involved readings from Romans, chapter 8, verse 18: “For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us”.
We all suffer, but are we suffering voluntarily for God’s glory? No one in the chapel raised their hands when asked if they would suffer voluntarily and that is understandable. Even though most times I feel that not only I am suffering being in prison, but that my family is suffering as well, then I pray, or even just listening to K-Love on the radio, I get a reminder, telling me that God is there even through our sufferings, and I know it is true, because I never thought I would make it through prison this long, but having God leading my way, I can do anything.
Goodnight world, time to watch some Olympics then rest before commissary tomorrow early morning.
