Prison Correspondence Course Report
by Randy Munter SOC Director
We are now in our fifth year of reaching into the prisons with the Correspondence Course and as with any ministry, it takes a season of plowing and sowing before you begin to see the fruit. This certainly has been true with this great work, but over the past couple of years, we have indeed begun to see the fruit of our labor.
Over halfway into the year 2010 and we have already graduated more students than we did in the entire year of 2008, and more than twice of what we graduated in all of 2009. I believe this is our bumper crop year; we have never seen such an interest of the Prison Correspondence Course. Scripture says "the Lord added to the church daily such as should be saved." We are seeing just that.
My wife Wanette also works on staff with the School of Christ and helps with the bundle of mail we get every day. We hear from over 500 of our students every week and on average enroll an additional 175 new inmates weekly. These are conservative numbers as some weeks are much higher.
Last year at this time we were in 730 prisons, over this past year we have reached into an additional 275 new prison facilities and are now in over 1000 facilities. We are now only a few states shy of covering the entire United States and may very well be there now as our office really doesn't know just how big an impact the Correspondence Course has made in the past four years.
I get calls every week from chaplains, pastors and lay church members who have copied our material and are using it as their ministry in the local jails and prisons, they call just to tell me what a huge impact the School of Christ is making. As Bro. Clendennen used to say, "the School of Christ has a life of its own", without question that life is the Spirit of the living God.
We started out with just a hand full of inmates taking the Correspondence Course in January 2006, but as is routine in the prison population, inmates are transferred on a regular basis from one facility to another; all the while the Holy Spirit was using this to spread the School of Christ with them. This is what's so exciting; our students are not just carrying another lifeless Bible study, but Life itself, because His Life is in them. Jesus said, "I give you Life." This is what the School of Christ is all about.
Inmates want this School, not just because it's an intense Bible study, but because of the change they have seen in the students who have already taken the course, they want what the others have, a heart that has been set free through the power of the truth in our Lord Jesus Christ. The most repeated comments we get from our students is that our Bible study course is unlike any other. The School of Christ is more scripturally accurate and far deeper than any other ministry course they have ever seen and it genuinely changes lives.
The Holy Spirit actually moves the School of Christ into places where we could never go, and in keeping with Bro. Clendennen's vision, we are making missionaries and their mission field is the facility they are in. My wife and I stand in awe at the testimonies that our students send us. This can only be a work of the Holy Spirit.
Because this ministry operates by faith, we strive to be faithful stewards with God's money and are continually working to give the very best to our students at the lowest cost to this ministry. Two years ago it cost us nearly $73 to send an inmate through the entire course. We pay for everything from printing booklets to their return envelopes. Through much diligence, we have cut this cost down to only $39 per student.
Brethren, it will be worth your time in eternity to support this great prison ministry, only $39 could bring a great light into a darkened soul, and who knows, he may be another Paul. Several of our students have gone on to become preachers, teachers and evangelists using the School of Christ material to bring life to others. If you could read the words of deep gratitude sent from our students, the life changes as a result of the School of Christ, you would sense the same urgency we have to work while it is yet day. May we never hear the words of the prophet Jeremiah who said, "The harvest is past, the summer is ended, and we are not saved." God help us to be obedient to the calling.
Your Servants in Christ,
Randy & Wanette Munter SOC Staff
Director Prison Correspondence Course
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