Christianity Explored breaks into prison

Can prisoners be transformed by the gospel?
In theory, we know the answer is a resounding ‘yes’. But here are three recent examples where that is exactly what has happened in practice.
‘C’ came from a church background but had lost his faith when his little nephew died. By the time he was released from prison he had rediscovered his relationship with God and was committed to serving him in the mission context in a local church. ‘J’ decided, when he came to prison, that it was now or never in terms of finding out about Christianity. He will be baptised shortly, and is seeking to give his life to Jesus. ‘S’ has been a Christian for a number of years but has struggled with drugs. Although very knowledgeable about Jesus, the basics of his faith have been rebuilt, and he too is now considering baptism. That is a major step for him, because, as he says, ‘It’s a once and for all’ — when he is baptised, there is no turning back to his old ways.

Prisons edition
The common denominator between ‘C’, ‘J’ and ‘S’ is that they have all recently completed the specially-devised Christianity Explored Prisons Edition (CEPE). The course was launched late last year after four years of research, developing and trialling at a number of penal institutions around the UK. CEPE is a version of the well-known Christianity Explored course (published by The Good Book Company), which has made a significant impact in the UK and abroad in the past ten years. It is now being used in 80 countries worldwide and has been translated into more than 25 different languages. In the 18 months or so since the reformulated third edition was unveiled, over 10,000 DVDs and 100,000 handbooks have been sold.

Big mission field
But why is a special edition needed at all? Prison is, firstly, a potentially enormous mission field. Although the population inside our jails has reduced since the aftermath of the widespread riots of August 2011, as at February 2013 there were still over 84,000 men and women behind bars in the UK in about 160 different institutions.
But prisons are, secondly, a very different mission field. While the very concept of sin is often derided in a Britain that grows increasingly secular, prisoners have, by contrast, little option but to consider their sin and guilt while behind bars. They may well be more open to Christ’s message of forgiveness and redemption as a result, meaning that every one of those 160 institutions represents potentially fertile territory for outreach.
CEPE was devised to present the gospel to this very specific and unique audience. The new version remains completely faithful to the original Christianity Explored course in that it continues to let the Gospel tell the gospel, while providing space to dive deeper into Mark for those able to do so.
However, the information is presented in a very different, simplified way, making it much more suitable, both for the particular prison audience and the particular challenges involved in putting on a course inside a busy working jail. It has therefore been tailored to accommodate the lower than average reading age and attention span of much of the prison population, and their potentially vulnerable mental and/or psychological states.

Practical difficulties
The circumstances of incarceration can cause practical difficulties for those running and attending courses, too. The prison management may offer a series of regular one-hour slots or, at the other extreme, a whole week’s course at one go. Yet these can be cancelled or interrupted at very short notice, for example if the prison goes into lock-down. And inmates may sometimes be unable to attend even pre-planned sessions because of court appearances or consultations with their lawyers. Flexibility and variety are therefore the keys to CEPE, for it has been re-planned and redesigned to work with a flipchart and handouts — so there is no handbook. Sessions have been shortened, made less intense and are now image heavy and text light.

‘A positive influence’
The chaplains who work at the sharp end of pastoral and mission ministry in prisons quickly saw that CEPE makes a real difference. Mark John at HMP Cardiff, for example, wholeheartedly recommends it, because: ‘It has been shaped in the prison environment, tested and refined for over four years, addressing the various problems that the prison regime can throw up. We have living proof that the course has had a positive influence upon prisoners who go through it’.
Sarah Morris, chaplain at a Young Offenders Institution (YOI) in Shropshire, is similarly enthusiastic: ‘Having led Christianity Explored in the parish, I was excited to have the opportunity to pilot the course at the YOI. The materials are excellent — interactive and easily accessible, without losing anything from the original. We found that all offenders could engage, no matter what their background or ability. Some preferred the Bible studies, some the discussions and others avidly awaited the DVD each week. Through each, the central message was reinforced and by the end all offenders had a good appreciation of who Jesus is, why he came and what difference that makes’.

Ian Roberts & Stephen James

CEPE is available from The Good Book Company on 0333 123 0880 or at http://www.thegoodbook.co.uk

This article was first published in the April 2013 issue of Evangelicals Now. For more news, artciles or reviews, subscribe to EN or contact us for more information.
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What’s coming up in the April issue of EN

A few highlights to look forward to in the April issue of EN! It’s scheduled to arrive from the printers on Friday (March 22). Of course you can always e-mail subs@e-n.org.uk as well if you’d like a complimentary copy or if you’d like to subscribe!

Christianity Explored: next ten

Christianity Explored has just celebrated its tenth birthday. We thought we should celebrate what has been achieved and — most importantly — plan and pray about how to take the ministry forward over the next ten years.

Firstly, it is worth remembering that Christianity Explored (CE) in its current form was created by Barry Cooper, Sam Shammas and myself at All Soul’s, Langham Place. It sought to ‘let the Gospel tell the gospel’ in the most powerful way we could find by letting people discover the Identity Mission and Call of Jesus from Mark’s Gospel.

Expansion

Ten years on, the ministry has expanded its range of products dramatically. It now publishes a wide range of different materials, including the follow-on course, Discipleship Explored (DE) and books such as One Question and One Life. Various versions have been developed, including the youth version. English as a second language editions of both CE and DE are also now available. These resources are all designed to introduce the Christian faith, from the Bible, to non-believers, primarily in group settings. Increasingly, however, we are seeing them used in very small groups and even for one-to-ones.

More than 5,000 courses a year now run in over 70 nations around the world. We believe this figure represents just over a third of the member countries of the United Nations. Courses span the denominational spectrum and have been translated into more than 20 languages and numbers continue to grow all the time.

Last year

Our most significant decision in 2011 was to invest in a third edition of the core CE course. This meant shortening it from ten sessions to seven, re-shooting the DVD and creating an all-new CE website aimed at seekers wherever they may be around the world. Since the new edition was launched in May we have seen a rise of well over 50% in the number of handbooks sold.

This is a humbling result and looking back there are certain key phrases that I have found myself saying again and again to individuals and at conferences. I believe them far more passionately now than I did ten years ago and, as an evangelist seeking to prepare God’s people for service (Ephesians 4.12), I am passionate about the fact that they bear repeating. Indeed, whatever else happens to CE, these truths will be central to our ministry over the next ten years. Time and again I’ve found these are the places where the battle is fought as we plead with churches to become more evangelistically focussed. So here are the phrases.

1. Get the calendar right

Evangelism is like mother’s milk and apple pie. In theory everyone is for it, but the first battle you have to fight is getting courses running regularly in the church year.

If you have the dates of a course in the diary (spring, summer, autumn), then there is a place to put the visitors who come at Christmas and Easter, if their interest is sparked. It’s a focal point for preachers because they can say: ‘If you’re not a Christian here today, then thank you so much for coming and if that point strikes you, well here is a place to discuss it’. And, above all, the church family knows where to bring its friends. Having courses that run regularly is critical, because many people take a long time to come. I reckon it usually takes 18 months from someone hearing about the course and being asked to them eventually coming. This means that the church family needs to know it is rock solid in the diary.

2. You can do it

From 1996 I had been trying to teach church leaders and members how to go through Mark’s Gospel with non-Christians. During those sessions I would so often see the screensaver go up in people’s eyes and the sentiment was obvious: ‘Rico, you can go through Mark’s Gospel with people, but I never could’. Then, really by chance, as we met to plan the filming of the first DVD in 2000 we saw that the journey through Mark could be summed up with three words — Identity (who is Jesus?), Mission (why did he come?), Call (what does it mean to follow him?).

I’ll never forget the first training session I went to after that three-word discovery. It was in Stirling on a bank holiday weekend. I announced that understanding Mark’s Gospel is about grasping these three words and the drama is seeing that the disciples are blind to them. People listened, I could see the hope in their eyes because it was so simple and yet so profound. At the end I turned to an old lady in a group to my left and I asked: ‘Do you think you could teach through Mark’s Gospel?’ And she replied in a deep Scottish accent: ‘Well dear, if it’s only three words, I think we probably can’.

3. How they come is how they stay

The CE material encourages individuals to come to faith as they hear the Bible at four levels — and to establish that foundation of Bible input that will take them from here to eternity.

The four levels are: (1) from the front — they hear the talks; (2) in a small group — they look at the studies together and ask questions; (3) one-to-one — particularly at the end of the evening they discuss where they are at with their leaders individually; and (4) in the home study where they read the Bible for themselves through the week.

This means we are aiming not so much at having biblical pulpits but creating biblical churches. Underlying all this is a question I so often ask at training conferences: ‘Where in the Christian life is the power?’ Well, the power is in the Word (Mark 4.26).

4. Cross the painline

Victor Hugo said: ‘Life’s greatest happiness is to be convinced we are loved’. Christianity Explored as an experience often stands or falls on whether an individual has grasped grace. However, to really understand grace we have first to see the horrors of our sin. We must see that sin leads to judgment, where we will experience God’s wrath and ultimately find ourselves in hell, unless we have trusted in the rescue of the Lord Jesus (1 Thessalonians 1.10). So the question is, as a leader, do I have the nerve to repeat to people the warning of Jesus in Mark 9.43-48? If I think I can do what I like with the hands and feet and eyes that God has given me, I’ll find myself in hell for eternity. It is a desperately counter-cultural message, but, as Billy Graham said, ‘In evangelism it’s not getting people saved that’s the problem, it’s getting them lost’. This is why from weeks two to seven we say to people: you are not good people going to heaven, but sinners going to hell. So please embrace the Lord Jesus Christ.

Hard-wired lessons

These lessons are hard-wired into CE, we are passionate about getting them out and as we now look ahead they will be our guiding lights. So where do we want to be in ten years’ time? We recognise the need for a third course that sits alongside CE and DE, although precisely what that will look like at this point is unclear.

We will undoubtedly need to respond to the dramatic technological revolution taking place in the dissemination of information. This means that all our courses will be able to be delivered over the internet as well as face to face. This has exciting implications for evangelism in places officially hostile to the gospel, where seekers may in future do CE online, away from the prying eyes of the prevailing civil or religious authorities.

Having said that, we will not overlook the fact that many churches in our land remain unaware of CE. We therefore aim to have a network of CE advocates operating in every county or region, and in every major town in the UK, by 2021. And internationally, we hope and pray that, within the next ten years, we might have penetrated fully two-thirds of UN countries, through CE having been translated into no less than 50 different languages.

Are such grand designs possible, in such a time of almost institutional cultural opposition to the gospel in the UK? Well, if they accord with God’s purposes, and if we always stay faithful to him, they just might.

Rico Tice

For more information about the CE course, visit http://www.christianityexplored.org/ or for resources go to http://www.ceministries.org/