What they have never had was hundreds of people from all over praying for them and sending tangible evidence of Christian love. Many of the inmates were very honest; they came for the food and cookies. They were totally unprepared for the abundance of both, but especially the cookies baked with love and prayer. I had never seen 60,000 cookies, and neither had any of the inmates. The concept of more cookies than the greediest of gluttons could want was a wonderful illustration of how much love God has for us. Every one of the candidates realized that they had no choice but to share those cookies with all the other inmates in the unit, and that even after sharing, they still had more than they personally could consume.

Then they got the letters, these men who are hardened criminals. One man went, event by event, through his life telling how in tragedy after tragedy he had never cried, yet he blubbered huge sobs over letters written by strangers. God's hand was at work as just the right letter went to just the right person. One man had his heart broken by a letter from someone's grandmother, another by a letter from a child. Still another by a letter from a teen, and yet another by the repetition of the messages of Grace given by different people. He told me that "they all say they care about me, and my own family doesn't."

We can never know the results of one of these weekends. Kairos is not interested in "counting scalps." We don't try to measure who or how many were "saved." Some of the touching things I saw were faked, while some things, like the gang members renouncing their gang, or racists who recanted literally put lives on the line. Kairos asks that those who are chosen to attend the weekend be leaders in the prison, especially what are called "negative leaders." With this philosophy, one might expect less than average results, but a recent study done on the 25 years of Kairos in Florida prisons had some awe inspiring numbers. Of those who attended a Kairos weekend, the recidivism was only 37% of the state average. Those who attended the follow-up Kairos events had only a 13% rate of state average. Kairos makes a difference, and it is not possible without all of you who went into the unit with the team.

During the weekend one question was asked over and over, "Who is the church?" The answer was thundered back, "We are the church!" As the team was leaving, we passed the mess hall, and we could hear that question and answer being proclaimed by those men in front of everyone in the unit.