Holy Week in Jail

It’s Holy Week, but how many Americans know anymore what that is? For Christians, it’s the final week of the Lenten Season, but this year it coincides with the Final Four, the end of March Madness. Perhaps the latter is more recognized than the former in today’s America.

It’s been nearly two years since I volunteered for a weekly Bible study at Cumberland County Jail (CCJ) in Portland, Maine and it’s a challenge. When I taught history I’d have the same students every day and planned lessons each building on the other. At the jail, I never know who will come through the door or how many. Maybe two or three will have attended before. Maybe none. Sometimes it’s a completely new group. Some enter carrying donated Bibles which are supplied free but most arrive empty-handed. 

Windham Correctional Facility

Most CCJ inmates are there less than a year either awaiting trial or already sentenced. Those who get longer stretches go to Windham Correctional Center or Maine State Prison in Warren. Inmates at every prison were in a jail first and given high recidivism, all correctional facilities have revolving doors.

An average Bible Study has eight or ten guys, some with much biblical knowledge, some with none, others in between. I always have a plan but it seldom unfolds as intended. How can I impart a sense of what Holy Week means to inmates who don’t know what Christianity is? Those with knowledge are eager to expand it. Others have no idea of what the Bible contains and for their sake I most offer a broad context.

I tell them the Bible has two parts: the Old Testament and the New Testament. Last week I drew a timeline on a white board. Explaining that we don’t know when creation occurred, I began by writing:

Abraham — 2000 BC

Moses — 1500 BC

King David — 1000 BC.

Babylonian Exile — 500 BC

Jesus Christ — 0.

Muhammed — 600 AD.

Dates were approximate and the Bible doesn’t mention Muhammed, but most inmates have been exposed to Islam because it’s usually not their first experience behind bars. They’ve have done hard time in prisons where Islam has a significant presence and occasionally I’ll get Muslims from Somalia or converts.

After fixing the Bible in time, I fix it in space using a folder full of maps. Starting with a world map showing Maine and Israel highlighted in red, I then I hold up one of the Mediterranean Sea with Rome, Greece, and Israel highlighted. Then I’ll draw a crude map of the eastern Mediterranean across the Persian Gulf toward Iran on the white board. Often there are Iraq and Afghanistan veterans present who know the region. I trace Abraham’s migration from the Persian Gulf up through Syria and down to Israel. Then I trace Israel’s enslavement in Egypt, the exodus back to Israel under Moses, the rise of King David, the establishment of Jerusalem, Israel’s captivity in what’s now Iraq during the Babylonian exile, and finally back to Israel for the birth of Jesus.

If I ask how long ago Jesus lived there are lots of blank stares. “What year is this?” I say. “In the western world, we measure time from before Jesus and after Him because He was considered the most important figure in history and the Bible is divided the same way: The Old Testament is about events before Christ. The New Testament begins with His birth 2018 years ago. We get our seven-day week from the creation story in Genesis, the first book of the Old Testament.”

Wide eyes tell me most never realized this. Finally, I explain the four gospels which begin the New Testament, each of which ends with events of Holy Week — the Last Supper, Crucifixion, Resurrection — the crux of Christianity.

Questions are asked and answered. Then comes a review of original sin — Adam and Eve’s fall from grace in Genesis. Throughout the Old Testament Jews sacrificed lambs to atone for sin. The New Testament tells of Jesus Christ offering himself as the perfect sacrifice by His death on the cross, then rising from death. That’s why He’s called “The Lamb of God” — the final atonement.

This week I’ll offer a more detailed summary of Holy Week: Christ re-entered Jerusalem on Sunday. Thursday he held the Last Supper, was betrayed, put before Pontius Pilate, then beaten and scourged. On Friday he was crucified with two others. On the third day, Easter Sunday, he rose from the dead.

Recently a very young inmate with a cross crudely tattooed between his eyes came in early before anyone else. He asked me, “Is it ever too late to get into heaven?” I told him of the “good thief” crucified next to Jesus who said to Him, “Remember me when you come into your kingdom.”

“Today you will be with me in Paradise,” Jesus said.

“No,” I said. “It’s never too late.”