I was reading through my prayer journal when I found this prayer I wrote 2 weeks ago.  I don’t remember writing it.  I don’t know if I was watching a sermon or reading my Bible, but I do know that God answered this prayer and is still answering it. 

New relationships is something I struggle with.  I get comfortable with my very few friends and I want to shut everyone else out.  But this past weekend, God blessed us with beautiful weather and a bunch of us decided to play some volleyball.  So here I am, on a team with 6 girls that I don’t even know their names.  So I learned their names and let my guard down, and enjoyed spending time with people I normally did not hang out with.

After volleyball, we moved to the softball field where even more people came out to play.  It was the most fun I’ve had since I have been here.  It was awesome how so many of us came together and enjoyed each others company.  And now, a week later, I see my new friends around the camp and I know that God is opening doors that I’ve kept closed.  And He’s opening my heart to receive His people who are in need of Him.

God has been looking out for me!  I am so blessed with the time I did get sentenced to and God is still working in my favor.  Even though I have been praying everyday “Please send me home early.”  God is answering:  “I am child, I Am.”    WOW!!!!

“At evening let not your hands be idle”  Ecclesiastges 11:16

The end of the song days, “Have you been standing on your own feet for too long? Are you looking for a place where you belong?”  I have found my place and the rest of my life will be spent letting Jesus put the peices back together.

At 1:15AM, we had a stranger in our room tonight.  I woke up to a blood-curdling scream coming from the top bunk.  Terri (my bunkee) was screaming and kicking until the stranger fell out of her bed.  After the stranger struggled with her blanket, she army-crawled on all fours and bolted out the door.

I thought it was Terri who fell out of the bed until I realized she was still screaming to tun on the light.  Once the light was on, the 5 of us were still panicking to figure out who and what was in our room.

It was scary that someone could come right in our room and crawl in her bed.

Sheila grabbed the broom and the padlock and said:
“Weapon Up Girls!”

We went to get the officer, who was only concerned about his turkey dinner getting cold.  He said he’d make a note about it.  Then he said all that he really needed to know was whether it was a man or not. Then he continued to tell us that it wasnt Santa Claus because he came last night.

“Very FUNNY…laugh out loud…THIS IS SERIOUS, MISTER!!!” I said.

After he left the room,we were trying to figure out if the whole thing really even happened. Then we looked down at the foot of Terri’s ladder to see a pair of slippers.

Our Cinderella stalker left her slippers as evidence.  Too bad everyone at the camp wears the same kind of slippers! So much for evidence.

In prison, we don’t have alarms on the doors…actually we don’t even have locks on the doors.  Being that we were still a little shaken up – kind of scared to go back to sleep – and not knowing if they would come back to our room… We decided to take precautions.

We dangled a pill bottle from the door..with yarn (only to find out that it doesn’t make any noise when the door is opened.  So much for homemade prison security systems.

The moral of the story is that even in prison, we are not completely protected!

The devil was trying to interrupt our Christmas play tonight. Before the play, my good friend and I got in a small tiff.

It was stupid actually. She felt left out yesterday because we played cards without her. So, when I asked her if she wanted to play cards tonight, she was still holding a grudge and tried to make me feel bad for not getting her yesterday to play.  I never realized just how frustrating the spirit of jealousy is. I recognize it in her because I used to always get jealous and feel left out.  I would get my feelings hurt and so – in return – I would try to hurt whoever made me feel that way.  I wanted them to feel bad for leaving me out.

Now, I look back and realize that it got me nowhere.  It probably only pushed people away.

Love is not jealous.

Of course, we made up right after the program.  The Spirit moved and we were both crying.  We are so much alike, it is scary. I see myself in a lot of the ways that she acts.

I feel like I have grown up so much in the past year and a half.  Things that would have bothered me then don’t bother me now. I don’t get stressed or upset easily. I am learning how to control my feelings. Now, I  just need to learn how to control my tongue. Still working on that one.

I woke up this morning at 6:45am to Mrs. Susie hanging up Christmas stockings full of goodies on our bulletin board.  She crocheted one for eat of my roommates. I helped her hang them and quickly grabbed hers to fill it up with treats.
It totally feels like Christmas morning! I am wide awake…anxious and excited for everyone to get up.

Susie just ventured out in the snow to get hot water for our coffee.  No joke…we are having a white Christmas in Dallas this year. It’s awesome!

Right now I am watching the sun rise out my window from my bed. {I really don’t have it all that bad, huh?}

I get my coffee brought to me in bed as I watch the sunrise on this white Christmas morning. And on top of that, we are having chicken fried steak with eggs to order for brunch!  Prison isn’t all that bad…I’m still spoiled rotten!  And I will be spoiled all weekend too. Shauna is coming to visit on Saturday. Grandma, Grandpa & my aunt are coming on Sunday! Yay!

Merry Christmas to everyone!

This morning I had this horrible thought about my bunkee.  I’m not even going to write it down because it wasnt right for me to think.  But it made me laugh out loud and I thought, “I’ll have to tell Jennifer this when she wakes up…she will get a good laugh too.”

At the same time the Holy Spirit convicted me and said “this is what you need to work on today.” Holding my tongue. Even when it is my close friend whom I trust and tell everything to. Even if I just want to make her laugh.

The Bible says:
” Let your conversation be full of grace”… “avoid godless chatter”… “Nor should there be any foolish talk or course joking.”

Sometimes I try to justify myself when I talk to my 2 close friends about someone.  “I’m only telling them this, and I know they wont tell anyone else….we just want to share a laugh…it feels good to laugh…especially in prison…”

I think that because I am in a dreary place, it makes it okay to laugh at someone else’s expense.  But there is no justification for sin! And gossip is a sin.

Lord, help us to be considerate of others. Keep a bridle on our tongue when we start to say words that tear people down.  Even if the words won’t ever be heard by anyone else.  I know that life and death are in the power of the tongue.  I will speak life into every situation. I will also love my enemies and pray blessings over them.  Thank you Jesus for showing me how to love. Amen.

“But at midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the prisoners were listening to them.

Suddenly, there was a great earthquake, so that the foundations of the prison were shaken; and immediately the doors were opened and everyone’s chains were loosed.” Acts 16: 25-26

Many people are trapped in the prison of their minds. Paul and Silas were imprisoned too, and it was their praise that set them free. When God heard their praises, He began tapping His foot.  Pretty soon, the earth, His footstool, began to shake.  The bands around the ankles of Paul and Silas fell off.  The prison doors swung open, and they were free.  If we will praise God as Paul and Silas did, we will see the doors of our own prisons swing wide open.

The Spirit-filled Life Student Bible says:

Prayer and singing were so much a way of life for Paul and Silas that even in difficult circumstances, they continued to respond from their hearts in praise to God.  The relationship between their song of praise and their supernatural deliverance cannot be overlooked.  Praise directed toward God can shake open prison doors!  Praise will also cause bondages and temptations to drop away.  We have to learn to praise God even when things are not going well, not only for the purpose of deliverance but because God is worthy of our praise regardless of what is happening to us.

Macy & Shauna talk about Prison Life from Shauna Callaghan on Vimeo.