December 1999 Edition
USA Suicide Facts
Attempted
every 42 secs.Successful
every 16.9 min.3rd leading
cause of death
ages 18-2430,000
suicide deaths
annually
At 9:49 p.m. Saturday, a notice dropped in our e-mailbox telling us of a message on our online chapel prayer site. The entry read:
"I have ben born again for years. I never was successful at the Christian Life. If You have never believd anything believe this, I Love Jesus. He IS my helper and my saviour. But I have let him down so badly! My Daddy is in Heavan. I Want to see my Daddy, Im Tired, Im going Home tonight, God Please forgive me."
Immediately recognizing the seriousness of the message and not being able to get an e-mail response from the individual, we began praying as we went to work trying to track him down. After much searching through online phone and e-mail directories, we were able to determine his police district and notify the authorities. Fortunately, the police were able to get to the scene before he attempted suicide. Many others are not so fortunate.
What drives people, even Christians, to the point of suicide? One of the prime causes is despair of enslavement to an addiction. They have lost all hope. This is why The Missing Link is so heavily involved in ministry to the addicted.
Is suicide an easy way out? By no means! Suicide is clearly murder, a violation of God's commandments. Suicide is satanic seduction. It is ultimately blasphemy against the Holy Ghost. The Bible says our body is the temple of God. To destroy that temple is to blaspheme. The only way out of suicidal depression is first recognizing it is clearly sin.
Second, real escape can be found by wholeheartedly seeking after the Lord, giving one's self in total consecration to God - not wanting your own selfish way, but rather His way alone.
[More resources on suicide can be found at http://misslink.org/distrib1.html]
"We wanted to write you a personal letter to let you know that it was good to hear from you. I wanted to write you myself just to say thank you for the Christian material that you have been so generous to donate to our Institutional Chapel. The material you continue to send is greatly appreciated by the men as well as ourselves.
"We wish there was some other way that we could thank you for the kindness you have shown us. We are under a very limited budget and cannot afford the gratitude that we would like to make with a paid purchase of your material.
"The one thing that we can do is to keep you in our prayers and in the most honest way, that comes from the heart is to sincerely thank you.
"Please know that it does mean a lot to the men and to the Chaplaincy here your dedication to serving the Lord. God Bless."
Chaplains William Akridge & Laurence Nevels
Religious Services / (440)-748-1049 ext. 342 & 345
Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction
Lorain Correctional Institution
2075 S. Avon-Beldon Road | Grafton OH 44044
Brought into Life
January 8, 1937Entered into Rest
September 24, 1999
Bill Mueller supported this ministry in ways most people didn't know about. He never wanted us to make a fuss about his generosity. He just did what he knew God told him to do, without fanfare.
For 28 years, Bill stuck with me through thick and thin. He encouraged me to pursue the vision God gave me to put a copy of The Cross & the Switchblade into the hands of every inmate in the Ohio State Reformatory, in the beginning days of our ministry. He motivated me to raise funds for the project from area businesses. As though that weren't enough, Bill even helped me pass out the books to the prisoners. It was a day I'll never forget. And, would you believe, some of those books are still floating around to this day in the prison system!
When I was working in Teen Challenge back then, I'd often become discouraged and weary. About then, Bill would pass by, and, with a pat on the back, say, "Keep your chin up and your knees down, Mario."
Bill had a real heart for those who were down and out. Often he would walk the streets of Cleveland with me until the late hours of the morning, ministering to drug addicts and prostitutes, roaming the sidewalks. On weekends, he played his saxophone in our coffee house. He encouraged the young people to form a gospel band. Together, you could hear them playing "I've Got a Mansion," "Amazing Grace," "When the Saints Go Marching In." The music would drift out onto the street, drawing in the crowds.
Bill was literally the heart beat of the coffee house ministry. It was common to find him with his arm around a young person, praying and encouraging them. When he wasn't at the coffee house, he was using his big bus to take young people to church services throughout the area, or you'd find him over at Teen Challenge, encouraging the staff or praying with one of the residents.
I imagine, about now, Bill's playing his sax on the streets of glory, giving it all he's got...just like always, with anything he ever did.
Download chapters of Black Samson or send a
reasonable contribution to help with our printing, shipping, and handling
costs, and ask us to send you a copy of the Black Samson book. Any amount
above our actual cost will be used to help us minister to more needy
prisoners.
This amazing conversion story of Maweja Apollo is told by Levi Keidel, 30-year veteran missionary to Zaire. The miracle of Maweja's release from prison is as strange and exciting as the unfolding of the astonishing story of this black man's discovery of himself and a new power greater than he had ever possessed before.
Because of your generous gifts, The Missing Link is able to distribute this book, free-of-charge, to prisoners. We have a limited supply which we can make available to the general public. Perhaps you would like to have a handy paperback edition of the book. It makes a great witnessing tool and a great present for gift-giving.
All funds need to be sent by check or money order, in U.S. dollars only, to the following address:
Black Samson Request
The Missing Link, Inc.
P. O. Box 40031
Cleveland, OH 44140-0031
U.S.A.
"I want to go all the way with the Lord. I feel an overwhelming drawing from the Lord. I have sincerely prayed, but it's like there is no change. How do you surrender all to the Lord? How do you know when it happens? Please I'm miserable and I need answers. I want to be ready when Jesus comes." - Jodi
"Hello my name is Kyle, i am, 7 my mum is sick and has to been in a hospital for 3 monthhs she is holm now but sleeps alot I want her awake soon, she had to go there to stop taking to much drugs I love my mummy will you ask Jesus to fix her caws I and my little brother and my big sister love her and want her like she used to be." - Kyle (Australia)
----
What a big heart cry from this little child in Australia! Kyle found our
online Children's Chapel. A volunteer couple has taken the online assignment
of e-mail ministry to this child. Pray that God will use this couple and
meet Kyle's needs.
"Help, I am alone I feel horrible, porn has invaded my life, I am not a good person, I know what I do is bad. God must think I am rotten. I hate who I am.""I come from Norway. I belive in God, with all my heart, and i have tried so many times to live for him. But it just dont work. Now i feel that my life is a mess, and i guess i need some help to go on." (Norway)
Volunteers are busy helping us minister to the many cries for help coming to us from the Internet.
Chaplain Mario's true life story.Find practical help for troubled and adults and those who minister to them. Locate a Christian residential program in our online directory, accessible 24 hours a day. Read our Tips for Writing Inmates. Find a host of Christian resources from our online Chapel Library.
Subscribe online to our mailing lists: Bible stories, Black Samson, Missing Link newsletter, Pulpit Series, and more.
Forget the crowds! Shop at home the convenient, easy way, using the Chapel's handy Online Christian Bookstore:
Back to In this issue...Not long ago, I noticed a familiar face in my chapel service. Afterwards this same inmate came up to me, grinning from ear to ear. He asked, "Remember me?" I couldn't help but remember the time we brought Christmas cheer to his family when he was in prison.
That cold winter day, I paid a visit to his wife and children, along with several volunteers, carrying a Christmas tree, decorations, gifts, popcorn, accordion, groceries, etc. We piled into the small upstairs apartment, as the children looked on in amazement. While some volunteers set up and decorated the tree, others put away groceries and fixed popcorn. Then we sat together and sang Christmas carols, ending with a brief devotional.
The next day I took this wife to visit her husband, sending her in with hamburgers for her husband. He never forgot that gesture of kindness.
After being transferred to another prison, Greg recently wrote: "Yep, me again - the one you brought my wife to visit me. Brother, believe me. I told all that I'd met you again in church and repeated my heartwarming saga of how you came to my family that Christmas. But you know the best part? That you remembered me after 20 years! Shocking (for me anyway). And the way it opened my eyes just that much more to how 'if this man can do for me as he did, can remember and know my plight of 20 years past, how much more my Great Savior can!'"
Back to In this issue...
From the pen of
Too often we forget where God has brought us from - where we could have been, had it not been for His mercy and grace.
September 14 marked the 30th anniversary of my spiritual birthday in New York City. This year, God allowed me to return to New York and walk those same streets.
My heart was flooded with memories as I recalled the special love "Mom"
Wilkerson showered on me because I reminded her so much of her wayward son
Jerry. Because "Mom" never gave up on me, today I carry the same Gospel
"baton" to others.
I was blessed to attend Times Square Church, pastored by "Mom's" son David, and recommit my life in total dedication to God's work. The work of Teen Challenge still lives on in my heart.
Now, because of modern technology, we are privileged to carry David Wilkerson's Pulpit Series in over 30 languages to the millions in cyberspace, who might otherwise never hear the Gospel story. The same Gospel that "Mom" Wilkerson so boldly proclaimed 30 years ago is still reaching the masses.
Friend, your prayers and support mean more than we can express. Together, we will continue...
Bringing deliverance to the captive,
Kurt "Mario" Haas, Chaplain
The Missing Link, Inc.
P. O. Box 40031
Cleveland, OH 44140-0031
440-282-1683
440-960-1871 Voice/Fax
online @ misslink.org
Make us your Christian starting point on the Web -
misslink.org
"Do you still offer the book 'Black Samson'? This book really related to the life I had and the life I'm now facing - especially the apprehension he faced after release. For I'm now 70 days away from being released, after being incarcerated for 5 years. "Also, does the offer still hold for a free copy of 'How to be Born Again'?" - Greg (Mansfield, Ohio)
"I'm in great need of religious reading material and good Christian books to read. Please send whatever is available to you to send." - Jackie (Paducah, Kentucky)
"I'm a young man who is in a battle with the devil. I am trying to live the way God wants me but me being in jail I keep falling back into my old ways. But I have turned my life over to God. "While I'm here I have been reding a lot of books on how to make things right with God and one of them was Black Samson. I enjoyed it and got a lot out of reading it but I would like to ask you to please send me a copy of How to be Born Again and any other book you think may help me to defeat Satan so I can teach others that God can do all things but fail." - Randale (Cleveland, Ohio)
Your gifts are making it possible to flood these prisons with Bibles and solid Christian literature.
If you're ever passing through the Cleveland, Ohio area, e-mail me at least 2-3 weeks in advance, so I can make arrangements with security clearance, to take you behind the walls for a firsthand glimpse of prison ministry.
What's your prison?
Is it alcohol, drugs, fear, greed, hate, lust, self, or some other addiction?
We are profoundly grateful for your encouragement and prayer support. With God's grace, we have remained debt-free. Together, we can help bring deliverance to the captive!
Linking Troubled Youth & Adults with Life-Changing Programs since 1983
Address your request to:
Ministry Brochure Request
The Missing Link, Inc.
P. O. Box 40031
Cleveland, OH 44140-0031
U.S.A.
If you want an online edition of our ministry brochure, you can find it
at our web site:
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This gift was given in memory of their daughter, Corrie Lykken, who was tragically killed by a drunken driver.
If you wish to designate a "Gift in Honor," or a "Gift in Memory," please clip and mail this coupon, along with your gift, to:
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*Beloved, I only mention these to provide you with a way to give these tremendous savings to missions! These programs are not a part of The Missing Link. We only refer these as a service to you.
Important: Please provide a business-size (#10), self-addressed, stamped envelope for this referral information. Your SASE really helps save our ministry time and money. Thanks for being so considerate!Back to In this issue...
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