For NBF, aftercare is the spiritual support someone needs upon release from corrections, or as they are coming out of addiction.
We need Titus 2 Brothers and Sisters. We also need leaders willing to launch new groups and provide Children's ministry at NBFW meetings.
Based on Titus 2:1-8, these are Christian men and women who attend and participate in Discipleship Groups. Primarily, they focus on building relationships, and become "passive mentors." These men and women do the work of modeling how to follow Christ.
NBFW is New Beginnings For Women. This is branch of the ministry is for the women who love a New Brother: mothers, wives, girlfriends, etc. It also provides aftercare support for women coming our of corrections or addiction.
God's success rate is 100%! Every man who gets connected and stays connected, stays out of jail and out of his lifestyle of addiction and sin. In the past 12 years we have worked on this mission field, this has been true for countless men. It is God's work, and He does it well.
7.3 million Americans are in prison, or on parole or probation.–that is one in 31 adults. The Body of Christ cannot ignore these statistics, or the vast mission field in our own backyard.
I started blogging almost ten years ago on Xanga, and thanks to Steven I ended up on my old blog today. Looking through old posts, I found one I thought I would share. This was first published on May 27, 2013.
I began to weed my garden.
Last summer I did a tiny bit of container gardening, and in the autumn planted some mums in the ground. That was a big deal for me. I’ve always thought I had two black thumbs, but after my little successes last summer, I am expanding my horizons.
So, I started to weed the flower beds beside the house. I like to weed. It is slow work for me, but with every weed I pull I imagine what I can plant in its place. I’m not very ambitious, and know very little about growing, but there’s a lot to like about being in the garden. It’s very satisfying.
Well, it was very satisfying, until I took my eyes off the nice, black plot I had just cleared. That happened on my second day. I stood up and admired my hard work, but as I turned to take my tools back to the shed I noticed all the weeds that still remained.
If you attend church at all, you will undoubtedly hear a thousand sermons on “Be filled with the Spirit” (Eph. 5:18) for every one sermon you hear preached on “Be ye angry, and sin not” (Eph.4:26). This is a command! It is not a defense for a bad temper. It is not an excuse for an explosion of bitterness from your bruised ego for personal rejection. I am talking here of Holy Anger. God gets angry: “The anger of the Lord was kindled against Moses” (Exodus 4:14); “God is angry with the wicked every day” (Psalm 7:11). (If you must have a bumper sticker, try this last statement for a while -- but be sure that you increase your insurance before you do so.)
The blessed preacher St. Paul walked down Main Street Athens, the intellectual capital of the world of his day.
John 19:30
“When Jesus therefore had received the vinegar He said,
‘It is finished’ and He bowed His head and gave up the ghost.”
I said last week that I’d attempt to talk to you on the three most important words, I believe, in history - IT IS FINISHED. This is one of the seven sayings, as we say, of the Lord Jesus on the cross. Just three words - IT IS FINISHED.
The Greatest Words Ever Uttered
By the Greatest Man That Ever Lived.
In these three words I see the consummation of all the Old Testament truth and the germination of all New Testament truth. I don’t believe that ever in history, anywhere, at any time, by anybody, were three words more pregnant with meaning than these three words given by one Man at the end of His life - It is finished. It is finished.
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