So here's my problem with the Lord of the Rings, and I am aware that I'm not the first person to bring this up, but why didn't they just use the gigantic eagles to fly to Mt. Doom and conveniently drop the ring in the fire?
If Gandalf would have just taken one of the Super Uber Eagles straight to Mt. Doom, the Lord of the Rings trilogy becomes a nice 30 minute Hallmark movie instead of the 11 hour 21 minute epic journey that we know it as now.
Don't get me wrong, there is nothing better than a Lord of the Rings movie on a sleepy rainy day, but that's not my point. My point is, if only there was a way of flying a long distance over a short time to accomplish your goal...
...and that is exactly what I was wondering as I sat in the Love Field airport in Dallas, Texas.
A Saints trip isn't really a Saints trip unless there is some travel drama and of course, we managed to find that drama on this trip and then some!
Our trip began at the Peoria airport. Jon Isbell from our Illinois team and I were making the trip to Louisiana to meet up with the rest of the team. We arrived early, made it through security and we were ready to board for our quick trip to Oakdale, Louisiana with stops in Dallas and New Orleans!
Unfortunately, our flight attendant for our plane was late. By the time she came running through the airport with one shoe and a tumbler full of coffee, we left 30 minutes late.
We made it to Dallas just in time to see our next plane leave for New Orleans. That left us stuck in Dallas. After going through all of the options to fly out of Dallas, we found a flight to New Orleans....from the airport across town. We circled the wagons and made travel arrangements and made our way across town via Uber. We had a really cool Uber driver named Karama. Karama was from Kenya but who loved authentic Texas BBQ and American football! Our new Kenyan friend talked football all the way to the airport. He dropped us off at Love Field and we were excited to finally be on our way.
We made it through security, found our gate, bought some snacks, and then heard: "Ladies and Gentlemen, please get comfortable..." The person on the intercom told us that Love Field and the Dallas Fort Worth airports were in a "ground stop" meaning no planes were leaving or landing until a radar issue was fixed.
We waited that out and eventually got on our new flight to New Orleans. We landed a little after 10 pm almost 11 hours after our original arrival time. We met the Saints Executive Director at the airport who managed to have an even more eventful trip than we did. Long story short, his trip included stops in Philadelphia and St. Louis before getting to New Orleans and his luggage ended up in Kansas City and he was re-routed through Nashville- two cities that were not part of our original travel itinerary!
We made a quick stop at the local Walmart and Chick-fil-A before making the three hour drive to the hotel.
We arrived a little before 2 AM but we arrived nonetheless!
We got as much sleep as we would be waking up and heading out the door at 6:45 am for a short ride and 7:00 am arrival.
We arrived at the prison and went through the security process. I was still really tired from all of the travel so I don't remember much of it (it must have happened in order for me to end up on the softball field at some point!)
FCI Oakdale had two different units and a camp team they wanted us to play this weekend. Our first group that we were going to see was Unit 2.
We made it to the softball field and shortly after arriving there, we realized that the majority of the population in Unit 2 spoke Spanish!
Shortly after starting the game, we realized that they were also pretty good at softball!
They were pretty good and we hung with them most of the game but unfortunately, they were leading when we ended the game for our ministry time.
Before I talk about the ministry time, I must remind you that most of them spoke Spanish and not English.
We found someone who could speak both English and Spanish and he agreed to interpret during our ministry time.
James Mast from our Illinois team shared his testimony. James did a good job walking through his story little by little as the interpreter translated it into Spanish for those in the prison yard.
After James shared his testimony, our Executive Director, Frank Zeidler shared the Gospel. Frank laid out a very clear presentation of the Gospel from John 3 and did a good job of sharing the message while working patiently with an interpreter.
After we wrapped up ministry time, we played a second game and pulled out a victory!
Since we had not prepared to see so many Spanish speaking men, one of our Missionary Athletes ran back to the hotel and got more Spanish literature. He made it back before the end of our session with Unit 2 so we could give out even more Gospels.
Overall during our time at Unit 2, we handed out 310 Gospels, with 247 of them being Spanish! We also saw 71 men make a profession of faith!
We left Unit 2 and went to Unit 1, not to play softball but to have lunch. We ate lunch with the men who we are going to play the next day. We enjoyed some nachos, smoked sausage, and some cookies for lunch. I had lunch with a guy who was excited about how the Lord was working in the prison and how excited he was to serve Him once he got out. Conversations like that are always encouraging!
After lunch, we left Unit 1 and drove to the camp. The camp was a little more relaxed in terms of security.
We played our first game against the camp and won in pretty convincing fashion. In between games, Buck Jorgenson from Minnesota shared his testimony of how he came to know the Lord and Jimmy Cochran shared the Gospel.
We played one more game and won again. After the game was over, we met with the team on the pitcher's mound of the softball diamond. We handed out some award books to the umpires and we recognized the MVP of the game by giving him a devotional book. We also took the time to pray with them one last time and remind them of why were there and urged them to follow the Lord.
Overall we handed out 171 Gospels and had 6 men make a profession of faith at the camp.
We wrapped up the evening by getting some small town Louisiana style food. Needless to say, after a couple of days of travel, early mornings, and softball, I will sleep really, really hard!
Tomorrow we are going back to the prison to play Unit 1. Please keep us in prayer as we play some more softball and share the Gospel!
