Spiritual Awakening Breaks Out in City Jail

September 2, 1999
by Rev. R. E. Knodel

[What follows is the first jail interview with student John Reyes, who has been imprisoned in the city of Lynchburg, Virginia, for preaching the gospel at a city school. Submitted by Rev. R. E. Knodel, Jr., pastor of Grace Orthodox Presbyterian Church, to the Internet, after his 2:30 p.m. interview (9-2-99) with John, after his first 48 hours of incarceration.]

The first word regarding John Reyes, after 48 hours in the Lynchburg City Jail is of a spiritual awakening! I entered the visiting area with trepidation, wondering whether John would show any sign of assault or exhaustion. Instead I was greeted by a smiling, euphoric dynamo going by the name of John Reyes!

I found the news good and every addition which John related made it get better. I am a man not given to overstatement. What I relate is nothing other than an extraordinary first 48 hours for John. God seems to be answering ORN's national director Flip Benham's prayers on a 3 or 4 to one ratio!

On the Monday (8-30-99) prior to John's Tuesday incarceration, Flip had stood on a rooftop parking garage overlooking the City Jail, and prayed for revival to break out in the jail with John's arrival. The details follow. Let the reader be the judge!

1) When the authorities put John in the Annex, or the detoxification-entry-holding cell, through which all prisoners pass on their way into the city jail, he got his Bible almost immediately. Normally prisoners spend three days in the annex which is a windowless basement area in the police station containing a number of large group cells without receiving personal effects. When Flip Benham went in, he didn't get his Bible for a number of days.

2) John began to read his Bible. Another prisoner asked John if he would read out loud to him. This was very early in John's incarceration in the detox cell. Almost immediately, the other men in the cell -- around half a dozen -- asked John if he would read out loud for them too! John began to read and make some commentary on his reading. They urged him to keep it up. After an hour or so, John asked them how long they wanted him to continue. They said, "Until you get too tired to read!"

3) The bottom line was that John read the Bible for hours and hours Tuesday night and Wednesday in the holding cell. I can't recall all the sections John noted to me. He said, "I've read them the story of Joseph in prison, and this story and that..." and I remember John saying that he took them through the whole of Psalm 119 (the longest chapter in the Bible) making commentary as he went. He said that all the men in his cell listened attentively, but in the next cage over, a number of scoffers mocked John and his cellmates. But they were undaunted. They, unlike the City of Lynchburg and its High Schools, wanted to hear the Word of God!

4) John said that one of these inmates has already become a Christian! He came to John after he had finally stopped reading, and related his sad life and his great need, as he perceived it, to change. He asked John if John would pray with him to receive Christ, and John -- of course -- acquiesced in the joy of the Lord. The man is 32 years old and has begged John to help him find a church when he gets out! I took the man's name and plan to write him, inviting him to ours and telling him he need have no embarrassment in our company. All of us consist of the greatest wickedness imaginable, but we have all been saved by the same grace. His name is William. Another prisoner named David has asked John for spiritual counsel. He's an E.C. Glass graduate, which was the school of origin of this whole judicial fiasco. But whereas superintendent James McCormick "stopped his ears" at the hearing of the gospel, this poor man has called on John to explain to him about the Living Waters of Christ! Pray for this man who knows he needs God's help!

5) Even in their fallen estates, the prisoners appear to have more enlightenment than the "gang of four"* who made sure the awful Christian, John Reyes, got put in jail. John has been approached individually, and by group, with prisoners comparing their crimes with his. They have told him, "You got a raw deal, I did this -- which was much worse -- and I got less jail time!" To this day our local paper, The News & Advance (N&A), has been unwilling to publish Judge Richard Miller's comparative sentences, which were unearthed by OR volunteers at the time of Flip's incarceration. The N&A looked at the sentences and couldn't see any inequity. They just couldn't see what the Christians were "crying about." But these supposedly ignorant prisoners, who should have been more concerned about themselves, and more self-centered, were empathetically telling John that he had gotten a "bum deal." They understood equity and inequity, and saw plainly that John had received the latter! In fact John said the other prisoners have been amazed at what befell him. Since going into the jail proper, he has been treated like a celebrity! The Gang of Four have tried to hang their sentence of condemnation over John. But here in Lynchburg's darkest pit, God has justified what the Gang condemned! (*Gang of Four:" James McCormack/superintendent of schools, Jim Petty/chief prosecutor, Charles Bennet/police chief, and Richard Miller/the judge, who, w/o jury trial, found Flip and John guilty and sentenced both to a year in jail).

6) God has given John opportunity after opportunity. It is simply amazing. Many of us were concerned because of John's short stature, and the prospect of jailhouse violence. But when John was transferred from the Annex to the jail (after only 28 hours instead of the normal 72! which is another story of God's grace!) God turned the "weakness" into a strength. When John entered the cell area, everyone's neck was craned. They had word he was coming! Then they saw his shortness and commenced commenting. "Hey man, you can't be John Reyes, that guy we saw preaching on the streets in Lynchburg on T.V. He looked like a big guy and you're just a little guy! John said they started laughing, and he started laughing, and the whole place got semi-hysterical! This paved the way for John's almost total acceptance with all the guys in this cell area immediately. John has said that a few have held back, but most have been quite congenial with him! He has not had to endure even the scent of a physical threat. In fact they have nicknamed him "The Rev.", and have accorded him honor, saying that he has been unfairly detained! When he was called out of the cell for my visit, all the men said, "Jerry Falwell's here to see you." But alas and alack it was only Pastor Knodel. But the reader can gain a sense of John's celebrity status within the jail.

7) I say that John has had opportunity after opportunity. In the jail proper, the men got griping about the cell. They said, "This cell isn't fit for a dog." John held his peace. But then, when he felt he had an opening he said, "You know, this is really not that bad. I've seen other prisons around the world. Can I tell you about them?" John said as he began to tell about the jails of Pakistan which he had seen, and some others, the men got very quiet. When he finished they said they didn't know about these other, squalid conditions, and that now they realized they didn't have it so bad.

8) On another occasion one of the prisoners asked John "how" he could be so happy in jail? This gave John opportunity to tell them about a man named "Paul" who had written a letter from the Phillippian jail (!), who said, "Rejoice in the Lord always, and again I say rejoice." (Phil. 4:4) One of the jailers heard John reading the Scriptures, which has continued in the regular jail. He went out and brought back a whole handful of devotionals for the men. And John said, "They were good devotionals too!" John thought he heard one of the jail staff say "Praise the Lord" quietly, under their breath. When he got opportunity, he asked, "Are you a Christian?" They said, "Yes, and if you need any help in here, just come to me!"

9) John said a verse which has leapt out at him is Psalm 119: 32, "I will run the course of your commandments. For You shall enlarge my heart." He commented to me how that had touched him. He had obeyed God in witnessing for Christ at E. C. Glass High School. This "course" had led him into the city jail. And now God was enlarging his heart with knowledge and the Love of God! John's been thanking his jailers for everything from opening doors to serving food. He said he'd learned that from reading Corrie Ten Boom, and her imprisonment by the Nazi's!

10) Lastly, but not least, John is the only inmate with a brand new orange prison uniform! All the other men, of more normal size, got "hand-me-downs" from previous wearers! (Yuch!) John, being somewhat diminutive, got a bright orange prison suit that had never been worn! God's sense of humor survives and triumphs even in places like jail!

Brothers and sisters who read this: Please pray that this abundance of blessings, this cornucopia of grace, continues. It's only been 48 hours, and the son of Juan and Renie Reyes, born again by the grace of God in Christ, is turning the Lynchburg City Jail on its head! I was so impressed by John's calm, and the evident grace by which God is working. This is not John Reyes, working in the flesh of his strength. It is the grace of the Spirit of the Living God, which cannot be constrained by men!

Continue to pray and "pass the ammo!" "Dem walls," like old Jericho's, "are coming down!" Also pray for those in Lynchburg, like myself who are doing all they can for John. Since last Thursday night, until last night (Wed.) I had only been getting four our five hours of sleep! We are scheduled to meet Sunday at 3:00 p.m. for a witness service outside the jail. This will continue until John is freed. I have churches to visit, faxes to wire, and people to call. Pray that God would finally give me victory in turning more of our city's pastors on to the justice of John's case. And don't forget to praise the Lord! This is just the first 48 hours for John! Our city may never be the same again!