Press & Articles
The
Biblical Recorder
Ministry reaches inmates with Bibles, books
14. July
2009 by Steve DeVane, BR Managing Editor
Kathleen
Skaar doesn't remember who made the
suggestion, but the idea changed the ministry of
Christian Library International
(CLI).
CLI had been distributing books in various locations - YMCAs, nursing homes and
the like. The ministry had some extra
books and workers were trying to decide what to do with them when someone suggested that prison chaplains
might like them to give to prisoners.
Skaar is director of CLI, which is located in a wing of
Hillcrest
Baptist Church
in Raleigh.
She said prison chaplains told her the
books were "answers to prayer."
"They were just thrilled," she said. "Some chaplains said they'd been praying for years and years."
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BR photo by Steve DeVane
Kathleen and
Anders Skaar work with more than 1,000 prisons to
provide inmates with Bibles and other
Christian literature.
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The
ministry had clearly found a need.
"Almost immediately we started getting letters and testimonies from inmates,"
Skaar said.
She likened the experience to the admonition in the
"Experiencing God" discipleship series to find where God is working and join Him
there.
"It was so dramatic where God was working," Skaar said.
Now CLI is totally focused on prison ministry.
"That's where we are and that's where we'll stay unless God tells us otherwise," she said.
Faith finds hunger
Skaar said the CLI story begins with
her testimony. She grew up in church, but had no personal relationship with
Jesus Christ until she attended a retreat in Raleigh in 1995 when she prayed to invite
Jesus into her life.
Her life changed. It wasn't dramatic, she said, but inside she had a thirst and
hunger to know God. She read the
Bible and Christian books.
"God would just bring the right book
to me every time I had a question," Skaar said.
She thought it would be great if other
people had Christian books when they
needed them.
"I just wanted to get books in people's hands," she said.
In 1996, CLI was born. Skaar's husband, Anders, joined
the
ministry full-time in 2002 as mission director.
Now, CLI has sent more than 300,000 books to more than 1,000 prisons and
detention centers.
The ministry has sent books to at least one facility in every state and to 88 in
North Carolina.
"They go out like missionaries into the
prisons," Skaar said.
Last year, the ministry received more
than 2,500 letters from inmates.
"We decided not to let anyone fall through the
cracks so we do answer every letter," she said. Volunteers write letters to the inmates.
"It's without a doubt the most
rewarding volunteer work I've ever done," said Carol Weathersbee,
a member at Hillcrest who writes letters.
Norman Beckham, who retired after more than 30 years as an international and
North American missionary and was pastor at Hillcrest for six years, also helps
at CLI. He said he is impressed by the
Skaars and CLI.
"They have a surprisingly small budget but they
do so much with it," he said.
Shipping is the ministry's biggest
expense. Skaar said it costs about $15 to $25 to send a box of books to a
chaplain.
Anders Skaar monitors shipping costs
to get the best rates. On a recent
day, boxes were packed to be shipped to prisons in
Washington,
Missouri, Texas,
Virginia and New York.
"We're always looking for books," he said.
The biggest request CLI gets from inmates is large print study Bibles.
The ministry also needs up-to-date Christian youth books for teenagers in
detention centers.
Most of the books the ministry sends are "gently used" Christian books,
but CLI also buys new Bibles.
Kathleen Skaar tells the story about
an inmate who called a donated leather
Bible he got from CLI the "best
Christmas present" he'd ever received. The inmate is now out of prison and
attending Bible college. He spoke at a CLI dinner last year and proudly showed
that he takes the Bible with him
every time he speaks somewhere.
CLI also offers inmates a free Bible study correspondence course.
"That's just something the Lord put
on my heart," Skaar said.
Chaplains have told CLI that they
need Bible studies to give to inmates. One day Skaar felt a burden to do
something about it, so she sat down at the
computer and wrote an application. She told volunteers not to put it in every
letter but to pray about it and put it in the
ones to which they felt led.
When the applications started
returning, Skaar, who is 15 hours shy of completing her master of divinity
degree at Southeastern Baptist
Theological Seminary, starting writing lessons.
The course now has 15 lessons. When an inmate completes one study, he or she
returns it to CLI.
The workers write positive comments about that lesson and send another one. Inmates who complete the course get a certificate.
Last year, more than 150 inmates enrolled in the
CLI Leadership Bible Study. An inmate in
Texas
wrote the ministry to say it had
blessed him.
"This study made me think and search my heart," he said.
Find more information about CLI at
www.cli-nc.org
or by calling (919) 212-8122.
