Dear Brothers and Sisters,

This trip was a “two-parter.” During the first week I accompanied a missionary medical team to San Salvador, the capital of El Salvador. The team consisted of 17 people and was organized by my home church, Maranatha Chapel. On Friday of that week John Janks and I went to a juvenile jail in Ahuatchapan, El Salvador, only fifteen minutes from the Guatemalan border. There were 66 inmates from age 12 to 20 and the most striking thing about their appearance was that at least half of them had large tattoos that covered their faces. These were not little tattoos, but large black letters and symbols that completely covered their foreheads, cheeks, and chins. The tattoo ritual involves a pact with the devil in which they join a gang and pledge loyalty to Satan. However, the King’s Castle Ministry has been actively working with them and about half of them have given their lives to the Lord, including 8 or 9 at our service, breaking that pact with the enemy. Just six months before, they had taken over the jail, kicked out the guards, and the guards refused to go back in because it was so dangerous. So they just put a cordon around the jail. What a difference the Lord can make. At the end of our service many of these same young men were on their knees, weeping and crying out to the Lord in repentance and submission to the King of Kings.

After a week of exhausting work praying all day for the patients that came for medical treatment in San Salvador, I arrived in Panama City, Panama and was greeted by the President of Prison Fellowship, Panama who had made all the arrangements for us to go into the prisons there. They told us that we would be the first non-Prison Fellowship team to ever work with them in Panama. I soon met up with Pastor Chris Gomez, Francisco Sanchez, and Carlos Velazquez from here in the U.S. These beloved co-laborers from Chicago had also accompanied me on previous trips. With just enough time to take a quick shower, we headed off for a Vigilia, which I found out once I got there, is a Latin American service from 8:00 PM to 2:00 AM. This was the first of several services that we had in the most dangerous part of the country of Panama, right in the center of rival gang wars and territorial conflict. The smell of marijuana wafted through the building from those who are smoking it nearby. Shooting gang wars were frequent before the Gospel began to be preached there. As we drove into the neighborhood there were two policemen with automatic rifles standing on the corner. No

one in the area knew who we were, or anticipated our arrival. As three of us walked down a very dark street, suddenly a dirty, disheveled man approached us crying, “These men are preachers of the King of Kings. They have come as servants of God to preach the message of God.” Chris and I were immediately reminded of the account in Acts 16:16-17 where a woman with a spirit of divination followed Paul saying, “These men are servants of the Most High God which show unto us the way of salvation.” At that point I began to realize that this was going to be another remarkable trip. When I finally got to my room that night I slept for 16 hours straight.

Monday – We went to our first prison in that country, Renacer, which is adjacent to the Panama Canal. The Lord arranged things so that we began our service in the Catholic Chapel because the leaders of Prison Fellowship there are Catholics. However, when the Christians heard us, they joined the service for the first Catholic/Christian combined service ever to be held in that jail. A total of 46 inmates attended and 7 responded to the altar call to give their lives to Christ. In the evening, we split into two teams and ministered in two different churches.

Tuesday – We went to our second prison, Centro Feminino, the women’s prison. In this service, we not only had the Catholics and Christians together for the first time, but the Seventh Day Adventists also joined us, as did the Director of the Jail. A total of 68 women attended and 13 responded at the invitation to receive Christ as Savior. At that service, we ministered with Jorge Godoy who is head of the Hosanna ministry, which is the most active jail and prison ministry in Panama. I introduced myself as “Capellan Roberto”, but they called me “Cappy” because they had never heard of the Capellan (Chaplain) or knew the concept of what a Chaplain does. In fact, no one in the country knew what a Chaplain was. Not many people minister in the prisons in Panama. We invited them to the Jail and Prison ministry seminar we going to hold on Friday.

Wednesday – In the morning, we went to the garbage dump for Panama City, which has a 24-hour per day stream of garbage trucks hauling the city’s garbage to it. As we approached, I saw from a distance what seemed to be a black tornado swirling above the fresh garbage. As we got closer, I saw that this “tornado” was actually huge vultures circling for a chance to eat from the pile. Competing for this garbage were many men sifting through the garbage piles. Occasionally, they would kill one of the vultures if

they could for dinner. These people were the Kuna Indians from the jungle of Panama who had traveled to the city looking for a better life. The Panamanians segregate the Indians and do not allow them to intermingle in their society and placed their community at the dump. We ministered to them in “slow Spanish” (which is the only Spanish I know) because their native tongue was Kuna and their Spanish, in some cases, was about as good as mine. We gave them an offering so that they could purchase a new drum. The one that they had was beaten up with holes in it. They were very happy with our visit and the moving of God’s Power as were many in the other services. We saw men and women drop to their knees like a stone and fall before the Lord on concrete surfaces but remain uninjured. Hungering and Thirsting for Him. In the afternoon, we went to the

local TV Station to make an announcement about our seminar on Friday. The local TV Station, Channel 29, turned out to be a part of the TBN (Trinity Broadcasting Network) which did a forty minute interview in Spanish with us about jail and prison ministry live to 50,000 Panamanians and sent for broadcast to another 24 Spanish speaking countries. I encouraged the viewers to go and “visit Jesus” because He is waiting for us to visit the least which is the same as visiting Him. (Mat. 25:31-40). In the evening, we went back to the most dangerous area for a service and a prostitute came forward and asked the Lord to change her life.

Thursday – Today’s prison is one of the largest in the country, the Joyita. On Tuesday I had watched the local news on television describe a disturbance and hunger strike by the Colombians in this prison with guards ringing the compound. I just knew that we were going to go to that prison and, sure enough, we did. Our service was in the open-air visiting area and, because of the disturbance, they would only allow the Christian Panamanians to attend, of which there were 28. Six guards were present inside and just outside the area were 5 more with automatic rifles. Only about 50 yards away, but separated by two fences with razor wire, were the Colombian prisoners that were striking and we noticed that about 35 of them were outside and against the fence watching us. We turned our speaker so that we could preach the Gospel of Salvation and repentance to them while the Christian brothers in our service prayed that these men would hear the Word and have their lives changed by Christ. One Colombian began to bang on the fence indicating that he wanted a Bible and to attend our service. My reaction was, “fat chance!” I turned my attention to the service and just as we were reaching the end of it, I turned to see this same Colombian standing next to me. He had been pounding on the

fence and begging the guards to let him come over during the whole service and finally, like the widow and the unjust judge; they relented and let him attend. When we gave him a Bible, he fell to his knees, kissed the Bible and wept. That evening we had a Compaña, which was an open-air service at a basketball court. Even people up in the balconies of their apartments listened and raised their hands to receive Christ.

Friday – This was the first prison and jail ministry seminar ever conducted in Panama and we had 67 attend. From 8:00 AM to 4:00 PM, I poured out my heart about the work of God in prisons and how to do it as Chaplain, Assistant Chaplain, Volunteers and

Supporter. At the end of the seminar, we laid hands on brother Jorge to become the first Chaplain in the history of Panama and to inaugurate Chaplains for Christ, Panama. Immediately after we did that, Chaplain Jorge conducted his first meeting of a dozen volunteers to discuss the next step. That evening we were back at the garbage dump for another Compaña there.

We thank God and all of you for your prayers and support for this trip. Please continue to pray as we prepare to leave May 18th with a team of 5 for Madrid to work in the prisons through the Assemblies of God and with the Teen Challenge-type ministry of Remar. This will include an official MAPS trip sponsored by Maranatha Chapel and the Assemblies of God. To God be all the Glory.

Staff Chaplain Rob Brown