From Pastor Kyle McQuillen (Member Care & Missions)

I’ve thought a lot about how I passionately pursue a vibrant relationships with God. While I continue in a discipline of prayer and study, for me a vibrant relationship with God has always come with the greatest impact through my relationships with other people.

For the past seven months God has opened up for me, once a week, the opportunity to teach and counsel inmates at the Tomoka Correctional Institution in Daytona Beach. This blog does not afford me the opportunity to share in depth the wonder of God’s grace and the joy I receive from being able to minister to those who are on the periphery of acceptable society.

I share only one of dozens of encounters He has allowed me to experience recently. Some weeks ago I met with a young incarcerated man who was doing twenty years for a violent crime he had committed. During our time together I asked him “what kind of relationship do you have with God?” He said “I’m an atheist.” But he asked me to share my faith because he had heard me on several occasions during my teaching refer to my deep routed faith in God. At the end of my “testimony” he looked at me and said, “Kyle, would you pray for me?” Of course I did.

The following week, I saw this young man again when I went up to teach. He came over to me, took my hand, tears in his eyes and said, “Kyle, I cannot stop thinking about what you shared with me last week. Will you help me on the journey that leads to faith in Christ?”

On my trip back to Edgewater that night, tears in my own eyes, I heard again the words of our Lord Jesus, “I was in prison, and you visited me…” (Matthew 25:36)