Felons and Frogs

This morning we had an early start when we left for Lushnia, a city of 75,000 to the south of Tirana.

We met up with a local pastor and visited a prison there. We went through numerous security cheques, as officious looking Albanian police checked our passports and the contents of our pockets.

We went in, through several gates and barbed-wire fences, into the prison. It was a fairly oppressive place. The buildings looked down onto a quad that was separated by fences into several courts where prisoners played football or chatted.

We went into a room and were joined by about 25 prisoners. Simon sang a song, and then we all sang a couple. I introduced the team and then Andrew and Pete told a story about how God had helped them in their lives. I then spoke about how God has a special place in his heart for prisoners and how, in Jesus, he had experienced being arrested as a criminal. I said we could do nothing about the physical bars in this prison, but Jesus could do something about the bars of fear, hate and insecurity that surround our hearts.

We prayed and invited God to come and then finished with another song.

After the service we hung out with the prisoners. A few spoke English, usually because they had spent some time in England in the past. We heard some eye-opening stories about why they were there, but also met two guys who were believers.

After the prison visit we went for lunch and ate a local delicacy - frogs' legs.









Very tasty!

We're now waiting in a cafe in Lushnia until we can go to a village nearby. A city church has recently planted a church in this village and we're going to go to meet the people there and do a presentation.





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