Stories From the Road

An Aerial photo of Mule Creek State Prison

Mule Creek State Prison
By Brian Sell

"Try that", yelled a helpful prison guard on the hunt for a good power source for our sound system. Earlier, when Joshua Wheeler reached into his lower bass notes there was a horrendous popping sound as the subwoofers shut down after drawing too much power from the outlet under the yard’s drinking fountain. The guard was now running a power cord into the formerly locked laundry facility.

"We’re powered up", said baritone/vocal percussionist Luke Coles after switching on the amps. We all breathed a sigh of relief. It was a two-hour process to finally gain access to Facility A of the Mule Creek State Prison and we were itching to do some singing.

When we first arrived we met Kimo, an educator that had it on his heart to bring Rescue to various prisons in The Sacramento area, and it was his hard work that was allowing us the opportunity to bring the message of Christ into not only Mule Creek, but also the Preston Youth Facility and New Folsom Prison. He even brought us a couple of canopies to put up in the prison yard to protect our equipment from the afternoon sun, but we were told during security checks that the snipers up in the towers would see the tents as a potential obstruction to a clean line of sight in case there was a problem.

We soon met Chaplain Scott Barham, a man who is passionate about his ministry to inmates. He is also passionate about music as witnessed by the fact that he used to tour as a drummer in a band with the likes of Amy Grant, Petra, and Joe English.
Luke, also Rescue's road manager, submitted an inventory of the equipment that we'd be bringing into the prison a month in advance of our trip, but some items had changed and the list needed some last minute updates. The changes were frowned upon but they were approved. Next was a visual inspection of every item on the inventory list by the guard. Everything was accounted for, down to the power strips and the dry erase markers for the song list boards.

One last problem to overcome before we could get into the prison: one of our members was unable to find his Drivers License and we had proceeded in faith, believing that if God wanted us to be there that he'd make a way for us to get in.

"They don't just let people into a maximum security prison without some government issued identification," said chaplain Barham, adding, "But we're going to see if we can get you in anyway, they kinda owe me a favor." After some nail-biting and coming up with some alternate plans we had decided that if we skipped two or three songs that we might be able to go on with the program even if they didn't let our buddy into the prison yard, it wouldn't be nearly as strong, but at least we'd be able to take advantage of the opportunity we'd been afforded.

One of the top administrators gave us the news personally that she'd allow our guy to go in. They would need to take a picture of him before he could enter. "Just make sure you look like the guy in the picture when you come back out!" He agreed, his picture was taken and we were on our way.

"We need you to wait," one of the station guards advised, "there's been a code and we want to make sure that it's cleared up before you go in there." This meant that there had been some sort of a threat of violence, which is not tolerated in the protective custody portion of the prison. These were the inmates that needed protection from the prison's general population because of the nature of the crime or because of gang affiliation. When a code is called, all inmates in the yard must immediately sit down.

After we were finally given clearance to go ahead, we carted all of our stuff through another security checkpoint, and then into the prison yard. Joshua and Tommy saw a prisoner being escorted to a different area that was beat up pretty bad. This was probably the inmate responsible for the code.

We were led to the side of a building on a sidewalk at the inner perimeter of the yard. We could see the basketball courts directly in front of us. There were two heavily tattooed inmates who were helping us to get all set up. They were both very excited to see us and were looking forward to hearing our program. Caution tape was stretched from either side of the stage area all the way out in front of the stage to encompass the soundboard where Jason Overstreet was running sound, to keep the area clear.

After a false start or two because of a lack of power we were finally under way. We had a nice little crowd gathered around the tapeline but there were many who continued to play basketball right through the performance.

I don't remember exactly when it happened but I think it was near the end of the performance when another "code" was called out over the loud speaker. What I do know is that it worked out so that the entire yard was seated on the ground and listening when Chaplain Barham gave his short invitation and told the guys in the yard that they'd have more guests like us if their behavior continued to be good.

Talking with an older Native-American inmate named Joseph who was carrying a bible and a very on-fire for God look in his eye he told me, "when a person is too sick to eat for himself they take him to the hospital and sometimes they need to be force-fed. These guys in here are sick and they won't stop to listen to God themselves. What God did here today was like force-feeding. He made them stop and listen to what he was saying!"

I felt like we were a real encouragement to the group of Christians we met at Mule Creek, but after chatting with some of them afterwards and hearing some of their amazing testimonies we felt extremely blessed by the overall experience. I know that my faith was stirred after seeing what God had accomplished in the hearts of these men.

After we had everything packed up and we were making our way back through the walls of that prison, Chaplain Barham said something that meant a lot to me personally and I know it will mean a lot to those who support the ministry of Rescue. He said, "In the year since Rescue was last here, there has been a legal battle to give ground to pagan philosophies in the prison yard. At one point they were even trying to force us to let them use the Chapel, but", he added with a gleam in his eye, "God didn’t allow that!"

He continued, "I really see that last year's visit by Rescue was an important first step and it stirred up a lot of spiritual enemies. This year's visit seems to signal that God is really establishing something here! We 'd like to get you back here again soon!"

We assured him, "We can't wait to come back!"