The work,as it happens.
The Gary Project is young, and most of what we do is quiet. This is where we keep the record: what we are doing inside Florida's prisons, with young people, and alongside the people walking changed men home.
Supporting the dorm and the ministry Gary leads.
Every month we do several practical things to support the faith-based dorm and the ministry program Gary leads inside. That has meant meals for the men working through the church's programs, from pizza to a full barbecue with all the sides; large-screen TVs and the equipment to go with them, so the dorm can watch teaching and films on their tablets; and Dave Ramsey financial-education materials sent in, so men learn to handle money before they come home. Small, steady things that tell a man doing the hard work that someone on the outside sees him.
Coming alongside Young Life, inside the walls.
We have begun supporting Young Life's ministry to incarcerated young men, including a recent camp held inside a youth correctional facility. Twenty-one young men spent the week in games, teaching, and honest conversation about who Jesus is. Reaching them here, young, is the heart of the prevention work: a boy who hears the truth in time may never have to learn it the way Gary did.
Standing with Trinity Reentry Center.
We have connected with Trinity Reentry Center in St. Johns, Florida, a faith-based ministry that walks men out of prison and into work, housing, and a church community that will not let them fall. Their results are real, jobs, homes, lives rebuilt, but they have lived out of sight, off the search engines and out of the story. We are helping bring that work into the light, so more people can find it and stand behind it.
Connecting the people doing this work.
Too many faith-based re-entry ministries labor alone, underfunded and unseen, each learning the same hard lessons in isolation. We are mapping the ones doing this work across Florida and beginning to connect them, so no one carrying a changed man home has to carry it by themselves.