I arrived in Costa Rica on Wednesday. My day started with a 3:15am ride to the airport and didn’t end until I got to the hotel at about 3:30pm. Costa Rica is on central time, but they don’t observe daylight savings so it’s an hour behind Alabama during this time of the year. With all the plane changes and waiting almost 2 hours to get into the country I didn’t get any lunch. So, I grabbed a quick bite and crashed in the room. The room is very nice and I have a great view.

The actual conference doesn’t start until Friday, but we were told that we needed to get here a day early in case we had any “pre” meetings to attend. Turns out I didn’t have any so I had the day free. This provided me the opportunity to go and visit the work of my friends Carlos and Carla Cunningham and Voice of Liberty. I have watched their work from afar, but it was encouraging to see firsthand what God was doing through their efforts. They work with inmates, ex-inmates, their families, and victims. Their goal is to help those they work with find faith in Jesus Christ and to reduce the rate of recidivism (returning to prison) by assisting the inmates through restorative justice. 

Voice of Liberty has established churches in most of the prisons in the San Jose area. Carlos also operates Kairos ministries in those facilities. However, the biggest project has been establishing a faith-based prison which I was blessed to visit today. The work of the faith-based prison has helped inmates to build skills and disciplines that are important for them when they are allowed to return to society. Less than 1% of those who go through the faith-based prison return.

It was great to hear several of the stories of those who were there and the blessing it was to their lives. My friend Marty Hand was there leading a group through the Celebrate Recovery program. There was another group who was learning to paint. I walked through a butterfly sanctuary that helped to raise the Blue Morpho, the official butterfly of Costa Rica. I saw a workshop where inmates were learning woodcraft, and I walked through gardens and orchards filled with fruit trees and plants of all types.

I spoke with one of the inmates and he told me that in the regular prisons, you had to spend most of your days worried about your health (staying alive) and making sure you had food. There was no time to worry about anything else. In the faith-based prison, safety and food are not a concern, so you are free to spend time working and learning. Many of those there were taking classes to finish high school or work on college credit. They had a mid-day worship and prayer service that I was able to attend.

After our visit, Carlos and Carla took me to a local restaurant where I had a wonderful authentic Costa Rican meal. Plantains covered in cheese and honey, a corn fritter with crema, and a tortilla (which here is a cornbread filled with meat, vegetables, and/or fruit).

Tomorrow, our first day of General Conference begins at 9:00am local time with worship featuring our three bishops: Scott Jones, Mark Webb, and John Wesley Yohanna. Most of the morning will be filled with procedural votes to help us in setting up the work for the rest of our time here. During the afternoon we continue the procedural work and consider what petitions are eligible to come before our body. Then that evening we will meet at the Methodist School here in San Jose for a worship service to close out our day.

You can watch most of the main sessions by going to YOUTUBE and the schedule can be found HERE. That’s about all for today. I hope to provide another report tomorrow.