Oh Brian! by Brian Hardie (freda ebook reader .txt) 📕

I had my own cell in the work block. I needed my reading glasses but was not allowed to have them because they were not prescribed. God made a way though. I found a “Giant print” Bible on the clothing shelf. I started reading.

I was losing everything of the world. My wife sent a lawyer in with divorce papers. I was glad to get them because I knew she was “making it”. I was told all of my stuff at the house was lost. I was down to the clothes in the holding room as my entire earthly possessions. I couldn’t make phone calls and didn’t like watching TV. It was “Jail Heaven” for me. The first time in my life that I was able to take an honest account of my life, read the bible and fellowship with the King of Kings. I spent two months forgiving everyone I was holding anything against, all the way back to the doctor who slapped me coming out of the womb. Forgiveness is the most empowering thing you can do. If you can learn to forgive like Jesus, no one can ever hurt you. It’s the un-forgiveness that hurts. Render its grip powerless and forgive! By the way, un-forgiveness in any measure keeps God from forgiving you; it’s to eternal death not to forgive.

One day I was watching TV and heard the testimony, “In America, out of every ten houses, there’s seven divorces, six alcoholics, five drug addicts, four, etc…”  I thought how this could be in the “Land of the free’. Then I heard, “And one Christian, a real one.” I decided to draw a banner (flag) that would identify this house. I put three crosses on a flag. That night God moved “over me”, I heard my name called. I felt the fear of the Lord and it pressed me to the core of my being. It was God’s love forgiving and pressing out my sin. When I sat up, my drawing was folded in half and creased. I didn’t do it and I was the only one in the cell.

The next three months were spent devouring the word of God. I kept coming to one verse which God was laying on my heart. Mat 19:29 says, “And every one that hath forsaken houses, or brethren, or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife, or children, or lands, for my name's sake, shall receive an hundredfold, and shall inherit everlasting life”. I felt like I needed a “hundredfold” to break even from the present state I was in. I had already lost everything I had except my three boys. In my heart they were definitely between me and God. I can remember telling God, “OK, you have everything but my three boys.” His reply was always, “That’s not enough.” By the way, He will talk to you if you draw nigh to him, quite your mind, and seek Him with all your heart. Try turning off the TV and stop listening to the garbage music.

It took three months of praying, fasting when I could, and seeking His face for me to one day “break” and say, “Alright, you’ve got them too”. I was immediately overwhelmed with His love. I realized I didn’t even know what love was until this day. God’s love is so different than what the world calls love. The world’s love is control, manipulation, guilt ridden, limited and oppressive. God’s love is free, abundant, overflowing and empowering. It presses the very nature of the old man out of you, as well as all your sin. I felt the presence of God and He called my name, then said, “I didn’t tell you to forget your children, I told you to put me first so I can show you what love is and then when I restore you to them, you will be able to love them as I love you”. As I write this, I only ask Him to forgive me for forgetting this “First Love” from time to time. I am being overwhelmed right now. I pray that whatever you are holding to before God that you let it go right now. It is the very thing that is keeping you from His fullness. My experience is that you will get it all back a hundredfold anyway. Quit kicking yourself! God doesn’t want your obedience (that will come later), HE WANTS YOUR HEART-ALL OF IT! Most local churches are so consumed with obedience and reputation that they never experience the power of God through surrender. It’s not your obedience, it’s Jesus’. It’s not your way, it’s “The Way’- Jesus. It’s not your righteousness, it’s Jesus’. It’s not what you do, it’s what Jesus did!

How did I spend two months on forgiveness and three months on Matthew 19:29 in four months you ask? They “forgot” I was in jail and did not send me to another judge I had to see in another part of the county for one check. They apologized when I inquired and they said I would see him “this week”. Well, efficiency is not what the Government is known for. A week later, I went before this judge and I thought I would get out that day. He asked me a simple question, “Where are you going to live?” When I hesitated he smiled and said, “You don’t know, I’ll see you next month and have someone come speak for you on that day”. I got a message to one of my friends and he said he would be there. On the way back from court I realize the judge did me a favor as I saw my jail room in a different light. I had a place to go. It was a place of peace. It had electricity and water. So what if it had bars on it, I was free for the first time in my life despite my environment. The guards used to say, “There’s something different about you”. I would reply, “I’m free”. They would say I wasn’t and that I was crazy to say so. I knew better. For the first time in my life I was not “needy” for things and people of this world. I prayed to God to keep me as long as necessary. I was in His hands!

The next court date came and went. They didn’t take me to the judge until the following day. He said, “Who’s here to speak for you?” I replied, “He was told to come yesterday”.  I showed him the court order for the day before. He said, “No one came anyway, we’ll see you in a month”.

A week before the next court date I was reading through the bible and when I came to James, I heard, “Save that for court.” The morning of court at “prayer call”, a brother in the Lord said, “God told me to read James today’. I was overwhelmed. When I went into court, my name was called and the judge immediately said, “I’m going to let you go”. I replied, “I thought you would”. I was learning that if God is your defender, you don’t have to say a word. When you try to defend yourself, you are taking his place and it won’t work.

I was released and sent to Shelby County jail. I was physically, emotionally, and most importantly spiritually stronger than I have ever been in my life. Although it was another jail, the environment was completely different. I was put in a block where there were about sixty men. There was four “lockups” in the back where we slept. The racial makeup was different too. There were six black guys, a few Mexicans, and the rest were white.

As I walked in the jail, the inmates were all yelling, “Fresh Fish.” I watched as the black guys harassed the white guys, stole their food and slapped them around. I thought about what Jesus would do. The next day a NASCAR race was on the TV. The white guys were watching it, or trying to, as the black guys would come out of their lockup and change the channel and laugh. I came out of my lockup and positioned myself where they would have to walk by me to change it again. This time only one of them came down, I told him he would have to get passed me to change it again. He started yelling obscenities and cowardly went to get his friends. I had no hatred in my heart for this man, only hatred for what he was doing. Amazingly, I felt love and sorrow for him. They surrounded me and the one kept yelling. I asked him to go into the lockup, just me and him and whatever happens stays in there. He said, “OK, let’s go”. As I walked into the lockup, I prayed a “gate” over the entrance that he could not pass. After a half an hour of bravado, carrying on, and talking trash, he was exposed as a fool and a coward because he couldn’t come in. Personally, I knew I could beat him in the flesh or in the spirit.

They all backed down when the guards came in. The white guys came in and congratulated me. I said, “It’s not us against them, I will help anyone in trouble, black, white, Latin; it doesn’t matter”. I started a bible study and invited the black guys. All of them, except one, became some of my best friends; especially the one who wanted to fight me.

The one that wasn’t “won over to Christ” in jail, I saw about six months later and we had peace between us. I saw him at the Wal-Mart and before he remembered who I was, I gave him a big smile, reached out to shake his hand and said, “Hey Brother, how you doing” in a loud excited voice. He smiled and shook my hand. Then he remembered, looked a little puzzled and walked away. A week later, I saw him again and he had definitely changed towards me. We greeted as old time buddies would. He said he was going to church and “doing good”. Hallelujah!

In my block was one guy who said “F… that stuff” to the bible. His name was “Red”. After talking with him I found out his dad was a preacher. Red had three young girls visiting him. He laughed about the idea that they each thought he was their only boyfriend. He talked continuously about doing drugs. I knew his foolishness would lead to a life behind bars. I wasn’t reaching him with talk. He was going to have to “see it.”

Another one, Jerry, became one of my best friends. He was “digging in” the word and came to all bible studies. We played “Combat” basketball when they let us outside. “Combat” basketball is a combination of basketball and tackle football mixed with a little boxing. Basically, anything is legal. Anyway, Jerry was one of the funniest people I ever met. If circumstances were different in his life, he would