Spiritual Rebirth Behind Bars: The Story of James K Jones

Prepare for a genuine human journey filled with faith, hope, and resilience as we journey with James K Jones - from his prison cell in Florida to an overcrowded jail cell in Montgomery, Alabama. A place designed for 18 men, yet housing over 50 individuals, with tensions running high due to gang activity. Amid such harsh realities, James experiences a profound "Come to Jesus" moment - one that forever alters the course of his life and ignites a spiritual awakening within his soul.

Buckle up as we unravel James's riveting transformation through faith and salvation. Imagine the transformational power of faith strong enough to illuminate the darkest corners of a jail cell - that's what James discovered in his unexpected encounter with Jesus. Hear about his baptism in an unlikely place (a jailhouse bathroom!) and his courageous decision to take responsibility for his actions before his public defender. Despite facing a potential twenty-year prison sentence, James's story is a testament to the strength of human spirit and the guiding light of faith.

In this gripping narrative, you'll learn about the unique sense of community that James finds among his fellow inmates. You'll hear about spontaneous revivals in jail, fascinating characters he encounters, and the unexpected ways that faith surfaces in the bleakest of environments. As James navigates his path, his story serves as a powerful reminder that even in the midst of despair, there is always room for transformation. This episode is both an exploration and a celebration of faith, hope, and resilience - a testament to the power of redemption, even in the direst circumstances. Join us as we uncover this remarkable journey.

Transcript

Speaker 1: 5:02

Hey guys, thank you so much for tuning in to season 2, episode 2, of the Straight Out of Prison podcast. My name is James K Jones and this is my story.

Speaker 2: 5:11

And I am Hailey Jones, and this is his story. That has now become a part of my story.

Speaker 1: 5:16

So into the last one. I got out of prison in Florida. I came to Montgomery County hellish travel it took me 3 or 4 days Went through my hometown sitting out of red light. I couldn't see it, but I knew my mom's house was on the other side of those trees and just coming to the end of myself, just like I'm just ready to die.

Speaker 2: 5:38

Well, and then you got there and felt like you got an injection of hope, seeing that you had bond which meant that you could potentially get out not forever maybe, I mean, but even just the thought for you of getting out for a day was, was, was crazy.

Speaker 1: 5:55

I got I could go home and that you fought like. The way that like shot me up in my emotions, like because if you remember talking about all my other County Joe experiences, I always had a HWOB, which meant hold without bond. And here in Montgomery County they gave me a $10,000 bond, which meant I mean anybody in my family could have posted a bond for that. So that euphoric like rise of like I'm going home and then setting it up and getting ready to go, and then the just the the total like downer of realizing that I had charges all over Alabama and the sheriff in Russell County and by, as my aunt, like there's no reason to bond him out, because if you get him out now he's going to go somewhere else and it's just going to be a endless cycle. You might as well just let him sit there. And then just that hopeless like feeling that led me to doing something else.

Speaker 2: 6:53

Well, and I've heard it said that when you, your highest of high meets your lowest of low. So that's why people, some people, avoid emotion because you don't want to get too excited and happy because then you're going to crash or the opposite. So for you that was true.

Speaker 1: 7:10

I mean just that height of hope, only to bring it down to the lowest of low because you had experienced the high and the devastating and the low that I experienced after that was you know I had at this time I've been locked up for three years and six months, but I had never been locked up under the conditions that I was locked up under. This was a nasty place I was in.

Speaker 2: 7:31

Oh yeah, cause you said it was not as well kept as the Florida prisons or jails.

Speaker 1: 7:36

Well, in Florida they had like it was like they had rules, um, they had to take care of you, they had to feed you, they had to make sure you had a bed. In Alabama, they didn't seem to have any of these rules.

Speaker 2: 7:46

Right. So you ended up in a room with 50 guys with a mat on the floor.

Speaker 1: 7:51

It was actually closer to 60, but it was a cell block that was designed for I think it was 18 men, was the design. Okay, so there were two toilets, two sinks, two showers four, 50 to 60 men. It was over 50. It was closer to 60 men that was in there.

Speaker 2: 8:08

So you're sleeping on a mat on the floor under the stairs in this net? I mean, what you said last time really stuck with me. Is that just the smell of that many men?

Speaker 1: 8:18

in a prison. It was disgusting.

Speaker 2: 8:21

I mean we're in Alabama and there was no air conditioning.

Speaker 1: 8:24

I think they had AC, but it was. This was July. They didn't really run it Like, okay, it's not like you know. You put our air on 66 and I tell you to stop and put on 68 when we're sleeping, whatever.

Speaker 1: 8:37

I just know it runs a power boot up, but they didn't. They didn't do that there. But even even if they had it set on 50, you know you, you squish like 60 people into a little confoundment like that. It is, um, it's a recipe for disaster. There was just the tension. You could cut it with a knife. There was a lot of gang activity and gang members in there and honestly, I'd never seen anything like that in Florida. You didn't really see it. I mean, I guess there were gangs, but the camp that I was at I never saw gangs, I just saw like homeboys. Like if you were from Jacksonville, you know, you hung together. If you were from from Dave County, which is Miami, or Broward County, um, which was Fort Lauderdale, those those guys kind of hung together but never really saw the gang stuff like I saw in Montgomery and it was terrifying, just the. You know, my first couple of hours in there I saw a guy get beat down and his face split open just for no reason, just cause he disrespected somebody.

Speaker 1: 11:01

So, it was a, it was a pretty, it was a pretty disgusting place to be. But then we talked about in the last one, the thing that would never happen to me happened. Um, I had to come to Jesus.

Speaker 2: 11:15

A literal come to Jesus.

Speaker 1: 11:17

No, it was real.

Speaker 2: 11:18

Or maybe Jesus came to you.

Speaker 1: 11:20

Well, looking back on now, I know that God had been chasing me for years and I even believed my whole life Like he's had his hand on me. But at that time I didn't believe any of that stuff. I didn't believe in any of the get saved or any of that stuff.

Speaker 2: 11:34

Yeah, because you had said in the last end of the last season you about your soul awakening in Florida before you left.

Speaker 1: 11:42

That was more of a like, if you use like the, the literal terms. Now I think I went from being an atheist cause I was a stone cold atheist. Like I don't. I have no problem knowing that Like I knew there was nothing else but me and what I could get away with. But I came to.

Speaker 1: 12:00

It was John Mack, not John Maxwell, john Wesley who defined it as a soul awakening moment, and he was in the 1800s. He was I mean, I've studied all his writings and stuff Like I really admire him. He was a guy that grew up religious. He was a in England, he was an Anglican and so which was a would be our American version of an Episcopalian. He did all the rituals, did all the things, had all the religion, but he was missing something. So he went on a missionary journey to the colony of Georgia and the thing that they were supposed to do during those times was to make the Indians become believers. But the way that they would make the Indians believe in Jesus was to pull a gun on them and say confess Christ or die. So they were like I love Jesus, praise the Jesus.

Speaker 2: 12:51

I think I would definitely do it.

Speaker 1: 12:52

They were telling me to do it, so but he did two or three, I think, well, two or three, I can't remember. He did, I know, at least two missionary journeys to Georgia and his last one he was just get. So he was so frustrated with his life and his faith and the church and all the things, and he was on a ship going back to England and he heard a small group of I think they were called Moravians I don't know the significance of that, I just remember the name but they were like not part of the big church, like they were just a small group of Jesus followers, and he heard them singing a song on the ship about the blood of Jesus and salvation and there was something in him that just came alive where he was like, whatever they have I need to have that because I have religion, you know and I think he was like confirmed in the church and had all the, you know, robes and rings and sandals or whatever they gave him in those days but he knew that something went right and he came to a soul awakening moment which led to a genuine salvation experience with him, where he met Jesus through his spirit, face to face, and it changed his life. And then he went back to England and started preaching and they kicked him out of the church and told him you know we don't want to hear all that, but he knew what he had was real and he kept at it and you know his influences, writings, the, I guess, the churches he started, I mean that's flooded the world up to this day.

Speaker 1: 14:18

And that was kind of what happened to me. I was not religious, wasn't looking for religion, and you know, 24 years in, I'm still not looking for religion. What I experienced in that dirty little jail cell was Jesus Christ, through his spirit, coming to me telling me all you got to do is give up and ask me to come in and then just trust me, come on to me, come to me. I got you, just trust me. And you know, I came to the end of that long night where I surrendered and I gave up and I said I give up, come in. And he did. And when he did, my heart was changed, and I don't even like to say my heart was changed. It was like there was something inside of me that had been dead all my life, that came alive in that time and I knew it. I knew it as much as I know that my hands are on the end of my arms and nobody could take that from me, and it changed everything about me from that day forward.

Speaker 2: 15:18

It's kind of neat because, as you describe that and as we've been talking about even outside of this podcast, is hearing your story Me, I mean, this is the first time I've heard it chronologically in this much detail. But hearing the details of who you were and how you behaved and just kind of some of the things that you did, it's that you're the same person then when you are criminal, that you are now as far as like the gifts that you have and how you, but you're also completely different because of the heart change.

Speaker 1: 15:54

Well, I guess, the way I see it, like God creates us, like we're created, like, no matter what your belief is, we are fearfully and wonderfully made and we are the capstone of his creation.

Speaker 1: 16:07

So any creation that you could look at and say, oh, look at that mountain or the universe, or Jupiter or Mars, we are, according to the scripture, we're the capstone of that, we're the top of that, like we are the pinnacle of creation, and he actually breathes a part of us in a part of himself in us, because whether we ever come to him or not, it is clear that we are created in the image of God. So that just in and of itself, is a fascinating thing, and I believe that your personality, like who you are and your gifts and talents, or how you're born, now, whether you're ever, like, redeemed or come to Jesus and get that salvation and he's able to activate all that stuff, is regardless. You're going to be who you are. I mean, jesus never said I don't want you to be who you are. I just want to change your heart and your motivations and give you my spirit and put myself in you so I can live through you.

Speaker 2: 17:08

Yeah, it's, yeah, it's neat. I mean, from my perspective, to hear your story and then as to know you as intimately as I do now and to be able to see and feel the things that are the same, the things that are totally different. So you got saved.

Speaker 1: 17:29

I like how you but I still don't like using that. I know, but even though the Bible says that I just it's like so many people have like taken that and abused it so much.

Speaker 2: 17:38

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 17:39

I mean, I don't even really call myself Christian. I call myself a follower of Jesus. I mean, even though you know I am a Christian.

Speaker 2: 17:46

So the part of you that was dead came alive because you asked Jesus to come in right, yes, and then.

Speaker 1: 17:53

but the next day, I mean my circumstances did not change.

Speaker 2: 17:57

Well, that was my question. So you woke up you first. You said you slept better. You don't even know how you slept, because you had the best sleep of your life.

Speaker 1: 18:06

Yes, it was like I woke up thinking how did I ever sleep without you?

Speaker 2: 18:10

Right.

Speaker 1: 18:12

And plus, I was in a violent place where somebody could have stomped my eyes out while I was asleep, Right and it was. I mean that was a reality. And the correction off the police there, they didn't care. I mean I guess they care I shouldn't say they didn't care, but they didn't really do anything about the gang stuff, Like if somebody got beat down like that they wouldn't even address it, they would just take the person out and, you know, tend to their wounds and move on.

Speaker 2: 18:38

So you woke up the next morning. Then what?

Speaker 1: 18:42

It was crazy. I was full of life and it was a life that I had never experienced before. It was a piece that I never experienced, a joy that I never experienced before. And don't get me wrong, nobody wants to be locked up in jail or prison. You know, we were not created for that. But there was something about that. Next day I was, I was changed, I was different. Now I did have this.

Speaker 1: 19:05

I don't know if it was weird or it was just how, the way I grew up, I felt like I had this understanding with Jesus Like surely you're not asking me to go to church. Like you know, I'm not going to do church. And you know, put on the pleated khaki pants and took my shirt in and put a tie on. Like I'm not, you know, that's not, I'm not going to do all that. Waking up that next day, I felt like I need to make this like official. That makes sense, and I don't even know why. I thought that. I just knew okay, this was me and Jesus. This thing happened Like I need to make it official.

Speaker 2: 19:37

Well, it's like anything else, I think we instinctively, if something big happens and you know something biggest happened, you almost need to like confirm it, yeah, and.

Speaker 1: 19:46

I didn't even really know how, but I knew they had chapel call and heard them, and so I said next time they say chapel call, I'm going to go to chapel call. So I think it was the second or third day they did a chapel call and I was first in line and I marched myself. I marched myself down to the little chapel and you know there might have been 10 or 12 guys there. I didn't know I was doing, but I felt like I needed to, you know, make it official. So I just went, sat through the little service they did and then explained to the chaplain. You know what I felt, like happened to me.

Speaker 1: 20:25

And he was like well, son, you've, you've experienced salvation, but to make it real, the scripture is clear you have to do a public profession of faith. And so I was like well, what does that mean? And he was. He said, well, you guys stand up in front of everybody and confess Jesus is Lord. So I was like, okay, well, what do we need to do to make that happen? And so he gave me like this little piece of paper and I stood up and said you know, I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God. I believe that God raised him from the dead. I ask him to come into my heart and I make him Lord of my life. And then he said you're saved. So I was like, okay, I mean you say that, but what happened to me two days ago in the jail cell? Kind of pills in comparison to this little checkbox.

Speaker 2: 21:10

Okay, so did you think that at the time? I know you think that now, but it was that the thought that came in your mind, absolutely.

Speaker 1: 21:16

I mean I felt like, okay, we're doing a religious thing and I don't really want anything to do with that. I mean I'll do it because I feel like I'm supposed to and I you know, I had been reading the Bible for like two days, but then it was a.

Speaker 1: 21:30

Bible scholar. I read no, I needed some guidance, I needed some input, I needed to know what to do next. And he told me that was what I was supposed to do. And in those days I hated, like I despised standing up in front of people and talking. I couldn't stand it. But that was what I was supposed to do. So that's what I did. I just sucked it up and did it.

Speaker 1: 21:52

And then he said and this was a sweet man, he was a good man, I would get to like him better over the next six months while I was there he said well, son, have you been baptized? And I said no, and so he said he like pulled me off from everybody else and he was like come back here. And he took me into this little jailhouse, slash, prison bathroom and it was like a little 100 square feet, a little metal toilet and then one of those metal sinks, a little mirror, and he said, well, I'm going to baptize you in here. And I was like okay, but you know, I thought you like dunked you or whatever, because I'd seen people get baptized before. I never really knew what it meant. He like grabbed me up and he said son, don't worry about how we're doing it. God meets us where we're at and he's meeting us here today. And he said do you believe that Jesus Christ is the son of God? And I said yes. He said do you believe that he died for your sins and that God raised him from the dead? And I said yes. And he said all right, I want you to put your head over the little sink. And then he filled his hands up with water and he said because of your confessional faith, I baptize you in the name of the Father and the Son and of the Holy Spirit. And he like had a handful of water and he like splashed it on my head.

Speaker 1: 23:12

And it was just the weirdest like feeling of like what are you doing? Like I felt so awkward you know I'm half wet Like like, if you're all the way wet, you feel some kind of way, but if you're just like halfway, you feel just awkward. And I had on my little orange prison suit and I was, you know, the head was wet, dripping down on me. And then he like grabbed me up in a bear hug and was like everything's going to be better now. And I just remember thinking how was anything? I mean like I mean I understand it now, but I understand it then like whatever, whatever you thinking you like, put me over a prison sink and wet my head is going to do really like pale in comparison to what happened to me, you know, three days prior in that nasty jail cell. So then what happened next was, even though I was like anti church every time they called chapel, I felt like I needed to go because I had like this I want to make sure that makes sense.

Speaker 2: 24:11

And then what was there? A feeling of like you didn't want to lose what happened, or yeah, I didn't know what I was doing.

Speaker 1: 24:17

I didn't have like any guidance and he didn't give me any guidance except for to say a confession of faith. And then he's going to wet my head and baptize me and then prison or jail like services that you go to is they're all like salvation oriented. So all they're going to talk about is you need Jesus, you need Jesus, you need Jesus, and you know they'll get to the end of every one of those and then they will say you know, by your head, close your eyes, raise your hand. If you need to be saved, then come up front and we'll do the prayer. So every time I went, I would do it again. I didn't know, I was trying to make sure it took.

Speaker 2: 24:55

Well, it's fine, Make sure it took. And it's funny, like knowing you, like I do, I know that you probably were just really wanting like, okay, like you have already said, what do I do now? Give me some next steps, Like give me something to do. Obviously, something happened and now I feel like I need to do the next thing.

Speaker 1: 25:12

Why didn't know? Like, I mean, I grew up like my, meanwhile, was very religious as far as free will, bat this, and she was a good person and she loved Jesus. Like, remember me telling you like that they told me at youth camp that she was sending because she dipped snuff. Oh, yeah.

Speaker 1: 25:28

And I remember going home after that and her telling me and she said, sonny boy, I just need to tell you, the Lord gives us a conscience. And I have begged the Lord to take the snuff from me, but he hadn't took it from me. So he's okay with it. So I'm going to dip my snuff and but it made sense. It was like, well, if God don't want you to do it, I guess he would help you. And he didn't help her. Not dip snuff, but there was some of that.

Speaker 1: 25:52

That was the only like frame of reference I had for any kind of like spiritual anything. That was my only thing on my dad's side of the family, my granny and my grandfather. They only went to church Like if somebody got married, somebody died, and then, like Easter, like we didn't even go on Christmas. There was not, it was not a lot of. And later on I don't understand she got hurt really bad by the church when she was young and you know she had to come to Jesus, and when she was 88 years old, right before she died, which was beautiful, but I didn't know, I didn't know what I was doing Like anyways, this chapel in this jail chapel in Montgomery. He got aggravated with me and he like was like, look, you don't have to come up here every time and do the confession. And so I was like, well, I didn't know. I mean I'm trying to. You know, you said, if you felt convicted, I feel convicted.

Speaker 1: 26:50

But that was like three or four weeks in and he was trying to guide me and he did a good job. He like would always send me back to the scriptures. You know, read the Bible, learn. He gave me some books. It was a process, but in the beginning for me it was so simple because I didn't. It wasn't clouded with like rules, regulations, any of that stuff. Does that make sense? Yeah, and for me it was like I felt like, okay, well, if I sin, the only sins I have is smoking cigarettes and masturbating. So if I can like not smoke cigarettes and not masturbate, I'm holy, I'm good. And that was a non-smoking facility, so we didn't have cigarettes, so that was not a knock that one out.

Speaker 1: 27:36

Yeah, that was easy. That was easy one. But then you know the masturbating stuff. That was hard because that was how I took care of myself. I mean, I was only 24 years old.

Speaker 2: 27:46

I even feel embarrassed hearing this right now.

Speaker 1: 27:48

I'm just trying to be real. I'm just trying to be real, but that was my, that was, those were my struggles. And then I explained to my mom what happened to me and you know she did not have a good initial reaction. She thought I had like some kind of jailhouse religion and she was like telling me like that's, you know, baby, that's like things that you don't, you don't play with that. And so I was like no mom, you understand, this is real, like this just happened. And so she supported me as best she could, but she didn't really understand what happened to me.

Speaker 2: 28:23

Well, you said, nobody believed you, no well, my mom did, my mom's mom.

Speaker 1: 28:29

She was overjoyed. She told me that she always knew I was going to be a preacher. And you're like on the phone, like I always knew you were going to be a preacher and I was like hold up, hold up, nobody's saying that. Like that's not what we're talking about. And then as I started reading the scriptures, like I wanted to, it was like I couldn't stop reading and devouring the words of Jesus, like it was just I just wanted more of it.

Speaker 1: 28:54

And then I remembered the guy that told me to read the gospels. I was reading through the gospels and then he also told me he said you know, there's 31 days usually in a month and there's 31 books of proverbs. So you should read a proverb every day, like if it's the first of the month, you should read chapter one. And I started doing that and I just remember during that time, like I would read through the scriptures and it would just make me cry, like I would just I couldn't stop crying because I just felt so stupid, like I've ruined my life.

Speaker 1: 29:25

And this was here all the time and it was kind of like a truth that I always been looking for, but I didn't know to look there because the way that I guess, like religion had painted it in such an ugly picture for me that I couldn't, I couldn't, I'm not doing that, I'm not fooling with that. I was so anti anything Jesus Like I would have been more likely to become like a Buddhist or Muslim or some other you know like new age person than I would be to ever become like a Jesus follower. So that in and of itself, even now, looking back on it, that's a miracle. That was a miracle just because of my mindset, the way I thought and the way I grew up in the and you know, just the abuse experience in church, like there was nothing in church for me that you wanted.

Speaker 2: 30:15

So you were changed. All that was going on. So I know from you from the previous part of the story. You're in the jail Now. You're waiting for a court date and a sentencing. Is that right?

Speaker 1: 30:32

Yeah, what was going on with you? You start the process over, so now I'm charged. I have an armed robbery charge in Montgomery. It was actually to armed robbery charge because we did too in Montgomery. You just have to start the process over. So I was appointed a public defender, because it's still at that time it was like 20 30 grand to represent me and nobody had that kind of money. Montgomery was different from like Jefferson County or Bay County, where it was like they had like real lawyers that would had to take a certain amount of pro bono cases. And so I got this lawyer I can't remember his last name was the bell debar DeLynn.

Speaker 2: 31:08

Debar DeLynn.

Speaker 1: 31:10

I don't know, it was D bell D bar debating. I could never say his name, I just called him Mr D. I mean I didn't know what to call him, but he was like a real lawyer and he was like fighting for me like a real lawyer. But I remember the first time I sat down with him after I'd had this experience with Jesus, like realizing you got to tell him the truth and I'm like, yeah, but you know I had all these stories. You know that's gonna be not good if I tell the truth, but I did. I just I leveled with him, I told him truth and he came back with an offer from the DA 20 years and I was like 20 years but 20 years in prison.

Speaker 1: 31:50

That was what they wanted to get me in Montgomery. I mean I had two class A felonies to armories. But just he, he wanted to help me and I Kind of accepted responsibility. I told the truth. You know this is what we did. I mean I probably played off the little drug thing a little more than it was true. You know the drugs made me do it kind of.

Speaker 1: 32:12

Thing but he was a good guy. He met with me At least once a week. He'd come and see me. We'd like try to talk through things and it was just hard to realize like, okay, now I gotta tell the truth and I'm stuck and they could send me to prison for life, you know, for this stuff. And it was a very Sobering. But at the same time I had a different, I guess, outlook, like I had.

Speaker 2: 32:41

I'd hope.

Speaker 1: 32:42

I didn't know. I didn't even know why I had hope, like my mom was. Like are you crazy?

Speaker 2: 32:46

Yeah, especially. I mean a good thing, you had hope, because right after they tell you you have 20 More years, you get. That was what I was looking at 20 years, yeah.

Speaker 1: 32:56

But then the craziest thing began to happen in that nasty, dirty like Unit that I was in. I started reading the Bible. I asked my mom you know I need you to get me a real Bible Because they could like send you stuff and I told her I had to be a new international version. I don't want none that King James nonsense. I need something I can read and you know she always supported me in that way. Anything I said I needed, like books or Bibles or any that stuff, she wouldn't got it.

Speaker 2: 33:25

It's the first time he asked for a Bible, though.

Speaker 1: 33:27

Oh, I'd never asked for a Bible.

Speaker 2: 33:29

Unless you asked for it to roll it up, to smoke it or something.

Speaker 1: 33:32

Well, bibles are like a, not a commodity in prison or jail, they're everywhere. Okay like you got all the denominations, all the people. They're always like dropping off Bibles. Oh so Bibles were not hard to come by, but I wanted my own Bible. Yeah because I wanted to study and she bought me like an NIV Bible, but she bought it with a hardcover, like a hardcover Bible. I guess she probably don't know this, but you can't have hardcover books in jail.

Speaker 1: 33:59

You can only have paperbacks. So she, they, she brought the heart, the hardcover NIV Bible, and they told her I couldn't have it, and she was so distraught that they just ripped the cover off and gave it to me, and then that was my first Bible that I studied.

Speaker 2: 34:15

Do you still have that Bible?

Speaker 1: 34:17

No, I think that that one got lost in transit, but it was. It was just a regular Bible. I didn't have a concordance or anything in it and I was just basically just reading it and devouring it. And I Started reading it and there was a guy that had a mat on the floor next to me. His name was Clarence, he was from verbina, alabama. You know, if you're traveling down 65, you pass by verbina. I always think of him. I see that wonder what happened to him. But uh, he's a little bit older than me, a black guy, and Just asked me what I was reading and I said, well, you know, I was kind of a little ashamed because I didn't.

Speaker 1: 34:53

I didn't think anybody Would believe me. You know, I'm me, this, this can't be happening to me. But it was real to me. But it was like I didn't really want to. It was hard to like communicate that other people. And so he was like I know she's been reading what he's been reading. And I said, well, I had, I hadn't experienced with Jesus, you know, a couple days ago, and this stuff is for real. And he was like Tell me more. And so I said I don't know, I had like this presence and he told me to give up and he come in. I gave up, he came in and now I can't stop reading this, these words, and he started studying with me and and Another guy came.

Speaker 1: 35:37

He started studying with us, and then another guy and another guy. The next thing I knew, you look up and there's 15 of us that are like studying the Bible and like trying. None of us knew what we're doing, okay, none of us. We didn't know anything about nothing. We were all just, you know, we locked up without hope in In the Montgomery County Jail, in the nastiest place on earth, you know, and we started studying and then it was like more people started coming and this turned into an all-day type of deal, like there are guys that will come in.

Speaker 1: 36:13

And you know, I remember this one guy, darby was like he grew up in church but he had been Said. He said he was back slidden wherever that means, and you know he had. You know, just by being there he decided to recommit his life to Jesus and do all things and he knew like some stuff he would try to teach us. And then there was a guy named Frank that was from Chicago. He was, he was like one of those guys who's real smart, almost too smart but he he said he was a believer but that he was also a Muslim. So I was like, okay, well, I mean, how does that? How you connect those two? And then he explained to me, like you know, abraham had two sons, one was Ishmael, one was Isaac. The Jews came from Isaac, but the Muslims came from Ishmael. So I was like, oh, I didn't know. I know that. So I would go and like then I started studying the book of Genesis, like I need to know who Isaac is, who ish male is on stuff, and Well, let me pause.

Speaker 2: 37:14

You did that. These guys that started studying. Did they Then have the same experience that you had? Some of them?

Speaker 1: 37:21

did like really did. I'm not sure about all of them, but they were all participating in what we're doing, and we didn't even know what we were doing.

Speaker 1: 37:31

And then, like this Derby guy came along, was like well, you know, god wants you to worship him. And I was like, okay, what does that mean? You know, okay, what does that mean. And so he was teaching us like all the old, like African-American gospel hymns, and so we were learning these songs and we would just sing the songs and, you know, the officers would come in and start doing it with us and it was just, it was crazy.

Speaker 2: 37:57

Like what was happening in that place Was crazy because in the jail there's nothing to do but wait.

Speaker 1: 38:04

You said that yeah, last watch TV. You're gonna watch TV?

Speaker 2: 38:07

Yeah, but now that which is why you all had time to kind of dig in and I felt like I had something to do this movement happened here's what I need to do.

Speaker 1: 38:17

I need to pursue this Jesus thing and the only way I knew how to do that was to keep reading. Like the more of the scriptures that I read, the more I knew I didn't know so, the more it made me want to like dig in and learn and grow. I Remember the first time I really recognized like something is different with you. James K Jones was Commissary, that I got because you could spend like thirty dollars or whatever you had. Like it was like once a week you could fill out this little piece of paper and you could order whatever you wanted. I think you could spend thirty dollars a week. But you know, by that time I've been locked up almost four years and I didn't. I was not really into sharing. Like I Got, I got to get mine. You figure out how to get yours. If I need something with you, I might share with you. But I remember that first, commissary, I had ordered a lot of you know, like food, soups and Zoom, zooms and wham whams, what they called them, what is zoom, zooms and wham whams.

Speaker 1: 39:18

It just means stuff that you get from the commissary like stuff that has value like food, food, pretty much. Yeah, that's all you had there, but that first commissary order that I got. After that I felt like the Lord told me to share with people and I was like sure what? But I did it. I did it and it was like liberating to me, like I don't have to, I have to be all about me. It was like God was trying to show me how to kill myself. Fishness Does that make sense?

Speaker 2: 39:52

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 39:53

And I didn't want to do it, but I did it. But I just remember thinking something's different. This is real what's happening to you, cause you ain't gonna give away your Swiss rolls, you know your zoom, zoom and wham, wham.

Speaker 1: 40:04

Well, especially in Montgomery, cause they fed you like that was probably, besides Jefferson County, the first one I was in. That was probably the worst food we ever had. Like you pretty much survived off white beans. I mean that was about all they had there that was worth eating. It was just so like clear, Like there is something on the inside of me guiding me that is showing me a better way. And what ended up happening over you know a couple of two or three months was I don't even know what happened. It was just like God just like breathed into that nasty jail cell and we were like having like revival in there.

Speaker 2: 40:44

So you said you, one of the guys said worship and you should sing songs. And he had these old school. Do you remember any of the songs?

Speaker 1: 40:51

Oh, that was Darby, yeah, he was teaching us. He would. He would just teach us songs. Um, I'm gonna lay down my burdens. Down by the riverside, you know just all these like old African, and they were like so filled with like faith and hope, and you know I was just in a good place, even though my circumstances were probably worse than they ever had been. But then, like when I would call home, like my mom was like you've lost your mind.

Speaker 2: 41:23

I mean he is officially snapped.

Speaker 1: 41:26

Yeah, they thought I was crazy. And then, like my stepdad or well whatever he was to me, like he was married to my mom at one time I think they were married at this time he would like get on the phone with me and talk about well, you know, everybody needs a crutch. So if that's a good crutch for you, just crutch it on. And I'd be like no, no, no, hold up, bro, I don't need a crutch. I don't know what you talking about. But then, like I remember having a conversation with my me mom, my mom's mom, or really grandmother, that raised her, that brought me up in the free will Baptist church, and I remember like telling her like just how excited I was and all the things that was going on. And then I remember, like one of the first times I talked to her after this, like she was telling me that she was worried about me, because she always worried about me, and so I said, well, me Mo, you know, jesus said we're not supposed to worry, and that's actually a sin, like we're supposed to trust him and then he's going to work it all out, and at this time she was close to 90. So she wasn't hearing none of that and I said boy, what are you talking about? Don't worry.

Speaker 1: 42:29

And I was like it's in the Bible. Like I'll show you the, I'll give you the address in the book of Matthew and you can read it, so you don't have to worry no more either. Like I thought it was so simple. And she was like boy, what are you talking about? Everybody worries, the preacher worries, even the preacher worries. And then she said, boy, have you become Catholic? So it's like, what are you talking about? But from her perspective, like where she was, from the way she grew up out in the country, there were two religions Baptist and Catholic. And you wanted to be a Baptist because that was the way to heaven I'm not saying that's true, but that was the mindset and don't be a Catholic because they get to drink and gamble or whatever.

Speaker 2: 43:10

Doesn't that make you want to be a Catholic? It?

Speaker 1: 43:12

would have, would have me if I had the choice. But but at the time I mean, that was her like, that was her filter, that was her. So she was asking me was I Catholic? And I was like me, mom, I'm not anything, I'm not, I'm not a Baptist, I'm not a Catholic, like I've had an experience with Jesus. And she didn't really understand that Like that was one of my joys of her being able to see that I was okay. And she was like, she was like I can die now, my baby, you'd be all right. So that was good.

Speaker 1: 43:40

But what I guess led from that crazy was happening there. But like the officers took note and they would come in and pray with us and do all the stuff. And you know, I did not have to pray and I do know that stuff. I didn't know any of that, none of us did. And I remember there was a guy that slept on the bunk next to me because, like eventually you graduate up, when people leave, you can get a bunk. So eventually I got a bunk. His name was James Jones and he was an old man or older. No, he was old, he was real old. But he was in there for, like, writing a bad check or something.

Speaker 1: 44:18

I met some of the characters in Montgomery County. They'd lock you up for everything in Montgomery. I mean, one guy was in there for, uh, he rented a rental truck and didn't turn it in, and he was arrested for grand theft because he didn't turn it in. So I'm like, dang, why don't you just turn it in? And it was some story, but anyways, these people would be in there forever. I'm like at least for me, like I had like a crime that I did. Some of this stuff was so silly Like it didn't make any sense.

Speaker 2: 44:47

It actually solidifies my fear. I remember in college when I was first getting, like my credit cards, my gap credit cards. Gap I finally, like confessed, came home because mom, my mom and dad were like I can feel like something's wrong with you. What is wrong? And I was like you seem just very like stressed and tense, and I I thought that if I didn't pay my bill, which I didn't have the money to pay it, my gap card, a little gap credit card that they were going to take me to prison.

Speaker 2: 45:16

I actually really thought that.

Speaker 1: 45:18

Lucky for you, you didn't live in Montgomery Alabama.

Speaker 2: 45:21

Um Pensacola is probably a little more like no, my dad laughed and they're like you, don't take you to prison for not paying. I'm like oh, thank God.

Speaker 1: 45:30

So you obviously were not paying attention in high school when they taught you civics. Like that's one of the reasons we broke away from Great Burton because they had debtors prisons. But anyways that's a constitutional thing. But his name was James Jones and he had a really bad infection like abscess tooth or something, and now he was like um those are painful.

Speaker 1: 45:52

Yeah, I don't know he was in pain, but they didn't care, they didn't do anything about it. And I remember, like reading that Jesus said you know, you can put your hands on people and pray for them and he would heal them. And like, praying for him to be healed, he like got better somehow and then he got out. So I had this like thing, um, and it's the reason why I don't like cats to this day when I was 17, my cousin, lisa, had two cats. They were little cats but, um, she got them from like the neighborhood, like somebody had some cats and she got them. And anyways, her mom got sick and got swollen in her, like something on her thigh where they thought she had cancer, man Patsy. And when they took her in to give her surgery, they realized that she had cat scratch fever, which you know I'd heard the song cat scratch fever, do, do, do, do. But that was, that's a real thing, like if cats don't get their shots or whatever. And they said, you know, we need y'all to go in and like strip the house, bleach everything down, because anything could like set that infection off in her again. So we had to get rid of the cats and Lisa was, you know, a year younger than me, but she was like a sister growing up and I loved her. And they called the like the dog catchers or the pound or animal control whatever to come and get the cats and she was so distraught, she was like 16. I was like 17. And they came in with like these black gloves on the snacks the cats up, and she was so upset, just so upset, and I said, look, can I just take the cats and just put them in the little cage so she can not be crying. And they were like, yeah, that's fine. So I walked them out to where the cage was and when the cats saw that they were going in the cage, they turned around and like scratched my face up. No, I mean, it was like you would think that would be enough. But like six months later my neck started swelling up. Go to the doctor. I mean I remember telling my mom like I feel like there's a worm in my neck and she was like, no, there's not, it's not a worm in your neck. But it was this hard little thing that just kept growing in my neck and I kept going to the doctor, going to the doctor. They couldn't figure out what it was. So they put me in the hospital and they decided that I had cancer in my neck and they were going to cut me open and like they didn't tell me that though I was young they told my mom that. But when they cut open my neck it was the same thing Cat's Wrestle Fever. It was in a limp node and what they do is they like do something where they drain it. But then they told me like be careful around, like anything could like set that infection off again. So at this time that had been like seven, eight years later. Wow.

Speaker 1: 48:35

But I went through three and a half years of prison in Florida and never had any kind of sickness, which was a miracle, because they don't take care of you when you're sick. Like, don't get sick, don't go to prison to get sick, especially if it's like some kind of condition, because they'll like amputate your neck or something. But my neck started swelling up and I knew the feeling was the same feeling I had then and that scared me. I was so scared and I didn't want to like tell the people because they were, they were mean. The medical people. They were mean. They always thought you're faking, you're making up stuff. But I made an appointment, I went and I told them you know, I told them I had this. I still have the scar on my neck. You can see where I got operated on. They just like gave me some time on, just told me shut up.

Speaker 1: 49:21

So I was scared and this was like my first like answered prayer, like where I just know that God answered my prayer.

Speaker 1: 49:29

So I went to this brother that was a little bit older than me and I just said I'm scared, like I don't want this to come back and be in jail. And then, you know, I don't know what could happen to me. And so he like grabbed my hands and he said you know, the scripture says where two or three agree, god is in the midst, he'll take care of us. So we prayed and I believed he believed, and I believed he believed all things, you know everything the formula said and I thought I should be instantly healed, you know, because that's what happened. That's what happened when Jesus touched on you. I mean, you know, you just was better, but I wasn't better and it was almost like I was worse. And then it wasn't. Two hours later this James Jones had left, he was gone. They said they call my name for Med Call and they handed me a pill and it was penicillin and the James Jones that was there had a abscess tooth and I was trying to explain that it wasn't me. Like I, that wasn't my medicine.

Speaker 1: 50:34

And they were like no, but the guy like got like like your James Jones, like he could see my name tag and so and they would make you take your medicine in front of them, Like you couldn't just like walk off with your medicine. It was like some kind of control. They controlled everything you did and I took my penicillin and then I took it again the next morning, the next night and then like two days later I was better.

Speaker 2: 50:57

But it was like I realized it wasn't even medicine for you it wasn't my medicine, but it was penicillin for James Jones.

Speaker 1: 51:03

You had abscess tooth who got out, but it would like did something for me. It was like okay, everything don't have to be like booty booty, all that stuff, like God was taking care of me. I needed some penicillin to knock that out. And it knocked it out and I've never I don't think I've ever had a problem with that since then. But it was like solidified for me, like this whole like following Jesus, praying, spiritual thing Don't always have to be like booty booty, like ooh huh.

Speaker 2: 51:34

When you say booty booty, I think you mean and correct me if I'm wrong some like emotional high that happens immediately, or just like an immediate miracle.

Speaker 1: 51:42

And I don't mean I have seen miracles. I've seen God perform miracles, but in my life, more often than not it was a process, something like that, where I knew, okay, he's doing this, I'm gonna be fine, I just need to trust him and everything's gonna be beautiful. And it was, and whatever was in my neck got knocked out. They didn't help me. The medical people there in Montgomery County, they didn't care to help me, but Jesus saw where I was and there was something about that. It was so, I guess, like comforting to me to know you know, I'm here, I'm locked up, I don't have my family, but God knows where I am and he's taking care of me. And he did.

Speaker 1: 52:22

And I never really lost that after that. I think for that for me, like that part of it, just like being, I guess, like known and taken care of, and he was taking care of me. And then in the meantime, you know what was happening in that County jail. I still, to this day, I've never seen anything like that. I mean, and at this time now I'm what, 24, 25 years in.

Speaker 2: 52:48

Well, if you could sum it up what you say you've never seen anything like it. What was it?

Speaker 1: 52:52

I mean, you say a revival, but like I mean, it was like a group of 50, 60 men that had no hope, that were stuck in like the worst conditions, worse, you know, like nothing was going to get any better, nothing was going to change and somehow the God chose to like come down to us and reach into us and take us somewhere different. And it was. It was amazing. I mean even the officers. It was like you know, whatever's going on here it's not, this is not like normal Montgomery County jail life. It was, and I mean there was. Nobody could take any credit for it, because none of us know what we're doing.

Speaker 2: 53:39

I mean we did almost like there, like from what you described, there was just like a breath of life that was breathed into there.

Speaker 1: 53:45

It was, and it was. I believe it changed all of us. I mean, I know it changed me. It got me ready for what was next. And I had a guy that came through there that had been through some kind of program it's called Canaan land, outside of Montgomery, and it was some kind of faith based like program and I remember him telling me you know, you can go there instead of going to prison. So I was like who I'd rather go there than the prison? And you know, like talking to my lawyer and all the stuff, and then him telling me how do they tell me? He said, okay, this is what we do.

Speaker 1: 54:20

The scripture says if you believe receive, you have what you say. So we pray one time, you believe receive, and then you just say you have it. And so I was like okay, like like that sounds like something I would be interested in. I mean, if that's all it is to it, I mean that would definitely be something you know. I just okay, I believe I receive, and then I just say, okay, easy enough. So he wanted, he like grabbed a hold of me, wanted to do this prayer thing, and then we believed that we received when we prayed and then we had what we say, so we just say it. So he kept saying you're going to Canaan, james, going to Canaan land. And of course I never went to Canaan land, but I remember like getting like two or three weeks into that and like I think you're missing, like the things, like that's not, I'm going to prison. So long story short, they offered me 20 years in Montgomery offered you.

Speaker 1: 55:20

Well, no, like in cases like that, you don't want to go to trial because you're already guilty. If you go to trial, like if they offer you 20 years, if you go to trial and lose, it's like a punishment in the criminal justice system. So if you go to trial and lose, that means you put them through a trial. They had to pick 12 jurors and do all take all this time spent on this money. So you ain't going to get 20 years, you're going to get at least double that. So if I don't want to try and lose, I might have life in prison. So I mean, that's the reality. And plus, for me, going to trial was not an option because I was guilty. I mean guilty. There's no reason to um, no reason to try to go. I mean I couldn't win anyways.

Speaker 1: 55:58

So he was real. My lawyer was real troubled. He was, uh, he was a believer and it was like he knew I was too. It was weird, like he knew, like he was like in my corner, he was for me, he was fighting for me and, um, he came back with a uh, a 10 year sentence. Like they're offering you two 10, two 10 year sentences. They'll run them concurrent, which means like I don't have to serve 10 and then serve another 10. I would serve one 10 year sentence and they would give me credit for time. So for all the time I did in Florida, which to me meant I'm going home next Wednesday because of good time and all that kind of stuff that makes sense.

Speaker 2: 56:41

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 56:42

So it went to a court. You don't have a guarantee when you go, but you have to go and you have to plead guilty and then you just roll the dice and then when you're getting sentenced you can have like character witnesses. I remember my mom came and a couple other people, but my aunt Sue got up there and was just saying you know how I messed up my life and I made a mistake and you know it'd be great if I could have another chance. And then she just like started squalor. And she was like judge, you got saved, you got to save. Judge, he's saved, he's saved. And so I was like all right, well, if that will make him do anything different, that'd be great, but if it won't, then that was not necessary to say all that. Um.

Speaker 1: 57:25

But he ended up giving me 10 years sentence and then credit for time served for my time in Florida, which meant I got almost four years time served, which meant I was only looking at the most. I was looking at six years. So here I was that that process was not quite as long as it was in Florida. You know, when I was in Florida it took me a whole year to go to prison. This took me. I think I was in prison by Thanksgiving. So it started like July, August, September, October, November I was. I was in prison by Thanksgiving.

Speaker 1: 58:00

The difference for me this time was I was almost excited to go to prison, Like just get me out of County Jail. You know, I got this Jesus thing going on. God's got a plan for my life. I'm ready, let's do it. I'm not scared. He already performed a miracle and they're not giving me 20 years, because they could have given me like 20 years consecutive, which would have been 40 years, and I was guilty. They had the evidence, they had everything they needed to know, and then again I'll say I couldn't lie anymore. So it was a weird like helpless feeling, Like you can't even like make up something to defend yourself, to like deflect the punishment.

Speaker 2: 58:41

What is it? You were just ready to pay the Fiddler. Is that what you're?

Speaker 1: 58:45

saying yes, yeah, if you're going to dance, you got to pay the Fiddler.

Speaker 2: 58:47

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 58:48

So I was getting ready to go to prison in Alabama and I guess that probably needed to be where we need to end this one. Yeah, during that process, you know, I had a case in Shelby County. I had to go up to Shelby County. I think I stayed in Shelby County overnight to get that case going up there. It was another armed robbery.

Speaker 1: 59:07

Shelby County jail was way different than Montgomery County it was. I mean, all jails are depressing, but this one was like a no contact jail. It was like everything. They did everything through glass, like they handed you stuff through these little cubbies and you felt like you were at Disney, what you remember at Disney World. You arrive by and you see the little people sitting in their houses and going up space mountain. You kind of felt like that, like the police will come by looking at you and then they would give you your food and you would watch TV and it was just jail.

Speaker 1: 59:41

Life sucks. It sucks Like there's no, it's just, it's just hard, hard time. But I was ready to go and ready for what was next and somehow I was like filled with faith and I was not hopeless. I was not. I really wasn't even discouraged, which troubled like my mom and my granny and like people that are close to me, like you got to at least be bothered and I'm like no, no, no, you understand, you understand, you understand what I got on the inside. So the end part of 1996 headed off to prison in Alabama and I guess that would be where we start the next one. Yeah, cause things get more dramatic right, not right away.

Speaker 1: 1:00:26

Remember in Florida I went to Lake Butler which was the North Florida Reception Center. That was one of three in the state of Florida.

Speaker 1: 1:00:32

And that was the roughest one to go to. That was the one where they beat you down, break you down. You know God stuff In Alabama there's only one. It's Kilby Correctional Facility. It's a reception center, it's outside of Montgomery. It's the only one in Alabama and it is not that intense. It's like. It's almost like a like watching one of those old Westerns where you see the land, that time forgot and you know you're going back 50 years. I was kind of like that and I mean it was prison, but it wasn't. They weren't trying to beat you down, I mean they made sure that you were submissive. And but I would soon find out that not only were county jails not the same in Alabama as they were in Florida, but prison Prison was not either. It was a totally different experience. But we'll get into that in the next one. Good things coming, stay tuned. Well, I think we're going to get to that.

Speaker 1: 1:01:35

Well, thank you guys. So much for tuning in to Straight Outta Prison Podcast. I guess we would title this one saved. This was my first, my first couple of months of following Jesus and trying to navigate through that, even though I didn't know what I was doing and just doggedly determined that I was not going to be a church person or religious person. But whatever I had on the inside of me was real and I wanted to keep following and learning and growing and I do. All right, we'll see you next time. Thanks so much. Bye, hey guys. Thanks so much for tuning into the Straight Outta Prison Podcast. For more exclusive content, head over to our website, timjonesco.

Speaker 2: 1:02:18

Yes, you can subscribe by clicking on the become a patron button and that's going to get you access to our for real. Real, which is very different than the highlight real Some very juicy content there.

Speaker 1: 1:02:32

Good stuff, or you can look us up on Facebook and Instagram Straight Outta Prison Podcast.

Speaker 2: 1:02:37

Yes, that takes the story to a whole new level, where you can see some of the people that James talks about in his story and see some of the places that he's been. I've been loving it and you will too. Prison recipes yeah, all the things Good stuff.

Speaker 1: 1:02:51

We'll see you soon guys.

Speaker 2: 1:02:52

Thanks, bye, bye, bye.