On this episode, we talk with our good friend Corey Martin about updates from jail ministry.
You're listening to the Dudes and Dads podcast, a show dedicated to helping men be better dudes
and dads by building community through meaningful conversation and storytelling.
And now here are your hosts Joel DeMott and Andy Lehman. Joel, Andy, wait, hello, gotcha.
You did.
Hey, uh...
Hey everybody.
Hello.
Andy how are things?.
Ah, good. The fair is done.
Oh boy, isn't it though?
That was a...
A long week.
Good. Good week, bit long.
Andy, um...
Tell me about your favorite, this year.
Favorite part of the fair, apart from it being done.
[laughs]
Well, my birthday always falls on fair week.
That's right!
And so, I always get Nedderman's steak tips.
Mm-hmm. You got a whole pile too.
- Yeah, it was good.
They like, yeah, piled them up today.
- That's so nice.
You should have been a little winky-winked and like,
"Hey, it's my birthday anymore."
- It's my birthday.
What's the birthday portion of Nedderman's steak tips?
- They feel like the same, just more.
- Not a sponsor, but they could be.
Nedderman's steak tips.
- Wow, that's impressive.
No, one of my other favorite parts though,
was the fact that, so we were stalled right next to somebody
that I knew followed the podcast,
but I didn't believe we've never really met
- Before, so Jordan and Krista Kerns, welcome.
- Jordan and Krista.
So Andy, I have a confession to make about Jordan and Krista.
- Okay.
- Here it goes.
So a few weeks ago, we had their mutual friends of ours
were house sitting for Jordan and Krista.
And I actually did contemplate bribing those house sitters
to gain entry to their home to leave them a nice surprise.
I didn't do it.
I felt conflicted about if it was just,
if it was crossing a barrier or a boundary.
And so, but I thought I was like, wouldn't it be great
if I just convinced those, those lovely young,
young ins to just let me just waltz right into their house.
I don't know, maybe leave them a jack cardboard cut out
of myself, like saying welcome home.
Wouldn't that be exciting in their bathroom or something?
Yeah, exactly.
That could be their shower.
Oh, gosh.
Just ripped that, ripped that shower curtain back terrifying.
But what was interesting is cause like we had been,
like we were right next to them all week in the barn.
And she saw me at the cafe.
You wore your dudes and dads swag.
And she's like, wait, you're, and are you,
Andy is like podcast?
And I'm like, yes.
- People ask me what they just say is,
are you dudes and dads?
- Yeah, and that's how she said, yeah.
And then.
- That's which is an strange question to answer.
- Right. And so I'm like, yes.
- Am I, am I dudes and dads?
She told me.
- There's so much more to me, but thank you.
- She told me that I should have told,
I should have said something to her earlier about it.
I'm like, no, like.
- You should have said, I don't know if you know this,
but I'm podcast famous.
I don't mean to brag, but I,
but anyways, it was nice.
It was nice to, nice to officially meet you guys.
So yeah, that's super cool.
And we always love it.
Honestly, when people say, hello,
I had a similar experience a few weeks ago
out at the baseball field where someone, someone point,
I was wearing my shirt and someone's like, is that,
is that you?
And I was like, well, it's us, but yes, it is.
It's, I am one of, I am one of the duo, which Andy,
I know we've said this before.
I what is super cool is when you find out in very,
I think organic ways roundabout ways that people in our community are engaging
with the show. They, they appreciate it. It's been, it's just,
it's super humbling to just get the opportunity to share life,
encourage people that are listening both here in our local community and beyond.
So as you can always, we're not, we're podcast famous,
but we're not real famous. So just say we're local podcast famous,
which is not famous at all. Just to be clear,
Let's just back up and say, but come say hi.
Always love that.
That's super, it's super fun.
Somebody, we did have a, somebody, our friend, John Swanson, uh,
reach out after last week's show and put some feedback in.
He gave some, some meaning as only John Swanson can do gave some meaningful
feedback. And so I might have feedback for his feedback.
So we're going to listen to that right now.
Let's see.
Sheesh guys, I'm out walking, um, listening to your
podcast about catching up. And I turned 65 this summer and have been in ministry jobs
most of my life and never figured out a financial plan. And I'm coming to the point of thinking,
What if, rather than everything we identify as bugs, all of the fear of not measuring
up and all of the wondering whether we're doing it right and all of those kinds of things,
what if those are actually just features?
Those are what life looks like.
I've just recently been thinking about troubles and thinking about how things can move from
being acute to chronic to being life. So we love to rush to acute things, not
acute things, but acute things. So like problems. When somebody has a problem in
their life, we love to rush to solve it. When it becomes chronic, then we're like,
"Oh man, are they still talking about that?" And at some point we move to it
being life. Life is those just wacky things. Life is those odd things. Life is
whatever friends we have or don't have. I worry sometimes about how much our
expectations then create our frustrations. And rather than working so hard to
try to measure up to something, if we reexamined our expectations and realized
is that, oh, maybe it's okay to be okay.
So I listened to the two of you
and Andy you're in the middle of fear
'cause I've been watching that.
It's like, yeah, you probably ought to be exhausted.
Joel, you just switched from one career to another career.
You probably ought to be exhausted.
It's not that there's a problem.
It's that that's what goes along
with all of the delights of all of those things.
So, enough preaching.
It was mostly nice walking with you,
except for realizing that really, really, thanks.
Love you guys, bye.
- Oh, John.
- John, Dr. John Swanson.
Yeah, I mean, I think when I first,
so when we first got the email
and I listened to that feedback, I was like,
there was part of me, there was an inside of me,
that was a little bit of me,
probably I would say slightly defensive to that maybe. Interesting. A little bit. Well,
because I got thinking about it, I'm like, sometimes we like, like, we like to be frustrated
about our circumstance or like whatever's come to us. Like we, like there's a, I don't know,
we could do a deep dive into the psyche of all of this, but it's just like,
Can't I don't know.
Can I be?
Yeah, can I be frustrated with something?
Can I?
Is it OK for me to be frustrated with where I'm at right now?
Like when I feel like I'm not responding,
responding the way I ought to be responding.
John's point is good, though, like I would say, like,
well, where does that sense of oughtness come from?
Like, like, oh, you should be doing this or whatever.
You know, we had mentioned kind of some of the financial,
the financial stuff that were my wife and I trying to figure out.
And yeah, I'm I want to be very careful
I'm not measuring any of that against anybody else at the same time at the same time Andy.
I would like to retire someday. I would like to not have to
work for the rest of my life. And so I think John would agree with us. I think John would be like
certain intentionalities financially are appropriate, but his warning is an appropriate one to say.
Yeah, like what he is freaking out about this gonna
right? Gonna add anything to you or the sense of like, why should be doing this?
In the coaching world, we say all the time, don't shit on yourself. Andy was ready for
the bleed by side. Yeah. I was quickly going to the bleed button. He was, he was worried,
but no. Yeah, there, there it is. There. But we thank you, John, for putting in feedback.
Thanks, John. We love it when you guys put in feedback. So you can either email feedback
at dudesanddadspodcast or voicemail us at 574-213-8702. We love those voicemail.
else. And why do we love them? Because we can put them on the show as quality content
to prove to everybody we have real life bodies there listening to what we're talking about.
Oh, thanks, John. Right back at you, my friend. By the way, we love you deeply. We're so grateful
for you. Thank and thank you for that. That was that was really meaningful. It played.
It played around in my head for a while. Well tonight, Joel, we have a previous guest on
with us. You know that you know how good a guest has to be to get back on this show. I mean
narrow is the way and few be that find it Andy. But but welcome back Corey to the show. Hi Corey.
Hello. Oh gosh. And not only that, not only is Corey with us, he's here with us in person.
Last time we made him sit in his shed, it was cold out and he had a heater on and
he was wearing flannel. I mean, he looked very in his beard was his beard was way longer.
- Yeah.
- Gosh.
Corey, let's just quickly,
I think first thing's first, most important things first.
What's the beard journey been like?
Where are you at in your,
how does the beard work for you?
Do you grow out so long?
Do a hard cut back and then start back at square one?
Or are you, is there a happy medium
that you're trying to find somewhere?
- I start every year in October.
- Okay.
- And I shave it in May.
- Okay.
- Gotcha.
- So it's a winter summer thing.
- Gotcha. - Okay.
- Now, can I also ask,
'cause is this also the result of any negotiation whatsoever
with your wife?
- The summer months are when we work
on rebuilding our marriage.
(both laughing)
From the winter months.
She's not a huge fan.
- Understood.
Understood, our wives have mixed,
sort of mixed feelings.
- Mine likes my beard, but not when it's like super bushy,
but can she can see it from the back?
Like if she's walking behind me and she sees the beard,
If your beard has a profile, that's why she draws the line.
Yeah. So she does.
She has a certain range.
Right. But when I shave it off completely, then it's no, like that's not a good thing.
Well, for my wife, the color, I think, as much as anything,
because we can be out and about and people will think I'm her dad.
Guys, literally spit the water. Oh, gosh.
Well, she doesn't find it as humorous as Joel does.
No, because that's creepy. I get it. I understand.
Shen, who was that elderly man walking with you?
The other. Oh, wow. No, that's well, that's funny.
OK, so yeah, that's that's a general the general take on on the beard.
So I've got a trim coming up here on on Tuesday, so that'll be good.
But yeah, my wife's same deal.
I think we've talked about this before. It's there's.
She she she generally kind of is kind of like, I don't know, whatever.
But then when I go and shave it off, she has like immediate remorse,
like immediate remorse about it.
And I'm like, OK, you're only giving fire to every stereotypical
male-female conversation here about lack of lack of clear boundary
and direction and what you want.
So anyway, so I think there's some happy medium that we're all trying to find
in general, right? I think so. Absolutely. Great.
Corey. OK. So here's the deal.
We, I think last time, last time we talked, we got kind of the overview and we'll link
obviously show.
Yeah, we'll link to the other episode, the previous episode, because we kind of got the
the outline of jail ministry, like what you're, what you're involved in here in
Elkhart County. I think it's helpful again, just for, for, for those that are new to the
crew, general outline of what you do, what the ministry is about, and then I think the
update stuff about kind of new adventures in jail ministry, if I can call it that.
Sure.
Well, I've been at the jail for about 10 years now.
And one of the things you learn quickly in this type of ministry is when you're in the
jail, I mean, maybe you're doing a Bible study or church service. Those are all good.
But when people leave the jail and they have no family, no friends, no place to live, no
transportation, a lot of kids, maybe with different people, drug addictions, trauma.
Life is just really hard. And there's no amount of Bible memorization that will fix all of those
problems. So you leave the jail and that your life just hits you as soon as you walk through those
doors and you're, you know, all the things that happened inside as good as they were,
they stay on the inside because now you're just trying to figure out how to get back
and find someplace to live that evening. Yeah.
Somewhat of a generalization, that's mostly true for everybody who, you know, most people who
leave incarceration, that's what they're, that's what they're walking out into.
Yep. And all the bigger reason for which, which outlines the challenge of them not going back
into that same thing, when, because you're there, when you are sort of resource depleted at that
point, both financially and relationally, then like, what are you going to go to to make your way,
make your way in the world? Probably what you knew or what is familiar to you would be my guess.
That's right. Where else are you going to go? Yeah. Right. The people who are incarcerated
hear this all the time. You can't go back to the same people. You can't go back to the same places
and you can't do the same things. Those are easy things to say. And then in the next breath, we
also say, "But don't come to my places and don't do my things and you're not going to be a part of
my people." Right. So, I mean, if you and I had to walk out of this room and never go back to people
that we knew or the places where we were raised or the things that we did, I mean, that'd be a
a difficult thing to do. And a lot of it also is just, again, a generalization, but a lot of
people who are in the Elkhart County Jail have been through a lot of trauma and abuse that they've
just not had the opportunity to work through. And so you can't expect all of that trauma to be
undone in a six-month program or in a Bible study inside the Elkhart County Jail. So I think what
we realized is, oh, the good news has to be more than just doing a Bible study in the jail.
The good news has to be more than just when I die, I get to go to heaven.
We think that people should be able to experience the kingdom of God before they die.
Dangerous ideas. Dangerous ideas.
So that's kind of our goal. Everybody knows the verse in James.
Can that faith without works? Can that type of faith save you?
But the type of faith he's talking about is somebody who sees somebody who's naked and
hungry and says, "Go, be well and be fed." And then he says, "But they don't do anything to
take care of their body." And so we're really trying to figure out how can we focus, and really,
the Gospels, the whole New Testament is so much more focused on bringing the kingdom of God to earth
than us going to heaven when we die. And so we're always trying to figure out what can we do
to take care not just of people's souls, but also their bodies so they can experience the
kingdom of God here on earth. A lot of us are going to live for a few more years at least.
The good news is not you will have to experience hell on earth for the next 30 years until you
die and then you can go to heaven. Yeah. Yeah. We're just holding on around here. Just hold on
for our last breath and then the good part starts. Yeah. So,
So in jail ministry specifically, like what kind of...
What is the on the ground experience as far as your kind of your ministry expressions?
The things that you guys have been doing sort of historically, because I think you outlined
a few of those, but like what does Elkirk County jail ministry look like past and present?
Well, the jail ministry has been around for maybe 40 years and 45 years.
I started a while ago, some churches in Goshen got together, formed a non-profit organization
and put a chaplain in the jail in downtown Goshen when it was there.
And so, you know, for a lot of years, it was Mike Kupke was a chaplain back then.
He was a chaplain for the first 38 years of the jail ministry.
Wow.
A fantastic guy.
And there were maybe a dozen assistant chaplains who would go in, me with inmates.
distribute Bibles and literature, help with church services. So today, things look a little bit
different. And I would divide our ministry up into three different areas. We do what you think of,
what most churches would think of as ministry proper. So the Bible studies, the church services,
the discipleship, baptisms, all of those things. But then we also do tattoo removal. So we offer
free tattoo removal inside the jail and outside the jail. So anybody who's listening to this,
if you live in Elkart County, you can get your tattoos removed at Vista Community Health Center.
Okay. It's for a suggested $10 donation. Yeah.
And then we also do reentry housing. So we have six homes that we own in the north side of Goshen
and we have either two single women or two single men living in a home. At any given time, we have
a guy named Don French, who's our housing coach and Chris Klazinski who helps down with our,
the men and women who live in our homes, because we've seen this to be true. If you don't have a
stable place to live, your life will never be stable. It all starts with that. Education will
never be stable, healthcare will never be stable, employment will never be stable,
church attendance will never be stable, your family won't be stable. Now, we also learn it's not a
guarantee of stability, but if you're always moving every three months, you're fearful of eviction,
your rent is too high, you can't afford it or you're forced to live someplace.
You know, it's hard to complete the drug court program if you're sentenced to drug court,
if you're living in a drug house. Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah. It's a real barrier.
It's a barrier.
Real barrier.
Right. But that's the only place you have to go.
Yeah.
Mm-hmm.
That's where you're gonna go.
Yeah. Yeah.
And so, I think everything that we do, housing, tattoo removal, all the stuff inside is really,
we really do, we really are kind of honing in this idea of we want to provide people with a
different kind of community that they feel like they belong to. And we would call it the Kingdom
of God. So the Bible studies are a way to help people experience that. Tattoo removal is a way
to help people experience that. Housing is a way to help people experience that. As we're looking
into the future, I think what we keep talking about, and let me back up, here's how we kind of
of operate with the jail ministry.
We bought a tattoo removal machine, laser,
and then we didn't know what we were gonna do with it.
So we were like, well, now we need to learn how to use it
and figure out where we're gonna put it
and figure out a process for it all.
We bought our first house before we had any idea
who was gonna live in it.
We had no model for it.
We had no processes or procedures in place for it.
But the next thing I think we're gonna do
is we wanna open up some type of a community center
in Elkhart County.
Are you guys familiar with the Elkhart County clubhouse?
Yes.
It is a fantastic organization in Elkhart County.
There's one in, it started in Goshen.
The one I know about is in Goshen.
Right.
Which Meyer heads that.
And there's one in Elkhart now.
Okay.
So that is a support community for people with mental illness.
It's open five days a week, eight to five.
It's a place for people who have any level of mental illness
can go and have a purposeful day.
And feel like they belong, they're supported.
There's a reason for them to be there.
They're needed.
And we think there's enough people who are formally incarcerated have unique enough hurdles
and obstacles that we want to start some type of a community center as a support community
for people who have been formally incarcerated.
So just like tattoo removal and housing, we don't know how it's going to work or where
it's going to be, but we've already hired the executive director to run it once it does
start.
That's awesome.
Right now she's helping down with housing.
This is totally in line with your business model.
I guess seeing is just how totally how you guys operate.
- Well, if we went in until we had it all figured out,
we still wouldn't be doing anything.
- See, now I just wanna hit the pause button here
because I think from the seat that I've been in,
executive pastor role and now CEO for another
non-for-profit organization,
I know and I can almost hear the board numbers
in the background saying,
who are usually business-minded people or who usually the kind of people,
you know, I have a finance committee that's comprised of a couple CPAs and a business
analyst for a large Fortune 500 company. And they tend to be risk averse people,
responsibly risk averse people, but they tend to be like, they're going to pump the brakes on
things and make sure. And I value that. I value that insight. I value that caution.
in faith based non for profits specifically, I have really seen that sort of demeanor often
in place. I don't want to necessarily, and maybe you can correct me, I don't always want to chalk it
up to fear per se, but there is maybe a sense of like, man, you know, we want to be stewards with
these resources and we want to make sure that we don't have egg on our face at any point in any
wrong term, all eyes dotted and T's crossed before we launch something, before we go into
something. And yet the story that you have told, there have been very intentional things.
And you guys as an organization, I know that you have all the things in place, but there's
been, I have sensed a little bit less of a version to risk. So that's just my outside
perspective. Yes, no, am I right or?
- May, I think it can be fear, but I think another part of it is, we set up these unreasonable
definitions of what success looks like and what expectation is.
- Thank you, Dr. John Swanson.
Yes.
- I was disappointed because I thought I was going to be Ron Swanson.
- Oh, yeah.
- But when he said it, I'll get over it.
- Yeah.
And so, John, you know what?
John Swanson should have his own pair of minutes of success.
The John Swanson pair of minutes of success.
I'd put that up on my wall.
Absolutely.
But yeah, so our, yeah, expectations of what success looks like.
Yeah.
And so we, we're very intentional.
We think that our only obligation at the ministry is to provide people with
opportunities and the resources for spiritual development, professional
development and personal development.
And we, we don't measure our success based on whether people take advantage
of those or not, because we just can't control that.
But if our only responsibility is to provide those opportunities for people,
it feels a little bit less like a risk. That's how I look at it.
Right. Yeah. Because now we're going to put all of this effort and time and money into this thing,
not to change Joel's life or to fix Joel, but in order to provide him every opportunity he needs
to grow in the ways that he wants to grow. So it's really an elevation. What I hear you saying
is it's an elevation of that person's individual accountability, the ability for them to hold
themselves accountable to something better, to something greater.
Yeah, well, I think once they experience a community that's supportive and is really willing
and excited to invest in them with no strings attached.
When people catch that, watch out. Yeah. Really. And if they don't, we don't have to,
have to chalk that up as a loss or a failure or we did something wrong.
There's a balance between we're always trying to figure out how we can do things better.
But we just never want to judge ourselves based on whether or not Andy decided to
you know, take advantage of the financial planning classes that we offer or whatever it might be.
Or he relapsed while he was in our home. Right. Right. You know, I don't know how long it takes to
undo possibly 20 or 30 years, you know, of living life a certain way. Right. Right. And that's,
you know, that's a, that's a great point. I was having a conversation with, with a,
with someone really close to me and not too long ago about, we were talking about an individual who
we mutual, mutual friend, person we both knew and talking about some, just some decisions that
they had made that were really, I mean, it's really unfortunate. Not, we would see as not wise
decisions, but this, this person, you know, had lived a fair amount of life and,
and my, my friend said to me, he's like, he's like, I just, I'm just wondering like,
you know, can this be turned around? Can this, can this change? And I said, well, first of all,
I mean, God can do anything, right?
Like, absolutely, God can do anything.
But this person has been living the way that they have been living for decades.
It's not an overnight change.
They have all the reinforcement in the other direction.
And you just sitting down with them, surprise, surprise, for 30 minutes,
trying to talk some sense into them or trying to offer them an alternative way.
I mean, I wish you all the best, but yeah, there's a lot of reinforcement in the other direction.
Well, I think we also sometimes conflate, well, something that I think what we're unintentionally
or maybe intentionally trying to do sometimes is to make people's lives look like our lives look,
is if the way we're doing things is the right way to do things.
If somebody who's not following the Dave Ramsey Financial Peace University plan,
They're doing things the wrong way. And we know that's the fifth gospel in the Bible.
100%. 100%. Andy, by the way, make sure we get a good sound clip of that because I'd like to
take it out of context. Put it out there. But not everybody handles money the same way I do.
And I'm just not... Now, in America, there might be a right way to do it. And the kingdom of God,
I'm just not sure those two things overlap as nicely as we like for them to look.
So sometimes we spend a lot of money, not a money, we spend a lot of time,
I think maybe trying to look, measuring somebody's success based on, you know, the way that we think
somebody should manage their money or, you know, whether they should rent or buy.
Some of this rubs me the wrong way because I think sometimes we do equate
how somebody manages their money with how spiritual they are.
100%. Yeah, it's a very, that's a very, um, it's a very pietist, Protestant problem. You know,
I didn't, for years and years, I never really thought about it. This phrase of the Protestant
work ethic, like that, like that kind of deep into our, you know, our history as a country.
And, and what, what that work ethic was always rooted in was I need to work really hard so that
that I can demonstrate that I'm saved.
So like my productivity and my salvation were tied together,
strangely tied together.
And I think that there's some there's there's some weird unknown
subconscious hangovers from that within so within our within our life.
At the same time, you would say for four inmates that have that have come out of incarceration,
you would say there are certain things I don't know how, what language are you use?
There's certain things that we hope for for them, certain maybe milestones,
mile markers, things that would be realized for them.
What does that look like?
Well, I've come to believe that everybody should be in therapy.
All right.
People who are have been incarcerated.
Again, this is not 100%, but a lot just have experienced
an unbelievable amount of trauma. Yeah. And one of my hopes for them is that they, so this is
the jail ministry offers every single person in the Elkhart County Jail, everybody who lives in
our home, everybody who gets out of jail, we tell them, if you find a therapist, it could be a family
therapist, a marriage therapist, personal, it could be about anger or addictions, you find one
that you like and go to in the jail ministry will pay for every session for however long you need
to go for however many sessions you need to go. Wow. That's awesome. Wow. We believe it's so strongly.
Wow. Okay. That people have so much stuff that they have to work through. Yeah. And
we want people, we want people to be the best versions of themselves. And I think the only way
to get to that point is you have to work through a lot of this stuff that you have either pushed down
or dealt with inappropriately or you haven't dealt with at all. One of my good friends who I go
church with has a t-shirt that says, "People need Jesus." And a therapist. We're really strong
believers in that. And so I would hope, I mean, I think, you know, reconciling with parents,
reconciling with children, reconciling with spouses. You can't do that unless you are
healed and whole yourself. I think it all starts with that. But I think that would be my hope for
people is that they're able to work through forgiveness issues, anger issues, and that they
would be able to start. Because I think that's what, I think that's part of what the good news is.
it's not just we get to die and go to heaven. It's through the death and resurrection of Jesus.
He is reconciling the entire world, all of the relationships. There's a great book. It's called
The Very Good Gospel by Lisa Sharon Harper. We did it in Book Club one time in the jail.
And she said, one of the things that isn't quite picked up in English translations of the Hebrew
Bible and Genesis is when God declared it as very good, it's implied that the relationship
between those things are also very good. So the relationships between animals and the earth,
and humans and animals, and men and women, all these things, the relationship is good,
the connection is good, and sin broke all of those things. And so part of the restoration and
the reconciliation and the healing that the Holy Spirit is doing is to make all those relationships
Right. It's early Genesis. And this is the moment where I do a random Hebrew callback
from years ago in graduate school. But I mean, some of the strongest words, it's this "tov ma'od,"
which is this good, very good thing. Some of the strongest words, I would agree. The way it's
structured in the Bible, it just pops off the page to you. That there is something very, very
significant relationally about what's being what's being described there. And that's
well, that's that's your hey bonus Bible lesson today on the on the podcast guys,
we're hitting all of the bullet points and more so good. So yeah, Cory, I'm with you. And I think
that I mean, it just makes a ton of sense. I am I am also blown away by the degree and the
length that you guys will take to make sure like to make sure and support that that's happening
That's amazing to me.
Well, I think what you said earlier is key there.
Like you're not measuring your success by how many people completed your program or whatever.
It's more of our successes. We felt the need to do this thing and we did it.
Yeah.
Like there's not a financial thing. There's not a number thing to it.
It's just we did it. We followed through with, we felt God calling us to do that success.
And it's the right thing to do regardless of whether or not people take advantage of it.
Yeah. Yeah.
So it's the right thing to do, even though so-and-so may have relapsed in one of our homes.
Right.
Or tattoo removal is the right thing to do. Even if somebody goes off to prison,
relapses, gets more tattoos and then comes back. It was still the right thing to do.
Yeah. And we've sort of, you've mentioned the tattoo thing and I wonder, just for specificity's
sake, because some people might wonder, it's like, what's the deal with removing tattoos?
the gist here and maybe there's more is that their tattoos can be a barrier.
So one of them can be a barrier to employment.
Yeah.
And then there are other reasons maybe goes beyond that.
What is the general, for the general person going in for tattoo removal, what are their
reasons, what are they hoping to accomplish?
Yeah.
Tattoos are becoming more acceptable.
Not the kind of tattoos that we're removing.
Yeah, yeah.
Yeah.
Still not acceptable.
It's still not acceptable.
No.
People come in for all sorts of reasons.
They have gang tattoos, dirty white boy tattoos
somewhere on their body and they wanna get out of the gang.
And it's really hard to get out of an organization
if you're tagged with their logo or a symbol
somewhere on your body.
So they wanna, it's a step they're taking
to remove themselves from that lifestyle.
Or it's racist tattoos.
One of the first people we ever treated,
his whole back was covered in a swastika.
And his grandchild was biracial.
- Oh, wow.
- And so of course, you don't want your biracial granddaughter
growing up with the grandpa who has a swastika on his back.
- Right. - They're in a swastika.
- Yes.
- Or they're embarrassed because when they get out,
their kids don't want them to go to their school events
because their tattoos are all over their face.
Or just, it's triggering and traumatic for them to see,
you know, something on their face that they did
during the worst lowest point of their life.
It's hard to move forward in life
when the worst parts of your past are tattooed
all over your face.
And so it's gang stuff.
We just wanna, we're tired of this life.
We don't want that to be a part of who we are.
We don't people to judge us when they look at us.
Part of it is employment.
You can get a job pretty much with any type of tattoo,
but the types of jobs that are gonna be open to you
are gonna be fairly limiting.
I mean, if you I'm just saying, if you have the F word tattooed up your neck,
near neck, I'm just going to assume that maybe not as many doors would be open for
you. Andy.
I have lots of tattoos.
But I will tell you, people who have those really kind of harsh tattoos are
some of the nicest people you'll ever meet.
I'm sure we did a video for our banquet this year and one of the guys is just
covered in tattoos and his admonition or his challenge to people in
video is if you see somebody like me on the street, come up and talk to me because it
may not, I may not be what you think. Yeah. Yeah.
But, you know, it's hard to get past that initial. Right.
You're going to make assumptions about sure. Yeah. And, and, you know, I think from, again,
from an employer's perspective, employers like, man, I had a really great interview with
them or had a great experience, but they're going to be interfacing with customers and
and things like that.
And like a number of things just realistically
go through your brain.
So it is a super, I mean, it's one of the most practical,
you want to talk about practical ministry
and like really making a new avenues available to a person
or re-available to a person.
I think that's the, just it's super cool.
And the stories that have come out of it, I think,
I've heard some of them, but they're pretty amazing.
- It's fantastic.
So Holly Young does our tattoo removal for us.
And so when we're in tattoo removal, it's just the two of us and whoever is getting tattoo removed.
So they're out of the ward. You know, it's kind of they can let their guard down.
We have, again, it's not about the tattoo removal. That's a good thing in and of itself.
But what it really is, it gives us an opportunity to have just a real conversation with somebody
where they can talk freely. They don't have to be guarded with what they're sharing with us.
They're out of the war. They're not with 40 other guys or 40 other women,
and it's just a time for them to relax a little bit.
Yeah, that's really amazing.
The manufacture of our laser comes out twice a year to realign the laser and kind of do some
maintenance and upkeep on the machine. They always count the pulses that we do.
This laser pulses 10 times per second.
And when the laser hits the ink, the tattoo, the ink absorbs that light energy
and the top layer of ink vaporizes kind of underneath your skin with a loud pop.
So it sounds like a taser.
10 pops, loud pops every, you know, 10 per second.
It's really painful.
But the the manufacturer, the machine said, on average, most people
who are doing tattoo removal, they have 500,000 pulses a year.
You're doing pretty good if you have 500,000.
And we're up over a million a year.
Oh, wow.
On average, we're doing a lot of tattoo removal procedures.
That's amazing.
That's awesome.
That's super cool.
And that's just in the jail.
That doesn't count the machine at Vista.
So.
So as you guys are kind of pressing forward with this,
with this community center idea.
One of the things that struck, I guess,
that's in the back of my mind,
because we're in talking about all the positive things. And I've, I wonder, I just, I wonder what the,
what the experience is like for you and your, and your staff. Because, because not every story is
a happy, is a happy ending. And not everybody, I know with other recovery ministries that I'm,
that I'm, I have connections with in the recidivism rate is, especially when it's addiction related,
The recidivism rate is super, super high. Some people have to go through a program
two, three times before they kind of make it out and stay out. And just in clear terms,
they have to stay alive long enough to also be able to do that.
What is your guys'... I guess like, because I've heard you talk about...
And maybe that makes sense in this way. When you talk about success, when you talk about what
what the ministry's kind of where you get,
where the hope is in that ministry.
How do you guys process together when it doesn't go the way
that you had hoped and that you had prayed for?
And then, 'cause the one thing about this ministry
and there's a ton of prayer behind it.
There's a ton of very intentional spiritual focus
on what you all are doing.
Some of my favorite people, some of my favorite faith leaders in this community are part of
the jail, the jail ministry.
And so how do you guys process that part of it together or, and maybe even individually?
Yeah.
Well, first part of it is setting up correct expectations.
So I'm always surprised the recidivism rate isn't 100%.
Yeah.
I don't understand.
the system, I don't understand anybody can make it out.
Yeah. Right. So I'm encouraged. I mean, so it takes one person
from the SD to stay out and do well. I get excited about that.
Yeah. But the other thing is once you kind of drop this pretense that we actually have the power
to change somebody's life. And if I only used strong enough arguments, if I only did, if I only
spent one more hour with them or did one more Bible study with them or, you know, once we
realize we just have so little power over what somebody chooses to do and we trust that God
is ultimately in control, then nothing that we do, we can have the confidence that nothing we do
has ever really wasted. I think we're trying to be okay with the fact that some seeds that are planted
today might sprout 40 years down the road and I will not be around to see them.
And that's okay. You just have to trust that what you're doing now is planting seeds.
It's planting seeds and it's the right thing to do and it's the good thing to do even if I don't
see any of the fruits or if I don't see any behavioral changes I have to trust
that God is still working in that person's life. But burnout and frustration,
it's only a matter of time if you think, okay, my job is not just to provide housing, but I need
to make sure this person does not relapse. And I need to make sure this person says the right prayer
before he or she dies or it's on me. We may not always think that explicitly by thing
Yeah, but we kind of do.
Yeah, kind of do.
I think we just have an inflated sense of how important we are.
Yeah.
And we forget that God's working by the high in the scenes.
God loves Joel as much as anybody else does.
And the other thing is, God may be working on something inside Joel that I don't even
know about.
In the meantime, I'm so focused on this behavior over here of Joel's that I think is the most
important thing.
so frustrated because Joel won't stop doing this thing.
And meanwhile, God is focused on something totally different
that I'm not even aware of.
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. The I think, you know, years ago, probably the first,
oh, my first encounter with it.
You know, Dallas Willard always, always talked about, you know,
behave, the kind of the myth of behavior modification and what he called
the gospel of sin management. Yeah.
And I think that it's all always like
there's this especially within our kind of our bigger evangelical tent.
There, you know, there, there is this myth, I'll call it a myth.
Yeah.
That that really what that really what the gospel is about is
is just kind of us.
Managing bad behavior, like managing bad behavior,
doing more better, more better behavior, unless not better behavior to put it
syntactically in a completely terrible way. But in that sense, that's essentially what
we're hoping for. Like that's the goal. And this real focus on behaviorism,
it trickles all the way down. You can see it even within, you know, how,
in boy, without this, I mean, I'm not even sure if we'd have content for a show. Like,
how parents, like even in parenting, like, if I just get my kid to behave xyzy way,
I mean, we've all had that thought. Like, then I would, number one, I would be affirmed in my
Christian parenting, which is the most important thing, most important thing, so that when we get
together with friends, we can talk about, you know, like, how great I'm doing at this.
We just have a list of behaviors that we're trying to suppress and a list of behaviors that
that we're trying to elevate. And then if that's the case, then those are kind of our
gatekeepers and our, you know, how we're measuring.
Yeah. I think it's hard. Once you start measuring your success based on other people's behavior,
it's impossible not to start manipulating somebody to get the behaviors you want.
No, there you go. Okay. That'll preach.
That's my next sermon for Joel.
No, I don't know if that's true or not, but it seems like that's one of the reasons we
'Cause I can manipulate, you know,
some by any specific way to get a specific behavior
that I could, you know, tout at our banquet.
- Yeah.
- To say, see, this is working.
Here's, you know, this person saved up
for an emergency fund.
- Yeah.
Ooh, another Dave Ramsey poke.
(laughing)
Ding, ding.
We should have like a voice over like,
"Take that, Dave Ramsey."
Bing. Yeah. The, well, and my goodness, let's just be,
let's just be really clear. Uh, I'm going to run off the emergency fund real quick.
Anyway, just to say the vast majority of Americans that have never been
incarcerated are not held to those standards. Right. You know, that's true.
Like we, yeah. And I think the, uh,
There is this tension and I know that I, and again, I know that I have subscribed to these things when
I'm probably under a particular stress or just want to see results. I want to see results and know that we're making headway.
But that's so much of the work that we do.
Number one, the work that we do as followers of Jesus is unseen work.
And that's why it looks absolutely, I mean, if you're going to take worldly standards to that, it looks absolutely bizarre and
nonsensical and foolish at times. And I can just hear, I mean, a CEO of a Fortune 500 company,
listening to you, what you guys are doing and being like, you know, like, could look at that
sideways because it's like, no, like, how can you improve anything with you if you're not
measuring, you know, X, XYZ. But at the same time, you're working, you're doing the work of souls,
of care for souls.
That's a completely different measurement than any worldly measure.
If you want to call it that.
Yeah.
And it's this messy work that feels a little bit like nailing gel to the wall at a time.
Tell me if this sticks with you, Corey.
I'm wondering, so many times, I've heard people much wiser than me basically say,
are the people that I'm walking alongside, are they moving toward Jesus or are they moving away
from Him? And that is the barometer by which I want to operate, I want to run my organization,
I want to run my own life and how I'm discipling. Would you kind of resonate with that?
I think so. I would say are the people who we have a relationship with exhibiting more fruits of
the Spirit. Yeah. Because I believe people in our homes right now who would not identify as Christian.
Sure. And you hear the experience they've had in life in a church and you can understand,
I understand why that person would be hesitant to go to church or call themselves a Christian.
But at the same time, I can see, I'm thinking of somebody specifically who is patient and kind
and forgiving and encouraging. And you just know, okay, he's getting it. And I'm not going to try
and force something down his throat right now. But you can just tell the Holy Spirit is working.
And our job is to continue to be a safe place for him to ask questions,
to talk about his experiences, his ideas, and we can talk about ours. Because the other thing is,
I hope I am, I hope I'm displaying more of the fruits of the spirit as a result of the jail.
And that's the thing about jail.
So it's more of a ministry to the church than it is the people who are incarcerated in Yonkark
County jail. You just wonder if Jesus maybe knew that, like with his, because I've been thinking
about, I know, I know the whole like visit people in jail gets thrown out a lot. And it's kind of
of like, "Oh, this is a thing you as a Christian should be doing." But there's this really
interesting phenomenon of exactly in the reverse of like, who's actually being ministered to?
Right. I tell every group that I talk to, to the extent that the formerly incarcerated
are not actively participating in our churches is to are the detriment more than it is to
there in that tremendous.
Yep.
I firmly believe that.
I hope, and I hope, I hope faith leaders hear that.
That I think that's the one thing that I would say I know in the previous ministry that I
was a part of some of the men, some of the men coming out of they were that would that
would frequently were part of our congregation or would frequently come and share in our
congregation.
It was like the absolute highlight for so many people because what it did is it really
put a mirror on them.
Like it re-prioritizes everything that you think you're worried about in your whatever
when you hear a completely different perspective of like, "Hey, I'm just working to stay clean
this month.
I'm just working to repair this relationship with my daughter because I was absent for
because I was so strong out or whatever for this long.
And you're like, huh, yeah, okay.
That's gosh, maybe the things that I'm griping about to God right now, maybe I need to like
recalibrate.
And maybe this person has a lot to teach me about grace and forgiveness and persistence
and all these things.
Got it.
We had a guy share his testimony.
He's smart.
He preached today at our church.
at work, he's currently at work at least. It is the same thing. You hear a story and you're thinking,
"Oh man, you've lived through more than I will ever live with or lived through."
And we have a lot to learn from our incarcerated brothers and sisters. And if we think that it's
just our job to go and administer to them, we're getting it backwards.
Yeah. That's really amazing. Well, Corey, I just, I guess, number one, we always want to make sure
this is available. If people are interested in getting connected with yourself in the ministry,
where should they go? Where should we send them? You can find us on Instagram, Facebook,
and our website. So if you just Google Elkart County Jail Ministry, you'll find everything.
Awesome. Bingo. Well, that'll be in the show notes for sure. We'll be always able to send people
there and, uh, and, and what kind of, I just quick overview, if people want to get connected with a
jail ministry and they're like, Hey, I got like a lot in life, but I feel like maybe I have,
might have something to offer or be able to participate in general.
Like what's the, what are the opportunities if people want to plug in?
We have some opportunities inside.
So COVID, last time we talked was during COVID.
Everything was shut down.
Yeah.
And we're slowly building up from COVID.
And so there are now opportunities to get involved inside the Elkhart County Jail.
So I do a book club and I teach an inside out dance class.
You guys, oh my gosh, you should do a podcast.
Oh, here we go.
From the jail.
Yes.
With our inside out dance.
Let's do it. Let's do it. Right here. Right here. Right now.
All right. Let's do it.
That would be fantastic.
Let's do it. Let's do it.
That's a brilliant idea. I love that.
Yeah. So they can join me for book club.
They can come to our inside out dads class.
We have different things throughout the day
throughout the month.
So we had an Amish choir come in.
Yes.
Wow.
And they sang two hymns and each
and each war they just kind of went around and did some.
Yeah.
Did a hym sing.
Yeah.
We do painting classes.
And so our assistant chaplains and our volunteers
are able to participate in some of those activities.
we're always looking for churches and volunteers to get involved in our housing.
So once a month, all of our tenants get together and we have pizza,
we have a topic that we talk about, it's just a way to get, you know, to build a community.
And so we met today, we have a group from 8th Street Mennonite attends,
a group from River Oaks attends. So we're always looking for people to get involved
because we want the people who live in our homes to have a good experience with people
who call themselves Christians, because they've always had a great experience.
Fair enough.
And we want our churches to get involved so they get to know some of the people,
because again, I think it's more of a ministry to them,
and we can learn more about God through them than maybe they can through us.
us. So, but also specifically, if there are people out there who want to be part of like a home,
what's like a home repair ministry team, we have a couple of them, but every now and then
our houses need a new roof, they need a new porch or a new toilet. And yeah, that's a great way for
people to get involved also. That's fantastic.
Great episode that also fostered what will inevitably be a future episode. Yes. I'm very,
very, very excited about that. And I think, or just on a personal note, I mean, I'll just
say, I'm super grateful for what you're doing, super grateful to call you a friend. Thanks
for being here. I feel like I learned, gosh, I feel like I learned some really significant
things. I have this whole like, sort of spiritual intake when we have these conversations. It's
like, gosh, I need to reconsider. I need to reconsider something. I need to think about
So just thanks to you and all the great people that are part of the jail ministry.
The number of stories just as a pastor in the community for, you know, for 17 years.
The stories that I have heard come out of it exactly on the other side of people that have
just their lives that they volunteered with the transformation that is brought to them.
Man, really, really, really significant things.
So very, very cool.
Well, I'll say the jail ministry has been so successful the past 40 years because Elk
Park County is just so incredibly supportive.
Yeah.
Yes.
It's unbelievable.
It's humbling.
It's unbelievable.
Across multiple denominational lines.
So if there's a denomination in Elk Park County, they're involved in the jail ministry.
That's awesome.
Mininites and all flavor of Mininites and former Mininites and missionary and Baptist
and Lutheran and Catholic and I mean, you name it.
So that's the other thing about the jail ministry.
I think it's more ministry than church because when you volunteer at the ministry, you realize,
oh, we're all playing for the same team. There might be significant differences between
denominations that need to be considered. But when you boil it down and you're working inside
the jail, what you realize quickly is, man, if we can just all focus and agree that Jesus is Lord
And that's who we're trying to follow.
You know, even a Baptist and a Mennonite can get along.
Let's say what?
Oh, that's awesome.
Well, again, Corey, thanks for hanging out with us tonight, man.
Thanks for having me back on.
So, so great.
And just, man, brings a lot of joy to my heart.
But as always, before we let you go.
And now it's time for the dudes and dads pop quiz.
Thank you, Aaron, James.
No, that's Reagan.
That's Reagan.
That was a new one.
Listen, look.
And now it's time for the dudes and dads.
That is Reagan Reagan.
I'm sorry.
It's an updated one.
I'm sorry, Reagan.
You got to I was unprepared.
I was like, who is this mature, more mature voice that I hear on the line?
I guess they done.
Yes.
So this is the time that we just ask Corey random questions
that have nothing to do with jail ministry.
Mostly he can't prepare for it.
He doesn't he doesn't know what what's coming next.
And in either the week.
So here we go.
I got to your number one.
What are you currently curious about?
Oh, there we go.
What are you currently curious about, Corey?
Oh, um, interesting.
It's like, am I curious about it?
I feel like I'm curious about a lot.
I'm trying to narrow it down about the thing that I've been
the most curious about lately.
Nice.
Does it have to be like profound or philosophical?
No, no.
We prefer less profound actually.
Something that's like, oh, that makes sense.
Yeah.
Okay.
Well, I'm really curious about astrophotography.
Astrophotography.
I'm a photographer.
Yes.
And so I've always been interested lately in shooting.
Pictures of the Houston Astros.
I get it. Astro photography.
Close. So close.
I had to turn it. That was anti-climactic.
Yeah, well, you know, ending to the Astro photography.
Fantastic.
Corey, my question is out of all of your family members,
who lives the longest in the zombie apocalypse?
Silas Silas, my youngest.
OK, by far.
And why does Silas make it the longest?
He's an inventor and a tinker.
and creative. And if there's somebody who can figure out a way
Doncha
to build some type of contraption.
Yes, that will to keep himself safe or to kill everything around him.
It would be him.
Bingo.
Silas way to go way to go.
I'm guessing those are the two most important things in a zombie apocalypse.
It is. Yeah.
It's it's a safe room and safe room and dead zombies.
That's really what it boils down to.
What's your favorite gadget?
Probably my I also I think we talked about this last time I like watches.
Yes.
And so my favorite gadget are my mechanical watches.
Yes. How many watches do you possess?
I was just being made fun of this today.
So great.
We can offer another opportunity.
I think I'm I'm just shy of 20, I think.
He's got two on right now.
Yeah, he's got two.
You know that.
He always has two, which is which is normal.
It's normal.
That's logical and normal,
depending, depending on what's going on.
OK, my
my next well here, next question.
What book should we all be reading right now?
Oh, that's good.
OK, I I just finished.
There's a couple I need to choose from.
We just finished one in book club
And it's called This Here Flesh by Cole Arthur Riley.
And again, any author with three names like that, it's worth it's worth it.
You know, you know, it's gonna be good.
His parents knew what they were doing.
This here, this here.
Flesh. Flesh.
And what's what's so great about the book?
Her her writing style is absolutely beautiful.
Love it.
It's one of the it's been one of the the the favorite books we've done in book club.
Wow. Okay.
This is your first. All right.
My last question.
Who would play you in a movie?
Oh, I've got I've I've got some requests, I think.
Um, Bob Odenkirk.
Yes. No, that is spot on.
And it was what I was thinking.
That is my favorite actor.
That is perfect.
He's he's one of my fit.
Honestly, yeah, he's a great actor.
He's fantastic.
You know, it's good when Joel thinks of the same person.
Oh, my gosh.
I just like that.
The joy that came up within my heart.
Oh, so good.
No, it totally attracts every every every bit of it.
And Bob Odin Kirk would for his character, Woodward to watch it.
So that would be like it would be spot on.
I think he would. Oh, my gosh. So good.
My final question is
if if given the opportunity
to you like right now you were told you get to take a three day a three day
vacation to any to any spot that you can drive to where you headed oh
interesting it'd be a haul mm-hmm oh no I've been changed my mind okay
Seattle Washington Seattle Washington I've never been there but I think I was
born to live there. I have a I want to go to Seattle.
Fair enough. OK, it is.
Seattle. I think I would love it there. OK.
That's where he said it.
Corey, you've successfully passed our pop quiz.
Way to go, Corey. Yes. Yes.
No one's failed yet, but there's been a few we've wondered about.
Well, hey, again, Corey, thanks for hanging out with us.
Appreciate it so much. Thank you.
Guys, as always, you can head over to dudesanddanspodcast.com
and check out all the show notes.
We'll have great show notes on this one and past episodes as well.
And we'll link to Corey's past episode too.
We will. So make sure you check that out.
Also, dudes and dads.
Let me see. Dudes and dads podcast at gmail.com.
If you want to send us any helpful or unhelpful emails, we'll take either.
We're not picky.
And if you want to be like Jordan and Chris and say hi to us, come find us somewhere.
Yeah, Jordan and Chris, to keep up the good work, spread the good word, appreciate it all.
Hey, guys, thanks for joining us and our next time until until until next time.
And we wish you grace and peace
(upbeat music)
[MUSIC]