Thursday, 15 September 2016 20:04

God is Moving in the Prison Ministry

God is moving in the prison ministry. This ministry faces strong financial needs. We print and mail out to the inmates in prison our newsletter, The Scribe’s Journal”, every week. $25 – $40 every week was being spent just for the printing.

As the prison ministry is exploding, so are the printing and mailing costs. These costs were hurting the move of God. It has become a major problem of getting the finances to make it happen;

Like Jacob in the Parsha, Vayishlach, you do what you can and allow God to do the rest. Here is the background of what Jacob did. He was coming back to the land of Canaan and knew his brother wanted to kill him.

He did three things to prepare to meet his brother, Esau:
1) He prepared for battle by splitting his people into camps
2) He prayed to God for protection
3) He offered gifts to appease Esau’s anger

Our Problem:

We have an inexpensive color printer, but six different color toners. The cost of these toners are not discounted. It is the black toner that gets the most use and is the highest big-ticket item. I believe that those making the printers sell them inexpensively to make their profits on the toners. The cost of this color printer was less that the cost of two black toners.

Our old printer could print 480 pages with the cost of $34 for the black toner. This is the reason we outsourced it to an outside printer at the cost of .07 cents a page side. When the prison at Coleman, Florida was approved, the cost at once doubled. As I mentioned, it was costing $25 – $40 a week just for the printing. ($110 – $175 per month). We are also looking at the inmates in the prisons of Texas and Alabama. These projects would have to be curtailed.

We were doing everything we could to follow God’s will in this ministry. Now it was God’s turn. How many of you know that when you pray and place it into God’s hands, He will, in your thought process, give you a path?

These costs triggered us into making a decision. We did not have the finances, but God opened the door! On Tuesday, we ordered a new color printer online. This printer can print 9,200 pages with the black toner before running out. GOD IS MOVING – Do the Math!

9,200 pages/480 pages = 19.16 times the old toner must be replaced to match the new printer’s black toner.
19 toner replacements * $34 toner cost = $646; the total cost of the black toner of our old printer compared with $120 being the cost of the new toner. This produced a saving of $527.
The cost of the new color printer was $500, making the new color printer FREE with FREE shipping – OR WAS IT?

GOD IS STILL MOVING! Because of the “Black Friday deals, the color printer’s cost became $244, saving $256. To this price, add the $27 added saving of the black toner ($527-$500). Now add the cost of the outsourced printing at .07 cents a page side ($110 – $175 per month).

The Outcome:

Because of the savings, we will own a new color printer at no cost. Plus the added savings of $393 – $458 the first month. Now add $110 – $175 (the outsourced printing) every month afterwards – God is Moving!