Stranger in a Strange Land

(By Steve Rempe & Prison Fellowship/edited with comments by Steve the son of John)

Imagine being transported 50 years into the future—things that were once commonplace have disappeared, or have become quaint relics of an earlier time. In their place are new items and technologies that you don’t understand and can’t use. The food people eat and the clothes they wear are different than you remember, and at a much higher cost than before. Even the way people interact with one another has changed.

Otis Johnson doesn’t have to imagine such a scenario—it’s his reality.

Convicted of the attempted murder of a police officer, Johnson was sent to prison at the age of 25. Now, at the age of 69, he has returned to a world quite different than the one he left 44 years ago.

“My reentry was a little bit hard at first,” Johnson says, “because things had changed. I got off at Time Square, and I was looking at the atmosphere. … I’ve seen that everybody, or the majority of the people were talking to himself or herself. Then I looked closer and they seemed to have things in their ears. I don’t know with those things—with the phone thing? IPhones, they call them, or something like that?”

While Johnson says he is happy to be out of prison (“It’s nice to be free,” he asserts), there is still a lingering sadness of relationships lost during his time behind bars. “[I] think in 1998 or something like that, I lost contact with my family,” Johnson laments. “Coming out of prison, I was mainly alone. … I had no family—no girlfriend, no sisters, no brothers. [I had] no people that I could communicate [with] that I had years ago. Bothers me a lot because … I really miss my family, you know?”

Even a trip to the grocery store is a new experience. “I eat different things now. … The funny dinners, different colored drinks. What do you call it? The ‘gator’ stuff? Pink, blue, all these different colors, so I started drinking that once in a while—just because it looks funny.”

When reflecting on the time he spent in Prison, Johnson says he tries not to dwell on his lost opportunities. “I don’t feel that society owes me anything. Everything happens for a reason, so I let that go, and deal with the future, instead of dealing with the past. I try not to go backward. I try to go forward. That’s how I survive in society.”

It is easy to forget that even things many of us take for granted can become hurdles for those who have been removed from society for even an intermediate period of time. The wealth of options for things like food, the ever-expanding technology, and cultural shifts can prove intimidating to someone who is experiencing them for the first time. In a real sense, these men and women are strangers in a strange land, learning to adapt and seeking help to navigate their way through a strange world.

Jesus said, “Whatever you do this to the least of these, you do it unto me.” If we forget others, Jesus said, He will say, “I never knew you.” In all the Christmas rush and demands on our lives—let us not forget those who Jesus said not too forget!

(Prison Fellowship seeks to help former prisoners succeed once their incarceration ends. Through in-prison training and mentoring programs once these men and women leave prison, Prison Fellowship provides hope that life on the other side of the bars doesn’t result in a different form of captivity that prevents them from becoming productive citizens.)

Dr. Steven J. Wentland www.wwjwmtd.com

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