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 When the guard clanged shut the heavy steel door, the hair on the back of Irvin Judd’s neck stood up. Now he, too, was locked in.
The year was 1976, and Judd (he goes by his last name) entered the Oklahoma State Prison to visit a man he had never met before. On an airplane flight to California a few months prior, a man named Bud Holt had implored Judd to visit his despondent brother. So here he was, in a fortress of iron bars and cold concrete.
This was Judd’s first time in a prison, and he didn’t know what to expect. From working oil rigs in Iran to being a pastor of an inner-city church in Pennsylvania, Judd (pictured above), now 71, has lived a diverse life. He has served in prison ministry for 28 years now—devoting himself full time to this effort for the past 11. Five years ago he and his wife joined Campus Crusade for Christ, and the couple still introduces prisoners to Jesus today.
But it was Don Holt who got Judd started in prison outreach. Don was the brother of the man on the plane, and at their first meeting, Don was 10 months into a 500-year sentence for various drug and robbery charges. When Judd met with him, Don was receptive; anyone who would keep his word to his brother was worth listening to. Judd explained how he could turn his life around: by becoming a follower of Jesus Christ. Steadily, after several visits, that’s exactly what happened.
Soon Don was talking about Jesus with his fellow inmates and prison guards, inviting them to surrender their lives to the Savior. Eventually Don was released from prison and later pardoned by the governor. After graduating from Wheaton College, Don joined the Campus Crusade prison ministry, becoming to other prisoners what Judd had once been for him. Before Don died in 1999 from cancer, he coaxed Judd into working with the prisons full time with Campus Crusade.
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Judd’s compassion for the common man may stem from enduring some of his own hardships. His first wife died 16 years ago from a brain tumor, and he has lost two children—a 17-year-old son in a car accident and a 5-year-old daughter to cancer.
Prison ministry isn’t glamorous; often it’s downright tough. “You see a lot of men and women come to the Lord and then drop out,” says Ron Dooley, director of the Campus Crusade prison ministry.
Experiences like that have prompted Judd to consider leaving prison work, but every time he thinks of leaving, his thoughts drift back to the words of Jesus in Matthew 25:40: “I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.”
To honor Don Holt on the one-year anniversary of his death, Judd took some Bibles and gospel tracts to a local house frequented by drug addicts to perform what he coins a “God bust.” His wife told him he was crazy—perhaps rightfully so.
Soon after he pulled his car up to the house, four young men approached his car. “What can we do for you?” a tattooed Latino asked him coolly. “I’m here to pay tribute to a guy named Don Holt,” Judd told them. “Don Holt? He visited me in Lexington [a prison in Oklahoma] a few years ago!” exclaimed one of the men. Judd explained how Don had turned his life over to Jesus and that they could too. Soon Judd had the men, along with the rest of their crew, circled in the front yard for prayer.
The men reminded Judd of the inmates he regularly deals with. And Judd sees himself in all of them, which is probably why he has been so effective. “I don’t care how rotten or lowdown they are,” says Judd. “We’re all in the same boat.”
- To find out contact someone about the Prison Ministry of Here's Life Inner City, please click here.
- To find out about Beyond Bars, a manual for discipling inmates, ex-offenders, and families of prisoners, please click here.
- To find out how to give to the Prison Ministry, please click here
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