Silver Spring Members Find Purpose in Prison Outreach

Gregory Glaude, Prison Ministries director at the Silver Spring (Md.) church, says he should be dead. “The fact is, I know God did not spare my life all these times for nothing,” he says. “God doesn’t do anything by accident.”

Story by Tiffany Doss, Potomac Conference

While crossing the street at age 24, Glaude and two friends were hit by a car traveling 65 mph. One was killed and the other severely injured. Glaude, however, was thrown 50 feet, unharmed. Later at age 35, he was held at gunpoint, and at 47 was diagnosed with cancer.

“The fact is, I know God did not spare my life all these times for nothing,” he says. “God doesn’t do anything by accident.”

In 2011 Glaude accepted an invitation from J.J. Moses, pastor of Chesapeake Conference’s Calvary Southern Asian church in Burtonsville, Md., to give a sermon at the North Branch Correctional Institution in Cumberland, Md. “All the drugs and alcohol I did never gave me a high like that,” he recalls. “The prisoners were alive and vibrant!”

Since then he has become part of this ministry and witnessed the baptisms of 20 prisoners and seen four join the church through profession of faith. Glaude and his friends Paul Bright and Josephina Navedo, who often help in the ministry, say God is blessing them through this experience.

Through the ministry, the Silver Spring church provides Sabbath School quarterlies to more than 40 inmates and conducts studies during monthly prison visits. This ministry is growing, as are the number of believers at North Branch. “I believe this ministry is one reason God kept me alive,” Glaude says.

Feature photo: Gregory Glaude, Josephina Navedo and Paul Bright, members of the Silver Spring church, regularly witness to men incarnated at North Branch Correctional Institution.