On Saturday, I had a show at one of my favorite churches in the state of Maine.  It happens to be the chapel in the youth detention facility in South Portland, and for the first time, our oldest daughter, Jo, was able to come with us.  While all of our girls have visited similar facilities in New Hampshire and Vermont, the one in Maine has stricter laws about minors coming into the center.  Jo, now 20, was cleared to join me this time.

There was a huge turn out for chapel, and we were warned ahead of time that the teens were wound up with it being their Christmas vacation week.  The warning was legit, but they became an attentive audience quickly into the first routine.  They may be troubled kids; they may have, in some cases, done terrible things; but they are still - first and foremost-  kids.  As usual, the rabbit production and swelling head illusion were huge hits, but Jo's performance of a mouth coil really brought down the house.  This is an audience that always appreciates people from the 'outside' who come in to spend time with them, but they seemed all the more blessed that someone of their own generation took the time to come that day.

We closed the show with the shackles escape, talking about Paul's discourse in Romans on "Wretched man that I am, who can set me free."  The teens seemed attentive, especially when I spoke about Paul's 'wanting to do what's right, but still doing what's wrong."  It's not hard for most teens to relate to that.  Several teens, especially some of the girls, chose to pray with us afterwards to receive the grace and forgiveness Paul spoke of in these passages.

As we were packing up, a few of the boys were hanging around waiting to be dismissed.  Of course, they tried to juggle, and a few mentioned having seen my show their in the past.  One young man also told me he had seen me perform before, but not at Long Creek.  He had seen me with LOL at his Christian school's chapel service.  We didn't really get to talk much, although he also mentioned having gone to a Christian camp with one of my students.  My first thought was, "How did he end up in here?"  But quickly,  I adjusted that to, "Christian schools aren't immune to troubled kids, and we need to stop pretending we can - or even should - insulate our students from challenges that all teens are susceptible to.