The ten days in isolation impacted me deeply. Even though it was challenging on many levels, it was also a time when God did many things in my life. We humans are created to have fellowship with others. We are created to touch other people. And it's simply weird to go ten days without fellowship with people, touching anyone, or speaking with anyone. But it was a beautiful time in the end because I was alone with God there and spent a lot of time with Him, and I was in His Word all day long. 

            After ten days, they moved me to pod B8. It was the next-door pod filled with four-man cells, each with two bunk beds fastened to the wall. I walked in, and twenty-five people were staring at me—the new guy. It was frightening. Most of them were in red suits, and only a few were in orange, as was I after the color of my suit had been changed from red to orange. Most people here, if not everyone except me, had come from prisons where they had served time. Some had even been in prison twenty to twenty-five years for murder before they were sent here, waiting to get deported. Some were forever changed by the length of time in prison; in a way in which they had become crazy being in an environment like that for so many years.  

            “What is happening here? How do I survive this?” I wondered, gazing back at the other men. 

            I took my things into my cell and then went to call Lene to let her know they moved me out of isolation. I went to the pod phones, but other inmates were on the phones, so I stood waiting for one of them to be free. I waited and waited and waited.            

             Finally, the guy on one of the phones was finished. I took the phone and started to dial Lene's number, and war broke loose in the pod. I had no idea what was happening. 

            People were yelling and shouting about me using the phone in the pod. I was in shock.  

            Some shouted, “What did he do?” 

            “You cannot call here!” others yelled.  

            “It's not your turn!” shouted someone else.  

            Another guy came up and said: “Relax, Relax! He's new. He doesn't know it.” 

 Two groups—one Black and one Hispanic—started arguing: “This is a Black phone! He cannot use our phone! You can have him on your phone.” 

            In the pod, there were two phones. There was a whole order and system in which people signed up to use the phones. One phone was for the Black people, and the other phone was for Hispanic people. 

            But as one phone has a long cable and the other has a short cable, they change the phone daily to avoid problems. So, one day, the phone with the short line was the Black phone, and the next day, the Black people had the long cable phone. 

            Standing there with the phone in my hand, and people shouting and yelling, I thought a fight was going to break out, I just wanted to go back to isolation again. “God, please, I beg you, take me back into isolation; I really don't want to be here,” I prayed in my mind. 

            In this pod, there were two other white men. They came to me later and helped me sort out the rules.  

            One was an older gentleman in his late sixties with gray hair and a big beard. He had been in prison for five years for robbing a bank, and now he was waiting to be deported to England, his home country. He was genuinely nice. However, one of the first things he said was, “Sorry to say it, but you stink.” 

            That was his greeting: “You stink.” 

            The other white guy, a young man, also from England, covered in tattoos from head to toe, came to me, gave me some soap, and said, “Here, you can get my soap. “You are really stinking so here is some soap.”  

            I tried to explain, “But I've been taking a shower daily. It's not like I don't take a shower.” 

            And then they said, “But you stink terribly; it's your clothes.” 

            And then I remembered: it was so cold in isolation because the air conditioner ran all the time that I slept in my orange suit because the blanket we had could not keep me warm by itself. And there I'd been walking around in that for many days, not noticing that I was stinking. Yes, I could not smell it myself. 

            To be in B8 was like another world from being in isolation. I was now in a four-man cell with three other people, and only one of them spoke a little English. They had to explain how the toilet system worked: “If you do ‘#1’ at night, you don't flush, but if you do a ‘#2,’ you flush.” They also told me about the rules regarding the shower as we now had four people using one toilet and shower. This made me miss isolation even more: at least I could go to the toilet there without people around me.

That night, when I went to bed, I was crying inside; yes, most people cry in here, if not outside, then inside when they first arrive at a place like this. I so wanted to get away from this place. 

            The day after was better because I discovered I could make a video call via two computers here and use them to call Lene. Yes, we had to pay for it, and I found most men didn't use it because of the cost. This gave me the freedom to call Lene whenever I wanted, without being in line for the telephone and being involved in violent discussions all the time. It was a hidden blessing for me.  

            I also learned to operate the kiosk. There was a computer on the wall where you could set up an account to buy food and candy, soap, and other things you needed.  

            You could buy a security toothbrush. It was a four-centimeter (1.6 inches) toothbrush, but it was still better than the one we got here, which you put on your finger. It was not easy to use. 

            You could also buy clothes. I bought blue shorts. I'm wearing them right now. So, I don’t wear the orange suit anymore; only when I must leave my pod. If we go to the doctor or other places, we need to have the suit on and be handcuffed. 

            After several days in the new pod, an event like discovering fresh water in the desert happened. A man came to me and invited me to a cell. When I walked into the cell, seven other men were there, Bibles in hand.  

            “Woah! What is that?” I thought. 

            The man leading the meeting was Rico. He spoke okay English. He had been in jail for five years and was now waiting to be deported back to Mexico. He had been there in that pod waiting for over a year and had been there the longest. While in jail, he had met God, genuinely repented, and now led a Bible study in B8, teaching what he had learned.  

            And right there, he became my Apollos. 

            In Acts 18 we read about a Jew named Apollos who taught others the way of the Lord. He only knew about the baptism of John, but he spoke with boldness. When Aquila and Priscilla heard about him, they invited him to their home and explained the way of the Lord to him in a clearer way. 

“Meanwhile, a Jew named Apollos, a native of Alexandria, came to Ephesus. He was a learned man with a thorough knowledge of the Scriptures. He had been instructed in the way of the Lord, and he spoke with great fervor and taught about Jesus accurately, though he knew only the baptism of John. He began to speak boldly in the synagogue.

When Priscilla and Aquila heard him, they invited him to their home and explained to him the way of God more adequately.” (Acts 18:24-26 NIV) 

                That happened here, in B8 of the detention center. Rico had heard of the Lord's way and experienced true repentance, but he had never gotten baptized in water and with the Holy Spirit. 

             Over the following days, I spent quite a bit of time teaching Rico the way of the Lord, and he asked many good questions. He was hungry for the truth, and it was beautiful. 

            Five days later, he got baptized. On this special day, I baptized him in my cell. It was with a cup of water over his head; that was the only thing we had. I would never do it like this outside the prison because baptism means to immerse. But in a place like this, where I did not know how long he would still be here and where there was no option of immersing him in water, I knew God would bless what we had to do. And He did. It became a powerful evening. 

            Looking back, it is special to think that this was just a small taste of what was waiting for me later, as I saw men baptized and set free in powerful ways. But Rico was the first I baptized like that in jail and he will always stand out as someone special. 

            The day after, he asked if I could pray for one of his family members over the phone who had a lot of back pain. I prayed for the person over the phone and God healed her. It was very special for Rico to see. The next day, we had another meeting in the cell. Here, Rico shared with all the others what God had done in his life the last few days, how he got baptized and filled with the Holy Spirit, and how God had healed one of his family members over the phone, and it was all so beautiful. 

            I then took some time to pray for people, and we saw strong deliverances. A young man from Jamaica, whom I later became good friends with, got delivered that evening. He fell down between the toilet and the wall, almost laying over the toilet, and there he got delivered from some unclean spirit. 

            I have seen this many times, but it is one thing to see this happen in churches or homes, and it’s just so different to experience this in a jail, with people wearing orange and red jumpsuits. At that moment, I felt like Paul or Peter: teaching the Word of God, praying for people, and seeing God move in the prison. 

            The day after, I shared communion with Rico/Apollos. We sat in our orange suits on the jail floor, worshipping Christ and taking part in His Body and Blood. You don't know what you have before it's taken away. It was the most beautiful communion I ever had, up to that moment, because I understood the importance of the fellowship of brothers. I hadn't seen any brother or sister in Christ since I was detained; I'd been alone. But now I had a disciple; I had a brother in Christ I could sit down with and share communion with; it gave me a new understanding of communion. I now understood howthe early church was a church that was persecuted and how they looked at communion much differently than we do.  

            As beautiful as this moment was, a few days later, after more than one year in jail, Rico/Apollos was suddenly deported. To our surprise, he was gone. The meetings stopped because I didn't speak Spanish, and they didn't speak English, and there I was alone again, and I really missed Rico/Apollos. 

            As I said, you don't know what you have until it is taken away. Here, I finally had fellowship with a brother in the Lord, and then suddenly it was taken away from me, and I was all alone again, and it was hard. But I so appreciated the days I got with him. It was like fresh water in the desert and gave me so much. But now I am alone again, and I still don’t know why I am here. I still expect to be released any day because this is all a misunderstanding. I did not smuggle weapons. I have not done anything criminal; I should get out soon. 

             But as you can understand, I still don't know when I will get out. Lene found a lawyer to represent me. Otherwise, there is no more information about why I’m here and what is happening. 

            Because of the new lawyer, I finally met an ICE (U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement) officer after being here for two to three weeks. It was a very shocking meeting.  

             The ICE officer came to my pod and gave me the papers. 

            “Here are your papers; this is about your court hearing that will be set in August, but it will be changed later,” he said.  

            “No, no, I need to be out before August,” I said, shocked at the news. “You know we have a lawyer, and I hope to come out on a bond.” 

            The ICE officer looked at me and said, “No bond for you. You are going to be here many months, and then you're going to be deported. Get used to it.”   

            Those words hit me so hard. “What is happening here? I cannot be here for many months. I cannot be deported. What is happening?”   

            Nothing made sense to me.  

            A few days later, I had another meeting with an officer again, and everything became even more unreal and crazy.  

            Another ICE officer gave me a piece of paper.  

            I looked at it and said, “What is this?” 

And he looked at it and said, "Oh, this is because they've done a review that you will continue being here. You are not leaving.”   

            I said, “What? Because of what?”   

            He looked at the paper and said, “Oh, because you have a chronic care condition,” and he looked again; “you are obese.”    

            He looked at me, eyeing me up and down like he was surprised.  

            “You are not obese,” he said, giving me the paper and leaving. 

            The paper was a Notice of Custody Determination. It said that it had been determined that I should be kept in custody. It said I had a “chronic care condition” medical professionals had confirmed, and that condition was obesity, and therefore I should remain in custody because my condition places me within populations identified by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control as potentially at higher risk for serious illness from COVID-19. Like it was not a higher risk of becoming sick in a place like this with no fresh air or windows. Yes, it sounds crazy 

            When I read it, I was like “What? I'm not obese, and no professional has ever checked me. It’s all lies.”

            Nothing made sense. This is so crazy; no one will ever look at me and think I am obese. And I have not been checked by any professional. It was both funny and scary at the same time. What is happening here? There is no one I can trust.

            The paper also said that I had overstayed my visa, but I had not overstayed my visa. I did not stay longer than the ninety days I was allowed by my U.S. Department of Homeland Security ESTA (Electronic System for Travel Authorization) application when I came into the country. It was a lie, as I sent in my asylum papers before the ninety days were over and got a response saying I could stay in the United States as my case was being considered. 

            It was all lies and at the end on the document it said: “Based on this review a decision has been made to maintain custody.” 

            It is difficult to put into words all the emotions that were going through me.

But here I was, and it did not look like I was going home. I often just spend hours in my cell, sitting on my bunk bed on a very thin mattress, studying the Bible, reading, spending most of the time alone.           

            To give you an example of how much I was sitting, here is a little funny story. One night, I went to bed. Suddenly I felt something on my butt and thought, “Oh no, I've got a rash. Oh no, I'm sick.”

On my butt, I had very weird skin I never had before, like tough skin.  

            So, I thought, “Oh no, I'm getting sick; what is happening?”  

            Then I checked the other side of my butt, and it was the same.  

            “Ah, it's not a rash. It's hard skin from sitting on my bed, studying the Bible.”  

            Yes, I spent hours and hours just sitting on my bed, reading and reading and reading, and I got hard skin on my butt, something I have never had before. 

            I cried a lot after those ICE officers had been here. I didn’t understand what was going on. But today, when I look back, I am so thankful He did not take me out then. I know today why. I know today that if I had come out at that time, I would have come out as a mess. I would have come out full of fear. I would have come out not ready and strong but broken and weak. And I would have come out where I would not be a blessing for the Body of Christ at all.  

            I would be the opposite. I would have said, “Be careful everyone, don't go there, keep away, stop doing what you're doing, don't take any chances, this is the worst thing that could ever happen to you.”   

            This was why God did not take me out: there was a lot that I still needed to learn, and therefore, he kept me in here. There was freedom I needed in here before I could come out. 

            Philippians 4:13 (NIV) says, “I can do all things through Him (Jesus Christ) who gives me strength.” Many people take this verse out of context and think, “Hey, I can be the best football player in the world, and I can be the best singer in the world; I can do everything if Jesus Christ strengthens me.” 

            But if you read what Paul is saying in context, in the verse before that, he says, “I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want” (Philippians 4:12 NIV). 

            And then comes, “I can do all things through Him (Jesus Christ) who gives me strength.” 

            Paul is saying that even if we go through tough times, even if we have nothing, even if it is challenging, we can do it because Jesus Christ gives us the strength to get through it. 

            This was what I needed to learn. And many people out there need to learn this, too. 

            I needed to learn this and so many other things were still waiting to be revealed and experienced. So, I am thankful I did not come out then and it shows God knew what He was doing. He still does.