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Paper Sunshine -- Part 2

LONNIE: Our guest today, decided that a shank is what he needed, but what prisoners really need is Jesus! Stay tuned to see how you can bring the savior to San Quentin.

CONNIE: Hello everyone! This is Connie Jeffery, welcome to our program today! We’re continuing our conversation with Don and Yvonne McClure of the Someone Cares Prison Ministry, what a great work they do! Today, Lonnie will be talking with Don about his own experience as a prisoner. Getting thrown into the hole for attempted murder and well…We’ll just have to listen to the rest of the story!

LONNIE: We want to welcome back Don and Yvonne McClure! So glad to have you back! Yvonne, you are known behind prison walls as double trouble, how so?

YVONNE: That’s right, I am! When we first started working at Soledad Prison, Don didn’t want to go ask for the warden’s signature on one of the programs that we wanted to do, the Chaplin didn’t want to go so they sent me! I got to know the secretary real well and the warden finally said, I have an open door policy for you Yvonne! At first he would read what he was signing, but our friendship grew and he would say, okay, double trouble, what is it this time? I would say to him, you know, God wants this done and he would sign it.

LONNIE: Now Don, we left off yesterday, and we were just digging a little bit into your past, starting as a young child, you really had no love, and you bailed out into juvenile hall at that point, right?

DON: The judge who sentenced me told me that I had no hope and I didn’t give a hoot! Who cared! I had nothing going for me. So I took and I took whatever was somebody else’s because I had nothing of my own. I never knew God, I was an Atheist, I had seen too much hurt and frankly later on when I got in the church I saw hurt that I don’t understand, but God taught me how to deal with it.

LONNIE: So you’re up in New York City, where you can’t survive unless you’ve got a gang. You were into zip guns and shanks and you found yourself in prison. Where did life go from there?

DON: The first day I got in prison I got a shank and then I found out who the boss con was and I went and stabbed him with a shank and I got thrown in the hole, but I was use to the hole too. I spent some time in the hole and got out and I had gotten what I wanted when you’re tough enough and that’s respect.

LONNIE: Did you become the boss con?

DON: Yes.

LONNIE: You said yesterday, Yvonne, that just because you were the sweet, peachy pastors kid that that’s not always a good thing, right?

YVONNE: No it isn’t! I was very naïve, and I didn’t know what was going on around me. I had only grown up in the church…

LONNIE: You can be in the church, but you can be lost in the mix. You can be in prison and…

YVONNE: Well, I didn’t know anything really…I would just go to the church and play for prayer meeting and play for church and go to church school.

DON: She liked my clothes and the big Lincoln Continental.

YVONNE: I was fascinated by his fancy crocodile shoes and all of that…

LONNIE: You were so naïve that you didn’t even realize what a credit card was.

YVONNE: To my knowledge, when I was small, my parents never had one.

LONNIE: So when you finally got one, how did you treat it?

YVONNE: When I got a hold of Don’s credit cards…Well, he always said, here take my credit cards and go have some fun! So, I did! I loaned them to my girlfriends when they went out and I used them all the time.

LONNIE: So, a person that might not be behind bars could still be just as messed up and troubled, because without Jesus it’s a dead end street there too, isn’t it?
YVONNE: It is. It’s a dangerous dead end street.

LONNIE: So, Don we’re going to flash back to your experience again. Talk to us a little bit more about the Don McClure before he met Jesus and so on.

DON: The Devil got me to a point where…I mean; at one time in my life…To say that crime isn’t profitable is crazy! I’ve had plans, boats, jet-set property…I’ve been known to take people from Los Angeles to France for breakfast!

LONNIE: So Satan is not stupid! He may take some people down into the gutter, but he may take others to the heights of prosperity and really nail them there.

DON: In my case I had both sides. I had the street side, which is bad!

LONNIE: So you got into prison, but you got out again…Did you go back to the same old way of life?

DON: I got into laundering money and a friend of mine and I in organized crime when over to Yvonne’s apartment, and we were talking about different sources of laundering money and Yvonne comes out of the kitchen and says, hey guys, I just got a washer machine! She said I’ll take care of your money!

YVONNE: I did! I was trying to help and I was excited…

DON: She had no idea what we were doing.

LONNIE: But she was participating in your lifestyle and supporting you.

DON: Yes! But let me tell you, one of the nice things about the Lord is that He’s there always. Satan is pushing always, but there’s a point in life…I had a drug problem, I was an alcoholic and I was going down fast. I lost the boats; I lost the plane, the cars, the money and almost lost Yvonne. It was, during this time that Yvonne’s goodness came through and she remembered the security that she had when she was with Jesus.

LONNIE: And soon you had one of the most transforming experiences in your life!

DON: She knew that if I was going to change, that she would lose me.

LONNIE: Just a quick word before we close today about your current ministry. You go into many prisons across North America with your ministry with Paper Sunshine, but right now tell us a little bit about Someone Cares and people can get in touch with you.

DON: Someone Cares….Our webpage is www.somonecares.org. This ministry reaches out to every single prison in the United States! We are also now in 17 prisons in foreign country’s, in places I don’t even know! Someone Cares is a ministry about tomorrow, and it’s not just for convicts. You guys and gals in the joint, you get in touch with us! We’re going to lead you to this a man named Jesus, someone who will change your life.

LONNIE: So again, what is Someone Cares all about?

DON: We have programs where people can get involved from the safety of their own homes. We can take them into prison to help us help you, but to help the Lord help an inmate!

LONNIE: Thanks again for joining us today, right here, live in the studio at the Voice of Prophecy headquarters.

CONNIE: That’s truly amazing! Imagine that from these peoples living room that they are reaching out to every prison in America and then some. I invite you to get involved as well!

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