There is a particular kind of singing that happens when people who have very little left to hold onto decide to hold onto God anyway. On the morning of Sunday, 23rd August, inside the chapel of Kuje Medium Security Custodial Centre, that was the sound that greeted a delegation of Young Professionals Forum members who had travelled in from every region across the FCT.
By the time the service ended, 56 men had walked to the front of that chapel to give their lives to Christ. Getting to that moment took a month of coordinated planning across all ten YPF regions, one reconnaissance visit that uncovered far more need than anyone expected, and a level of unity that turned a single Sunday into something much bigger than any one visit to any one facility.
A State-Wide Call to Kuje
This outreach was conceived and coordinated as a state-wide YPF program from the outset, under the direction of the State President and the state Evangelism team. The call went out to all ten FCT regions — Nyanya, Airport, Bwari, Kubwa, Gwagwalada, Lugbe, Abuja, Orozo, Kwali, and Kuje — inviting every region to take ownership of some part of the outreach, whether through giving, prayer, or presence on the day itself.
That shared ownership shaped everything that followed.
What a Reconnaissance Visit Uncovered
Before any outreach could happen, permission had to be sought. A formal letter went to the Officer-in-Charge of Kuje Medium Security Custodial Centre on 31st July, and remarkably, it was acknowledged that same day — the facility's Head Chaplain personally carried it in for endorsement.
That first meeting turned into something much bigger than a permission slip. The Chaplain walked the evangelism team through the facility's clinic, where they met inmates facing real, urgent need: one man waiting on a prescription he had no way to pay for, another confronting a serious health scare with no means to access treatment. In conversation, the Chaplain also mentioned a young man studying Political Science through the National Open University, who had saved everything he could toward his final-year project — and was still fifty thousand naira short of finishing it. Others, the team learned, had already served their time but remained locked up simply because they couldn't raise the fines required for release.
None of that was in the original plan. All of it became the plan.
Getting Ten Regions Ready
What followed was a month of coordinated preparation across every region: a donation tracker went live so members across the FCT could pledge food, toiletries, and cash toward specific needs; countdown flyers went out daily; and a prayer chain ran on two tracks right up to outreach day — a general prayer call every Friday, and a rotating regional schedule that gave every region, in pairs, a turn to intercede.
When donations moved slower than hoped in early August, state leadership stepped in, itemized the full financial need, and gave each region a clear, specific target. It worked. By the evening of the outreach, well over a million naira had been raised — funding not just food and supplies, but the very specific needs uncovered on that first visit.
The Day Itself
Delegates converged at the facility's Visitors' Parking Lot on the morning of the 23rd, were briefed on the strict no-devices policy, and passed through thorough security checks before being led into the chapel. Kuje's own resident inmate choir opened the service in worship — the kind of praise and worship, one attendee said, that could only come from people who have decided joy is still theirs to choose.
An inmate stood and testified to God's goodness, even inside those walls. YPF's State President addressed the congregation, and a message on spiritual freedom, delivered by one of YPF's crusade ministers, ended in an altar call — and 56 men stepped forward.
After the service, a legal team from YPF's Mentorship Secretariat stayed behind to offer pro bono legal counsel to inmates with pending cases. Donated food, toiletries, Bibles, and Christian literature were distributed. And quietly, without fanfare, the outstanding fifty thousand naira for that final-year project was paid in full, and fines were settled for inmates who had already done their time.
The visit closed with a courtesy call on the Officer-in-Charge, and a short word from the Chaplain, who thanked God for a church that had not forgotten the believers behind those walls.
What We're Carrying Forward
Fifty-six new believers. A degree that will now be finished. Medical needs met. Fines paid. A chaplain in tears of gratitude. None of it would have happened without ten regions choosing to move as one.
If this stirs something in you — to pray, to give toward the next outreach, or to simply ask how you can be part of it — reach out to the YPF Evangelism team. There is more work like this ahead, and more walls that hope hasn't reached yet.
My transgression is sealed up in a bag, and thou sewest up mine iniquity. — Job 14:17