"Anyone who has ever lived in poverty knows beyond a shadow of a doubt just how bad the curse of poverty really is."
—William Bumphus II, D.D.
William Bumphus has been arrested 23 times, has been sentenced to three
prison terms and many jail terms in Indiana. Today, he has a Doctorate in Divinity, has traveled to more than 550 prisons around the world, and founded Jesus House, a place where reentrants from prison can live, find wholeness, and step into the world on a foundation of faith here in Indianapolis.
As a child, William lived in the inner city on 12th Street Alley on the west side of Indianapolis. Born in ’46 to a couple of 16-year-old kids, his father was absent, and mom moved in with her mother. Both grandma and mom were "drinkers," which often left William and his younger siblings alone and without food or money. Says William, “A typical memory includes waking up in the morning, Mama gone, no food in the house and my brothers and sisters crying for something to eat.”
Food was always a problem, and winters were cold. The children often went to bed without dinner in a house so cold they would shiver themselves to sleep. Out of desperation he began to search the neighborhood for food. He’d pilfer from a garden, or find food that someone had left out, but eventually he was driven to steal from a grocery store so that his insides would stop burning in hunger.
One winter was so cold, the family had nothing left to burn in the little stove that warmed their house. Some men had dumped a number of used car batteries nearby and William’s mother got some to burn in her stove. The next day the family was rushed to the hospital with lead poisoning, and the two younger children died. With no insurance, the state buried the children, and William ached with the shame of their poverty.
He was 12 when he met is father, who pulled up in a shiny car with three women on board. His father was a “player” who made a living by “gambling, pimping, and stealing.” And William wanted to be just like him. He was tired of being poor. By the age of 17 William was in prison, at the old Indiana State Farm, now the Putnamville Correctional Facility. There, he was radicalized, became a Black Muslim, changed his name to Hashaii Abdul Hakim, and gained a heroine addiction that lasted 10 years, long after his release.
So, what happened to change a drug-addled felon into the man William Bumphus II is today? It started with an other conviction. This time he was sentenced to the Marion County Jail. On one Sunday morning there, he was awakened by “a short, older white man,” talking about Jesus and wanting to pray with the inmates. William reasoned, “What can it hurt? And I heard myself praying, “Jesus, if you are real, put me in a good cell block.”
He did. William was sent to the maximum security cell block where it happened that five prisoners were steadfast Jesus followers. There they were, holding hands, in a circle, praying together. Soon there was no more Hashaii Abdul Hakim. William joined the group, became a believer, and later prayed that earlier prayer again, omitting the “if you are real” part. This time, when he prayed, William says, “I broke down and began to weep. He had saved me. For the first time in my life, I felt clean inside.”
Miracles began to happen: A 60 year sentence somehow became a four year sentence, which became an early probation. He says, “As I meditated on my bunk in my cell one morning before release, Jesus literally appeared to me and said 'William, I want you to build me a prison ministry.'”
And he did,
Nancy
From You Can Be Set Free! A Message of Deliverance, By William Bumphus II
