Mathilda, the prisoners’ friend - All The Good Seed Daily Devotionals for 2026

Is not my word like a fire? says the LORD, and like a hammer that breaks the rock in pieces?
Jeremiah 23:29

Mathilda, the prisoners' friend
Here are some testimonies of Mathilda's visits in the prisons:

Arksa: a violent murderer who claimed to be the worst bandit in Finland and was astonished that that frail girl entered his cell fearlessly; she sat down next to him and spoke about his village. He was disarmed by her simple affection, accepted the New Testament she offered him and promised to read it. The warders witnessed a radical change in his behaviour some time later.

Honka: sentenced to life imprisonment, he confessed to committing nothing but wickedness in his life. Mathilda thought of Jesus' meeting with a woman who also confessed her sad past (John 4). So, like her Master, she asked the inmate for a drink. Seeing her place her lips on his dirty mug moved that man. "She was not ashamed of my condition."

Matti: sneering when she opened her Bible, he defied her to find anything on the first page that concerned him. So she read: "The earth was waste and empty - that's your heart, Matti - and God said, Let there be light!" Light gradually penetrated Matti's soul.

God never forsook His ambassador in the presence of the prisoners and always gave her the word appropriate to the situation. All her life her motto remained: "Grace and peace" - the divine grace and peace that caused her happiness and that she insisted on sharing.

(concluded)

Today's reading: Judges 13:1-10 · 2 Corinthians 11:22-33