Our Origins & History

When prison chaplain, the Reverend Noel Proctor, wrote to the Lord’s Day Observance Society in 1978 asking for a few diaries to distribute among prisoners at Dartmoor, Devon, he little realised that his request would bring about a nation-wide ministry of distributing Scripture text diaries to men and women in prison.

The Lord’s Day Observance Society responded to Noel Proctor’s request by sending 150 diaries to Dartmoor. Just two years later the Society distributed 24,500 diaries to 93 prisons, with half of Britian’s prison population receiving one. By 1995, the number of diaries distributed exceeded 60,000 to 160 prisons and Youth Custody Establishments.

The growth of this outreach to prisoners is a great achievement by any standard, but even more significant is the realisation that hundreds of men and women in prison have found new faith and fresh hope by regular use of the diary. For most prisoners the diary is the only Christian reading matter accepted by them. Many long-term prisoners who would never dream of reading the Bible or a religious book, annually beat a path to the door of the chaplain’s office to make sure they did not miss out when the diaries are distributed. Even after release, a number of ex-prisoners write to the Society asking for a copy of the diary and tell of the immense help and comfort it gave them when in prison.

The small, colourful diary, published by Day One Publications and known as the Day One Dairy, has a Scripture text for every day of the year. The stories retold in this book tell of the amazing way God is blessing and using the diary to bring the light of the Gospel into our prisons. What may seem even more incredible to the reader is the way in which lives have been transformed on no small scale.

Gerard takes up the story in the late 1990s

…Day One’s General Secretary, John Roberts, invited Phillippa and me for lunch … In the general table talk, he told us about the regular invitations coming to Day One to send speakers to prison chaplaincy services and meetings. These were triggered by the sending (then) of around 130,000 free Day One diaries to the chaplaincies each year. … His council had set aside money to appoint someone to set up, head up and develop Day One Prison Ministries. He looked at me and asked, ‘How would it be if you did that?’… 

We set to work to contact the chaplains in the three different prison authorities in England and Wales, in Scotland, and in Northern Ireland (now comprising just over 160 prisons). We asked them to confirm how many diaries they wanted each year, and also to say if they would like us to make a visit to speak at services and meetings. God’s hand was on that. The response was so encouraging that we have never looked back from then… 

 Soon it became obvious that this huge prison ‘pond’ needed more ‘fishers’. Accordingly, we began to invite some gifted public communicators of the gospel and teachers of the Bible to join us as voluntary ‘PMAs’ (Prison Ministry Associates). To support and accompany them we also asked some winsome and wise personal workers to become ‘PMVs’ (Prison Ministry Visitors). … One PMA, Paul Philpott, also on the chaplaincy team at HMP Maidstone, soon became the[ir] coordinator …. 

 After the launch into prisons under Day One Prison Ministries, Paul Philpott, Phillippa and I became more and more convinced that a firmly Bible-based UK mission was needed with a clear doctrinal basis. … Its other goals would be to produce more appropriate literature and courses, and involve keen traditional evangelical churches   going into prison with the gospel and thereby helping prisoners both after as well as before their release. Initially, we asked Day One to consider taking on this development. … Key to our thinking was the desire to pray in sufficient resources …  

 We felt very definitely that not only must the work continue, but it must also grow in scope and depth in its gospel influence. The Day One Council were fully appreciative and encouraging in their understanding of this. However, because of other pressures on and priorities of the total Day One work, they very reasonably and understandably felt that this would be a diversification too far for Day One Christian Ministries at that time. They had many financial commitments, including the ongoing financing of providing and shipping the Day One diaries to the prisons, and were understandably concerned about where the money would come from to finance the anticipated vastly expanding prison work. They also had to concentrate their efforts on the continual core work of Day One Christian Ministries. 

The Day One Council had always been behind the prison work one hundred percent—and still are—and so we were warmly encouraged to form and develop a new independent trust to achieve our goals.