Pastor's travels lead him to prison ministry

The Rev. Barry Kolb of Lord of Life Lutheran Church in LaFox was on a plane recently when a stranger asked him what he did for a living.

"I said, 'What day of the week is this?' " Kolb recalled, reflecting on his career.

"I told him that on certain days I was a church consultant, at other times I'm traveling to India as a missionary, I have a prison ministry, and you will also find me doing color commentary on high school football and basketball for TV 17, a local cable station.

"I did tell him finally that I was a pastor," he said. "But in a roundabout way, I'm not very pastoral. People usually think of a person in a robe or a collar who holds the hand of little old ladies and goes to the hospital to visit the sick. I've fallen more into leadership roles and pushed out into other areas. Wherever God calls me to be."

A diverse career

God has called him to be in some unusual places. Maybe it's the diversity of his background and career that makes Kolb multi-dimensional, a man of varied passions and interests.

Kolb and his wife, Nancy, who also takes a leadership role through women's Bible study and other ministries, have been at Lord of Life Church for 12 years.

He has taught church growth principles in Russia, Kazakhstan, India, South Africa, Nigeria, Brazil and other countries.

Kolb's love of sports has roots in the years in which he taught in Lutheran schools and coached high school basketball and football. (He even coached women's basketball at a Catholic college to help make ends meet while he was in the seminary.)

The energy he has for his prison ministry is fueled by his love of teaching, and rooted in the painful experiences of his own childhood.

For the last four years, Kolb has traveled to the Louisiana State Penitentiary in Angola four or five times a year to lead classes for inmates who are studying to be ministers.

There is a cosmic connection. Prison robbed him of his father when he was a child.

"My father was in and out of prison," Kolb said. "One of the charges was armed robbery; there were other things.

"I was raised by my grand- parents in a small town and it was embarrassing. I bore a lot of animosity toward him, but I didn't really know him. When he died, his was the first funeral I did as a pastor, and my attitude changed. I used to think we should lock people up and throw away the key. But now I can honestly say that I have many friends who are in prison."

Kolb pays his own airfare to Louisiana, about $350, but is housed and transported free of charge by the prison after he lands. It is the largest maximum security prison in America, located on 18,000 acres on a bend in the Mississippi River. The average sentence length is 88 years.

It is a ministry he was drawn into by Manny Mills of Koinonia House in Wheaton, a ministry for ex-offenders, (Kolb is a board member) and one that he has gripped with a firm hand. The walls of his office at the church are lined with oil paintings done by a Louisiana inmate. Other grateful prisoners have given him leather bags or other hand-made items.

"People ask me why I'm so involved. But the Bible says, 'Where were you when I was in prison?' I try to be encouraging and get people on the right track. When Christians come out of prison, if we don't meet them, the devil will."

Early influences

Kolb was born in Wheatridge, Colo., and moved around a lot during his early years.

When he was about 5, his parents divorced, and he moved in with his mother's parents in Seward, Neb.

"It was small town America," he said. "It was like Mayberry. I have three really good friends I have known since kindergarten. I'm a Cornhusker fan and I spend my vacation going to the world series of college baseball in Nebraska."

His grandfather was the custodian at a local Lutheran church and school. Kolb went to the Lutheran elementary school and to Concordia Lutheran High School, which was a lab school on the campus of Concordia Teachers College (now Concordia University).

Both of his parents remarried and had other children. He has a full sister who spent most of her time with their mother.

"I used to wonder how my parents could get a divorce and just leave me behind," he said. "But my grandparents were very supportive. They always wanted me to be a minister. I was raised by conservative Lutherans and it was a good influence."

The influence was strong enough to launch him into a first career as a Lutheran school teacher.

Kolb spent time in Indiana and Illinois where he taught at the elementary and high school levels, coached sports and served as athletic director.

When Kolb was teaching at Valley Lutheran High School in St. Charles in the mid-1980s, (it is now Fox Valley Lutheran Academy and located in Elgin), he decided to go to the seminary and study to become a pastor.

"I always wanted to be a pastor, but it was difficult because I was married with small children," he said. "When I was a small boy I'd go to the church with my grandfather on Saturdays when he got it ready for services, and I'd put the hymn numbers up. I'd also take the microphone, and pretend I was preaching."

Kolb attended the seminary in Fort Wayne, Ind. He completed his year as a vicar in Richland, Wash. He served as pastor at Immanuel Lutheran Church in Belvidere and at Trinity Lutheran Church in Bloomington before coming to Lord of Life.

A great grandfather

Kolb and his wife live in Maple Park. They met in high school and married 43 years ago when she was 17 and he was 19. They have a son, Eric, and a daughter, Terri, who both live in Texas.

Their grandson Josh is 18 and a freshman at the University of North Texas.

"Terri is a single mother and I spent a lot of time with Josh," Kolb said.

"One day when I picked him up from school, he wanted to know why other boys had a Dad. I told him everyone has a father, but when you don't have a Dad, sometimes God gives you a great grandfather."