Forty Years.
One Calling.

His Story

Writing for the Forgotten

Don Anderson has spent four decades walking the halls of county jails, state prisons, federal facilities, and ICE detention centers. In all that time, one thing never changed: the hunger he found there for something true and simple enough to hold onto.

Don serves as chaplain with Pacific Youth Correctional Ministries, focusing on ministry in the greater Dallas/Fort Worth Metroplex. He provides direct ministry to youth and adults at multiple facilities — overseeing church services and Bible studies, offering one-on-one pastoral counseling, and performing the full duties of his office. He has been in full-time correctional ministry for 40 years and on staff with PYCM since 1989.

In those four decades, he saw something consistently true: the books, newspapers, and religious materials available in most facilities assumed a level of education and biblical literacy that many inmates simply didn't have. Men and women who wanted to know Jesus couldn't find materials simple enough to understand.

So Don wrote them himself. Plain language. No theological jargon. No assumed knowledge. Just the gospel, explained so clearly that anyone — regardless of education or background — could pick it up and meet Jesus for the first time.

Today those two books are distributed entirely free of charge to chaplains in jails, state prisons, federal facilities, and ICE detention centers across all 50 states. Over 200,000 copies have been given away. Every single one funded by donation. Every box packed and shipped with prayer. The ministry currently ships over 5,000 books every month — and the requests from chaplains continue to outpace what the ministry can fund.

In his ministry career, Don has recruited, trained, and supervised over 500 volunteers. His approach has always been the same: work directly through chaplains, put books in the hands of people who want them, and trust God with the rest.