An Atmore area family facing adversity has found a way to turn a tough situation into a way to spread the gospel.

Samantha Zundel said, for almost a month now, her brother-in-law has been incarcerated in a federal prison in Kentucky, but she and her family are using a situation many people would simply try to survive as a way to spread God’s word by collecting Christian-based books and other literature to send to the “campers” serving time.

“My brother-in-law was on top of the world, and now he is pretty much at the bottom,” Zundel said. “He was involved in a very large mortgage scandal when all the sub-prime lenders went under a few years ago. He is serving his time in a federal prison camp for ten years.”

Zundel said the idea to help supply Christian-based books for the prison came to her when her brother-in-law began to grow more curious about faith.

“It’s amazing how he has changed in only the first month,” she said. “They have a lot of down time and he is just devouring books.”

And Zundel saw that opportunity as something to be taken advantage of for the Lord.

“He’s very open to the Lord and we want to provide books that will nourish that relationship.”

Zundel said the chance to send faith-based information also benefits the other men in the prison camp.

“He asked ‘what do I do when I’m done with them?’ and  I said ‘why don’t’ you pass them around.’”

Zundel said each man is only allowed to have 21 books at any given time, and even those are subject to strict rules, but added the possibility of a library on the prison campus could help that situation considerable.

“The books have to be softback and they cannot have any markings or notes in them,” she said.

Zundel said she is looking to the public to help begin a collection of books she can send in bulk to the prison.

“It’s much cheaper to mail them and I can send them myself in a box.”

Zundel said anyone wishing to donate Christian-based books of any kind, including Bibles, can contact her through Facebook or at (251) 655-6304.