Chasing the Dragon (29 page)

One such habitual offender was Ah Bill, who stayed in my Lung Kong Road house for only 10 days before deciding he could manage his own life. But he could not cope with freedom and its choices. He wrote me a letter from prison:

HM Prison Stanley

Dearest Pullinger,

I have left the people in the house [of Stephen] for a long time. Please, ask after every brothers for me. I also ask after you. Hope that Jesus will help you on everything.

I have to stay here for ten more months. Then I can have my new life over again. I hope that in this time I
can make my last repentance and will be accepted by the Lord, so that my dirt can be cleansed. Can you pray for me?

Last time when you came to visit me, I was transferred to Cat A because I have done something wrong in the prison. But now everything is just O.K. After this punishment, I have learnt how to be obedient. Every time you visited us and have meeting with us, and explained the Bible and really considered our condition. But I still did not give hear and broke the regulations. I was ashamed of myself.

When I first entered the prison, I came to the chapel every Sunday and I prayed in tongues every night. Some people just said some bad things against me. For example: Ha, you believe in Christ, but you still have to stay in prison. You don’t need any food if you believe in Christ, do you? There are many other bad words. But I did not want to write it down. I think you can guess some. At this moment, I was very angry. But when God’s miracle came in my mind, I just neglected all their words.

I have written quite long already. I am now following Jesus. Lastly, I want to talk with those new brothers. It is time that God has given us many opportunities. But have we taken these seriously? Have tried to get Him? Although I have come across many difficulties, I could get a little bit of His grace. In the past, I have wasted my time and life in a wrong way.

I would be very happy, if I can receive your letter on next month. And I would write back to you in order to ask some question concerning about the Bible.

Hope you have good health.

Ah Bill

Ah Bill was one of those who found it easier to be a Christian inside prison. Like other recidivists, he actually looked relieved
when he was inside. This was not because he liked prison; in fact, he hated it. But at least inside he was spared the necessity of making all the daily decisions, like whether he should get up and whether he should go to work. Each time he was released, he found himself less and less able to cope with the world outside.

When Ah Kit was released into our care, he told me of his friend Kwok, whom he had met in prison. He was in very serious trouble, for although he was a 20-year-old policeman he was also a Triad and had taken part in a gang battle. One of the rival gang members had been killed in the fight. No one was quite sure who had actually put in the knife, but five boys were on trial.

Kwok was a quiet country lad, the son of a chicken farmer from the New Territories. He was courteous and clean looking, but drawn and thin from the worry of the remand period. Like all Chinese his eyes were dark, but his were still blacker with a bleak despair. When I told him about Jesus dying for him, he could just about understand and could accept that He was God’s son, too. But he repeated sadly, “What hope is there for me—I mean what future?” I prayed quickly, hoping to give the right answer.

“Did you know that the two men in the Bible that God used more than any other men in history were murderers?” He looked stunned while I continued, “One was called David and the other Paul. Paul was chosen to spread the news of God’s forgiveness to more men than any other man in history. He had murdered Christians, but God showed the whole meaning of the gospel when He used such a man.”
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When Kwok heard this, his face lit up and his black eyes shone a little. “Do you mean,” he exclaimed, “that as well as being forgiven I can have work to do for God?” This idea that he could be useful so encouraged Kwok that he prayed as if his heart would burst with joy.

Two days later, I saw him again. He was positively glowing as he told me, “Miss Poon, I have such peace in my heart. It is what I have been looking for all my life. I know my past is forgiven and
I have hope for my future. I do not fear the results of my case anymore. If I am found guilty or not guilty, I do not mind. I have hope.” He talked as if we might never have the chance of meeting again, packing as many words as he could into the time.

He was sentenced to death the next day. I remember watching him as the verdict was announced. He was calm. But the other youth sentenced with him looked terrified. This youth immediately made a show of bravado, and as he passed me in the Supreme Court lifted his handcuffed hands to his neck in a dreadful gesture meant to convey hanging. He laughed.

I was not allowed to see Kwok for two years, while they were deciding whether to execute him or not. Eventually, his death sentence was commuted to life imprisonment …

When at last I went back to see him, I was nervous because I had only seen him twice and had told him very little. He knew that Jesus was God’s Son and loved him and died for him, and he had prayed and received the power of the Holy Spirit, but that was all. I thought,
Poor boy, he does not know very much. He has not had a Bible all this time; no minister has visited him, and maybe he does not really remember all that much about Jesus. He has probably forgotten all that I told him
.

When I went into the special little room provided, I was not quite sure what I was going to meet. But when Kwok came running into the visit room, he was still absolutely radiant. I had never before seen such pure joy on a man’s face. “Oh, Poon Siu Jeh, it is absolutely wonderful,” he gasped. He was so excited that he hardly paused for breath.

“I have got such peace in my heart, such joy to know my sins are forgiven. I sit in my cell every morning and every night and I pray. I do not know what I am saying because I am speaking in that language that God has given me, but I know He understands what is in my heart, and I have been telling all the other prisoners about Jesus and six of them have believed, too, and here are their names, and here are their numbers.”

He thrust a list at me, and later I visited the men on it. All of them were either long-term prisoners or convicted killers,
and one of them was the youth who had made the hanging gesture in court. They did indeed believe. Their teacher had known little with his head but much in his heart, and I never met a group of men who understood better the meaning of Jesus giving up His life for them.

I gave Kwok a Bible, and he had finished the New Testament within two months. He wrote his questions on a minute two-inch square scrap of paper, and there was never enough time to talk. He had read through the New Testament twice before he had time to ask, “Excuse me, Miss Poon, but what is a Gentile?” His converts grew well too, and since all were baptized in the Holy Spirit they used these gifts quite freely. They had their own songs, which the Spirit gave them as they prayed and prayed for one another when they were sick.

One day, I visited Kwok when I was a little tired and worried that I would not be allowed to see him and his friends again. “Don’t worry about us, Poon Siu Jeh,” he told me and smiled encouragingly. “We’re all right here. We’re praying for you.” They are the freest men I know.

I received several letters from them, and some of the young people in our group helped me to write return letters or wrote the letters themselves, as my written Chinese was still very poor. The English was delightful, as they lifted whole phrases out of dictionaries or the Bible or translated the Chinese themselves, word by word. William was one of the students, and Kwok wrote the following letter to him:

Dear William:

It is with much pleasure to hear from you and thanks be to the Lord Jesus Christ, for by His Wonderful name we know each other, Praise God!

In reading your letter, I was so delight to communicate with you and I want to thank you for writing me giving me so great encouragement and message in understanding the love of God—thank you! You know, Jackie uses to come and visit us in the prison every month even
it is in hottest day; preaching and explaining us the Gospel. And there, we find not a word could be good enough to tell you how great is her kindness to us! We really feel deeply impressed by this—the wonderful love of God. Every time she comes to see us, we would be very happy and there we would ask her many questions in the Bible and she would be very willingly to give us every details and explanations and that is why we never find time enough for us to be with her. Now and then I greatly believe in what the Bible says that Jesus Christ is truly died for us and I sincerely hope to do my best for Him.

It is through the power of the Holy Spirit, God gives me very many opportunately to witness to others here and many of them wish to see Jackie but I did not dare to give any answer or even tell Jackie about this, for I sense that they are asking this on purpose. I know there is nothing I can do about this and I just pray that the Holy Spirit will touch them and that they would be changed perfectly.

Now I have to close my words because it is very late at night. Please pray for us here and greets to you in His name. KWOK.

On the first occasion I had visited Ah Lung, there was another white-striped Taiwanese prisoner who was on trial for bringing into Hong Kong the largest amount of heroin ever discovered on a ship. He was the second officer, and he started to discuss his case with me as soon as we met.

“I’m sorry I cannot discuss court cases with you,” I said. “The only reason I am allowed in here is to talk about Jesus.”

“But I cannot be a Christian,” said Go Hing. “Let me tell you a story.” He told it in Mandarin Chinese with the odd word in English.

Over 20 years ago there was a family who fled from mainland China and ended up as refugees in Taiwan.
In this family there was a young boy, about four. He ran away from home one day with a young friend and went to play at the schoolhouse. There was a large water pool there, and as he was playing with his friend, he fell in. The little boy’s friend was so frightened because he knew they should not have been playing there that he ran away and did not tell anyone.

Several hours later, the Headmaster got back to the school and saw to his horror and distress the body of a child floating in the water. He fished him out but was unable to revive him. Recognizing the child, he sent for his parents, and the mother arrived beside herself with grief that this beloved son of hers had died. She insisted that they take him to hospital. Of course, it was too late to save him and the doctors certified him dead; but she would not believe it, so she took him to another hospital where he was again certified dead. Sadly she took the body home, as is the Chinese custom, and dressed him in his burial clothes. She was going to sit by the body all night keeping vigil.

In the middle of the night the boy sat up, looked at his mother and said, “Why am I dressed in these clothes?” She could not believe what she was seeing. She thought it was a vision. She said, “Do you remember falling into the pool?” and the little boy said, “Yes, I remember, and I remember I was going down in the water and I opened my mouth to shout for help, and the water went in, and then I saw a man come.”

The mother interrupted him to ask, “A man—who was he?”

“Well, he came and he held out his hand to me, and he pulled me out of the water,” he said.

The mother supposed that the boy had seen the headmaster, so she asked, “Do you know his name?”

“Don’t you know?” replied the boy, “It’s Jesus.” The family had never heard Jesus’ name before. They had no
contact with Christians, but from that time onward the mother and the whole family became disciples of Jesus.

Go Hing told me this story very dramatically and very emotionally. Then he looked at me and asked, “Do you know how I know that story is true? I was the boy. I was brought back from death, and since that time my family have been Christians. That is why I cannot be a Christian, because I knew the truth and I have not followed Jesus.”

“I’ve got very good news for you,” I told Go Hing. “Jesus doesn’t expect us to follow Him in our own strength, so if you are prepared to tell Him that you are sorry and ask forgiveness, then He will forgive you. You can start again, and He will give you the power to help you follow Him. The power is His Holy Spirit. He will give you a new language to help you talk to Him, because there will be so many things in your heart that you will want to tell Him after all this time.”

I could not lay hands on him under the gaze of the curious prison guard, but as we prayed together he began to pray in tongues, and he then began to cry.

He looked up afterward and said, “That’s the first time that I’ve cried since I was a boy. I feel so happy. I know Jesus is with me now.”

I went back to see him some days later and told him, “You know you have to tell the truth in court. You have to tell the truth.”

“I’m too frightened to tell the truth. I can’t.”

“You have to tell the truth. You are a Christian now.”

“I can’t, because if I plead guilty to this case I’ll be killed. According to Taiwanese law, whatever country you commit a crime in you are liable to be sentenced again in Taiwan, even if you have already served a sentence. In Taiwan they still execute a man for drug peddling, armed robbery and for murder. So I can’t plead guilty.”

“I’m not your solicitor. I’m not giving you legal advice,” I told him. “I’m just telling you that you have to speak the truth.
You know Jesus saved your life, and you can’t go only halfway with Him.”

Go Hing was found guilty and was given 12 years in prison. I wasn’t able to see him for some time, but just before I went back to England, I was allowed to visit him in Stanley prison. As I looked at him through the panel he began to cry, but he was smiling.

“Because you are going, I just have to tell you this,” he said. “I am known as a very hard man. I’ve been a seaman for many years; I’m not afraid of the great wind and I’m not afraid of the big waves. When my father died, I didn’t cry; when I was arrested and I knew I would not see my wife and children again for many years, I didn’t cry. There are only two occasions in my life when I’ve cried. One occasion was when you came to the prison before my trial and I received Jesus and His Holy Spirit, and the other occasion is today. But today I’m crying with joy, because I know my sins are forgiven.