To light from darkness

To light from darkness

This Friday, we were privileged at FGB to have brother David share his very powerful testimony. It was indeed an amazing story of how God poured out His amazing grace and mercy on his life.

Now brother David was a former drug trafficker in the 1980s who traveled to and fro from Thailand twice a month, shipping through the customs 120kgs of morphin each trip. And then in 1988, he was caught by the police. Traveling ina Ford LS3, brother David was speeding down the highway when suddenly two fast cars appeared behind him. Shortly, one of them overtook him and went in front of him while the other remained behind. Sandwiched, David tried to overtake the car in front but was hemmed in and he noticed that the men in the cars had walkie-talkies. That’s when he knew he was finished. They were policemen, and shortly, he saw a police roadblock in front and a policeman dragging a row of spikes across the road. He knew that the car would capitulate if he were to go over those spikes, so he hit the emergency brakes and handbrake and spun 180degrees. Facing backwards, David tried to go back the same way but was blocked off by the other car. Faced with no choice David surrendered, and the first thing the policemen did was to give him a severe beating, and he even lost two teeth.

After being remanded in prison for 6 years, David was sentenced to death for trafficking 120kg of morphin. For morphin, death was mandatory for anyone who trafficked more than 15g, what more 120kg!

In prison on death row, David now found himself in another world, a terrible, morbid place, isolated from the rest of the world. There, the prisoners were treated like dogs, with no human dignity left at all. Any time, the prison officer could call up anyone and make them strip naked and crawl across the basketball court at 12 noon, burning their skins very painfully. The food was worse than that eaten by beggars, with worms often coming out of the measly vegetables. There were drugs in the prison, smuggled in by a corrupt warden, and all sorts of cheating and inhuman activity was rampant in the prison. There, David saw many people praying to their gods – torn pictures on the wall of deities were worshipped. However, David decided not to pray, as he did not believe any of these could help him. Instead, David went to the library and read a lot of books, magazines, Reader’s Digest, anything he could get his hands on.

Somehow, David believed there was a god out there. Sometimes, looking at the window, he heard voices of laughter and he often wondered what was outside the window. Resolving to look outside, he came up with a plan to stack the books he borrowed to make a makeshift staircase up to the window using leftover rice as glue to hold the books together. Reaching the top, he saw just outside was the beautiful Taiping lake gardens.

Now David had been transferred from the prison in Alor Setar to Taiping as the prison had no gallows. In Malaysian history, Taiping was the oldest person and had the record of never having a prisoner escape before. Looking outside the window, David wondered why he had not treasured life, and dreamed that if one day he could walk out, he would sit in this beautiful garden and taste the sweetness of the grass. The Gardens seemed so near yet so far.

Around that time, David came across a newspaper 3-weeks old and found a column about Malaysian Care and their ministry helping ex-prisoners, giving them a place to get shelter, and be disciplined and get a job. With hope, David cut out the column and kept it in his diary, a little “555” notebook, which was a luxury in prison.

Then one morning, an officer came and called out David’s number informing him that his date of appeal was tomorrow. Great fear filled David’s heart there and then. Every week, drug traffickers were hanged for 18g, 32g, and here he had 120kg. He felt that he had no hope, no chance. Everyone had one appeal, but David could not see how his salvation was possible.

With a greatly troubled heart, David looked up to the window, kneeled down and called upon God. “God, if you are there, please help me. I deserve to die. I know I am a sinful man. I have sinned against you. Have mercy on me. I promise I can be a good man. I want to repent. I am so sorry.” Through the night, David continued to pray and ask God for mercy though he did not know God. And so the next day, he was brought to the Supreme court. As he saw the bright sunlight, David said to himself, this is the light that I want. Taking a deep breath of fresh air, he thought, this is the air I want, not the air of the gallows. His lawyer came and asked him “Do you want to be born again?” Not understanding, and from a background where he was taught reincarnation, David thought it was an insult. But the lawyer continued to ask him to just look to heaven and pray to the mighty God. “It does not matter that you do not know him, just pray”, the lawyer said.

And so David prayed, as he had done the whole night. The prosecution went up to the 3 judges and had a private discussion and then sat back down. To David’s relief, one judge spoke and declared the judgment that in this case, there was a doubt, and as such, David would not be hanged. Instead, his offence would fall under another provision which was 20 years jail. Due to good behavior in prison, David was released after 15 years. On the day he was set free, there was an official of the Home Ministry who told him that he was a free man, but only within the country as he would not be granted a passport because of his serious crime.

Coming out of prison, David didn’t know where to go. He did not want to go back to Penang because of the painful memories, and so he took a bus to KL where he hoped to find a job. Arriving in Pudu Raya, he found himself in

Petaling Street

and saw a Hindu Temple and a Buddhist Temple. Somehow, he managed to persuade the Buddhist temple’s caretaker to let him stay for 2 nights, but strangely around 4am in the morning, David was suddenly chased out. It was very dark, and feeling helpless, David called out to God “Where shall I go. I need direction”. Suddenly a voice came from behind “Open your diary”. Startled, David turned around and saw nobody, and then suddenly, the voice came again, saying the same thing. So David picked out his 555 book, and the column he had cut out fell to the ground. He picked it up and remembered the Malaysian Care column he had put in. After whiling the time away in a Mamak shop until 9am, David called up the Malaysian Care office and proceeded to go to 7 ½ mile Old Klang Road. In Wisma Peter, they interviewed ihm and checked his record and sent him to Rumah Petros at 3 ½ mile

Old Klang Road

. Rumah Petros sheltered a lot of rejected, broken people, and upon arriving, David found some ex-drug addicts he knew from before. They welcomed him with open arms and it was the first time he felt wanted by somebody. Looking back, David realized that Rumah Petros was the turning point in his life. David decided to stay on albeit initial reservations about Christianity and accepted Jesus into his heart. From time to time, volunteers came to share the gospel and on the first night, a volunteer gave David a Gideon Bible. Opening it, he saw “thou shall not steal”, and couldn’t quite understand. The brother asked him to turn to Psalms 18:6, and he tried to find “Sums” in the Bible. Another brother showed him the exact place, and when he read the words, tears came to his eyes, and he wept for some time. Sum 18:6 reads “In my distress I called upon the LORD, and cried unto my God: he heard my voice out of his temple, and my cry came before him, even into his ears.” Brother David remembered that it was God who heard him in prison that night and saved him. His little faith had moved a great mountain.

8 months after that, brother David was still allowed to stay and help, and he was offered a job not too far away. After working for some time, he was persuaded by a friend to go to an FGB Chapter meeting, and speaking was our very own President Damien Chua, speaking of how God saved him from a serious kidnapping. A friendship soon developed and Damien offered to sponsor David to attend the School of Acts. So David attended as a full time student, while Damien attended as a part time student. After 5 months, the time came in the course for the students to go for a mission trip, and they were to go to Thailand. He told Pastor Raymond Mooi that he could not go because of his prison record but Raymond asked him to pray. He prayed and nothing happened, so Raymond asked him to pray and fast. After, a week, a dream came to David asking him to go to Pusat Damansara where he applied for his passport. Amazingly, his record did not show any black mark, and in a second miracle, David was now free to join the mission trip. And so, David, ex-drug trafficker graduated by God’s grace from the School of Acts.

Since then, David has seen many visions, and is serving God in ministry to orphanages, disabled centres, and even cleans the wounds of AIDs patients. Some of them have blackened holes in their arms, and worms come out of them. David helps them clean the wounds, kill the worms, and place dettol before bandaging them up, giving great relief to the patients, and he shares Christ with them. David feels his particular calling is prison ministry and in mission trips to Philippines, he has seen many turn to the Lord through his testimony.

One of David’s favorite verses is Jeremiah 33:3 Call unto me, and I will answer thee, and shew thee great and mighty things, which thou knowest not. He encourages all of us to call unto the Lord, like he did, and see truly great and mighty things indeed!