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 (continued)I returned to drugs straight after I was discharged and was sent to a Penang rehabilitation centre which practised a punishing physical regime treatment method. Patients were even beaten up to discourage us from returning to the habit. Yet many of us still did. Helpless, my father even brought me to a bomoh upon a friend’s recommendation. Upon a psychiatrist’s advice, he also sent me to Singapore to stay with relatives for a change of environment. During my second stay in Singapore, I saw some people taking drugs and went up to them to ask for some. Obviously, a change of environment didn’t help. I was even caught trying to shoplift a bottle of liqueur but fibbed my way out with a sob story. When I look back at that situation now, I believe it was the Grace of God that helped me get off the hook. That was in 1975 or 1976. My mother had returned to her faith in Jesus Christ because of my problems and she arranged with my uncle and aunty, who were also Christians, to bring me to a meeting at the Salvation Army headquarters in Singapore. There, six ex-convicts shared with me how Jesus saved them. I listened to these ex-gangsters, ex-addicts and former criminals and inside of me, I whispered to their God: “If you are real, show me”. One of them asked me if I wanted to know Jesus. I said I do and we prayed together. Immediately, I was filled with a great surge of joy which seemed to bubble up from my stomach to my whole being. I had tears in my eyes and started to weep. I had never experience such joy. This encounter with God lasted a few hours as His divine joy overwhelmed me. I threw away my cigarettes and drugs and stayed with a church elder for a month in that building. I then made my way back to Kuala Lumpur in 1976 determined to start a new life with God’s help. For a short period in Malaysia, I slid back to some drugs and cigarettes but it was not because of withdrawal symptoms or peer pressure. I think it was simply because I didn’t have any purpose and didn’t yet know how to fill up the void within me by praying and reading the Bible. Thus, I returned to what I knew - the routine of drugs. But that encounter I had with God was fresh in my memory (it is still fresh today after close to 30 years too) and knowing I can’t help myself by myself, I enrolled myself in a Christian rehabilitation centre with the help of a friend. Since that day, I never did drugs again. Next Page Back to Page 1 |
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