Taking the Challenge of the unknown Mission.
Reading the book “Chasing the Dragon “has opened a lot of insights that I thought I would ever get from such a book. At first, I never took this book seriously just by its title, and I was questioning myself why choose such a book for the course. The word dragon is always identified from the spirit world with Satan the power of darkness of the world. Revelation 12:9-10 spoke loudly to me as I saw the title pf the book. I had no idea what I was entering in as I went on reading the book that is very inspiring. The 22-year-old girl following a call that many dismissed especially of her age and with no money but just enough to get her to Hong Kong, I am still puzzled by her determination to go on such journey. Just imagine your 22-year-old girl immediately after college, she says she is going on a mission trip to the world of unknown.
I connect very well with the story in this book which was the norms in the world around the Kowloon Walled City, which was not policed and was the world’s largest producer of opium and ran by the Chinese Triad gangs. Just imagine for a second, your daughter going to such an environment. What will you be thinking would likely happen to your daughter? Therefore, my connection to this story is the drug world that Jackie is moved in and how she becomes the saviour of the community. My son has been a victim of drug abuse, and he was mostly using opium when he went to college. Our son was a rugby player and was introduced to drugs by other students who later became a problem for him. It was very painful to us that he was in college for four years, and we thought he was going to be graduated only to discover the last moment that he has not been attending classes for the previous three years. He had just attended classes the first year of college. He was sending us forged transcripts with excellent grades, and we thought he was performing well and hence there was no reason to check up with the department.
Just as Jackie got pulled to the gangs and the need to help them come out of the yoke of the drugs and be liberated by Christ, we also got moved to help the boy. As much as we were shocked and disappointed, we went ahead and took him to rehabilitation for drug addicts. We also intensified prayers for our son for spiritual healing through the rehab. It was very painful to us as parents after spending all the resources on him thinking we are educating him while were funding the drugs for his being. The college was a private one, and we paid a lot of money annually. We spent all the four years tuition and other upkeep fees for the boy only to discover we were funding drugs used by the boy and others in the college. He lived and operated in the college, and the college administration did not even find him. The only difference with my son is that he never lived in a gang community but he his behaviour out of our sight was not different for the boys in the Walled city.
I was annoyed with the university administration for not being careful with students when they do not sit for exams year in and out, how do they remain students without alerting the parents or guardian? You can imagine the college did not know and we as parents did not know the boy was a drug and alcohol problem. When he was with us, he was one the super boys of the home. He pretended to be good, and no one would know he was involved but only his peers. We discovered at the end of the fourth year when we were preparing for graduation, and he cheated on us that he has will no graduate with others because the unfinished project and he sent us another fake transcript. I got alarmed how this can be possible when their supervisor had been working with them on their respective project. His major was Computer science. It was me who discovered after I sat with him and a severe straight talk where the truth came out because he could no longer lie anymore. It is when I brought to the attention of the college which was not even aware.
This is a real situation of chasing the dragon out of our son’s life. We returned him to the same college to continue and finish his college, but just before the end of the first semester, he received a suspension from college for coming to the college late in the night and drunk against the college rules. As if we had not learned a lesson from the previous, we wasted the money too because he did not sit for that semester exams. It was out of this suspension that we took him to a senior psychiatrist who did several tests on him and was found to be an addict to drugs and alcohol and needed a medical rehab. Our son lived in the Walled city of darkness which Jackie describes as the “a place of terrible darkness, both physical and spiritual.” The boy was confused for four years living in a world of darkness, and no light was near him to realise that he out of the way until his term of being college was over and had to come home. I can now see from Jackie’s description the fallen angel in the name of the dragon that fell from heaven played a part in confusing this young man. He lived in the dark world for three years without noticing he was in the dark. Jackie describes his encounter with the light of Christ in the dark community. She says, “I had let God have a hand in my prayers, and it produced a direct result.” Our son was a true pretender when he was with us. He even was a Sunday school teacher at our local church. The kids loved him, but he was living a fake life. After four years in college living in darkness, the veil on his eyes was removed, and he started seeing and noticing where he was.
After three months in the rehab, he got a discharged after he was found to be sober from the illicit substances. The did detoxification and more sessions of psycho-counselling and character/attitude change. Through prayers, he was very receptive and accepted the help to come out of the dark world. He has since changed to a better person, and we stay with him in the town of Kisumu where I live and goes to the college nearby. We switched him to another college and changed the course from computer science to economics. I see this as Jackie calls a walk in the light. She expresses after years of working in the walled city of darkness there was some sanity and order now. “We walked together down the Walled City streets towards the clubroom. They were empty now as many illicit businesses had ceased.” We moved from the walled city to the streets where there is no substance of abuse as it was with the previous college.
About the Author
John Muhanji
I am the Director Africa Ministries Office of Friends United Meeting. I coordinate all Quaker activities and programs in the Quaker churches and school mostly in Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda. The focus of my work is more on leadership development and church planting in the region especially in Tanzania.. Am married with three children all grown up now. I love playing golf as my exercise hobby. I also love reading.2 responses to “Taking the Challenge of the unknown Mission.”
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Wow, brother, thanks for being transparent with your son’s story and how you handled it. I truly wouldn’t know what to do if that had been my experience with my boys.
Just as the Holy Spirit did for Jackie, my hope and prayer is that he does the same for your family. As I think about what your son did I’m reminded of the parable of the prodigal son–which by the way should be renamed as the Prodigal Father. It sounds like, as only the Holy Spirit can do, you, as a father, acted in extravagant ways in accepting and helping your son to wholeness. What an encouraging story. Thanks for sharing.
Thanks for sharing your post, John. I agree that Tsang’s book spoke of ‘personal leadership ambitions’ under British control. I also appreciated your comment about how a small country like Britain could rise up and start colonizing the world. Great insight! Looking forward to experience Hong Kong in person.