Gina

5 October 2014

Dear Phyllis,

Last week I was lamenting that the Lord has placed me on a dusty shelf, and it has been a long time since the Lord has pleased to use me for anything significant. In reflecting on that, my mind went back to the last time the Lord used me in seeing someone saved. The best that I could come up with was Gina Crane five years ago. Gina was truly one of the major events in my life.

About six years ago there was a famous incident here in Chiang Mai where a foreign lady had shot and killed her gaijin (foreign) husband. That was huge news covered in the Bangkok Post, in all the international wire services, and reportedly on CNN. We were all a buzz wondering how anyone could get it in the prison to lead this poor soul to Christ. I was stunned six months later when my dear friend Dave Moore's wife, Joyce, met the woman in prison, saved and baptized her. What a strike! About that time my friend, Scott Noble, was also working in the ladies prison and met Gina every week. Gina was deeply involved in the occult and would argue with Scott as he tried to explain salvation through Christ to her. She frankly admitted that the reason she accepted Christ under Joyce was to add another god to her list. She thought, "the more gods the better". One day Scott told her the testimony of the Vietnamese general, Tha Dam, who died an unbeliever and came back from the dead a born-again man. That one rocked her. She asked Scott, "Could you please bring in that man who personally knows the general and have him talk to me?"

In 2003, the top North Vietnamese general, Tha Dam, died on Christmas day in a hospital in Saigon slam full of cancer. Two hours later he came back from the dead healed and a born-again man. His son-in-law was the man who was working with our teams who were going into Vietnam, and I frequently heard of his testimony from our teams. Of course I had a great desire to talk to him personally, but I was on blacklist in Vietnam at the time, and it was a year later before I was finally able to get back to Vietnam. When I arrived in Saigon, his son-in-law met me and took me straight over to the general's house. When the general met me he said, "Bill, we want you to make this place your home in Saigon. It is illegal for foreigners to stay in national's homes, but the police don't hassle me, and you are welcomed here". I spent a most interesting five days staying with the general listening to his life story, and amazing testimony how he got saved. While I was staying with him, he decided to start a church in his own home, and it was my great privilege to preach the first message in that church.

It was a few months later that Scott asked me to go with him to the ladies prison to speak with Gina. Scott was mad. She had argued with him for six months standing toe to toe against anything he had to say to her. But when she met me she sat there like a little bird with her mouth wide open begging to be fed. After spending an hour with her, I told Scott, "That woman is slam full of demons, and needs to read Neil Anderson's book Bondage Breaker". Scoot bought her the book and Gina devoured it. She said she was on every page, and asked Scott if he could have Bill come back to cast demons out of her. I did go in the next week. I told Gina I could easily cast those demons out of her, but that would do no good. They would come right back in. I said, "What you need is light". That started a most unusual period on both of our lives. For the next two years I went with Scott every week to the ladies prison, and spent two hours a time discipling, teaching, and fellowshipping with Gina.

That prison was utterly ridiculous. For the first year I had no authorization and no reason to be there whatsoever. I would go with Scott, hand the guard at the main gate an expired California drivers license, and walk in. The female guards there were incredible. Technically the only way Gina could have visitors was 15 minutes a day, in a special room, talking through glass. As it was, we would sit at a table, like we were in a coffee shop, discussing the Bible for two hours. I considered all the guards personal friends. I told them, "You guards are a disgrace to your profession. You are supposes to be mean and ugly, and as vicious as junk yard police dogs; but instead of that you are so sweet, charming, and helpful you are ruining the reputation of prison guards. This place is supposed to be filled with hatred and deep hardness, but instead of that, it is more cheerful in here than a church. What kind of a prison is this?" Oh those guards were wonderful! I had no authorization to be there but they gave me the run like I was the warden.

But oh my goodness - Gina! I have never seen anyone take hold of the Lord harder, with both hands, like she did. She tore into the Scripture like a famished soul eating a steak. She was filled with questions, and Scott kept her well supplied with the finest Christian books. Being in prison, she had nothing to do each day but read the Bible, Christian literature, and pray. Within a year she was more familiar with the Christian classics than most pastors. It is to Scott's credit that he kept her supplied with the finest books and her knowledge of Christian literature was encyclopedic.

It was my great pleasure to be able to nurse a new-born soul through her first early development to a mature believer. Going in there every Wednesday was the high light of the week. That was more fun than church. She hadn't been saved too long when she asked me about baptism one day."What is baptism? Isn't that something where you are supposed to wash your sins away?" I told her some people look at it that way. Then she went on, "When I was baptized by Joyce, there were five of us. I was last. If those previous four washed off their sins, and then I got in that filth water, what does that do to me?" I had to laugh at her child-like simplicity, but spiritually things were growing in her very fast.

Gina was no cold-blooded killer. She was married to a horrible man. She had six children by him. He was a very swathe fellow, but a cultist, and called himself Jesus. You name it - anything you can think of that is disgusting and evil - and he was the animation of it. One night he was at a restaurant with another woman, and Gina showed up. An argument ensued, and he pulled a gun on her. In the subsequent fight, he dropped the gun and ran. Gina picked up the gun and shot him. The only thing she did wrong was that she should have killed him years sooner, but the Lord will forgive her for that. Because of the unusual nature of that incident, the Thai court graciously ruled it more or less self-defense, and gave her only three years in prison. I was with her for most of two of her three years, and saw her off at the airport. It was beautiful. Tears flowed as I looked at that beautiful, radiant, woman, who three years before had been used of a vile cultist, and herself filled with demons; but now she was the picture of Christ living in a victorious heart, clothed in a snow white robe washed in the Blood of Jesus. (The robe was inside. She had street clothes on at the airport.)

After the murder incident and arrest, her eldest daughter, Angel, stepped forward to take legal custody for the five younger siblings. Angel had taken the other four children back to Canada. In answer to Gina's prayers, the Lord had saved Angel, and she was an active member in a very good church in Vancouver, Canada.

Gina, was one of the most amazing converts that I had ever had the privilege of playing some small part in their salvation and establishment in Christ. She has always credited me as her spiritual father, but she really belongs more in Scoots basket than mine. I just happened to come along at the right time with the right message for her. But her testimony, her spiritual stature, and gifts marked her as unusual. I fully expected shortly after she got back to Canada, she would write a best selling book, and be a popular speaker traveling around North America sharing her testimony, and winning souls. I was wrong

During her three year period of incarceration the greatest burden and pain of her heart was her children. Once she had found Christ for herself, the pain of her failure in not raising her children right, weighed heavily on her heart. The one great consuming passion of her heart was to get her children back and try to make up for the years she had directed them in the wrong direction. I was full of optimism when she got on the plane here in Chiang Mai. Neither one of us was prepared for the nightmare that awaited her at home.

Angel was the oldest and had suffered the worst in the black scenario with her father. She had some very serious emotional scars from that former life, and she somewhat blamed her mother for it. It was hard for her to believe the deep transformation of her mother's new-birth and was fearful that, once home, Gina would revert to her former character. Angel had the legal custody for the younger five children, and refuses to allow her mother to have access to them. This was a heartache totally unanticipated. She had looked forward for two years of having the warmth of a Christian home, and now she found herself locked out in the cold that was worse than the Thai prison. Gina would write me from time to time sharing the agony she was going through. Recently it has been a long time since hearing from her. About eight months ago Scott was able to get both of us together on the phone where I was able to talk to her. She still seemed positive but had not emerged from her tunnel yet. The other day I sent her the following letter.

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Dear Gina,

How I would like to talk with you. When you were in the Institute I told you that the day would come when you would become nostalgic and wish you were back. I can't speak for you, but those were very good days for me. What a joy it was to see the Lord reveal Himself to you and daily discover the riches that are in Christ!

I have been surprised at the path the Lord has led you on since leaving Chiang Mai. I fully expected that He would give you a very large ministry. Instead of that, He has given you a large portion of sorrow. Samuel Rutherford wrote “Grace grows best in winter”. That being true, He has given you many frosty months. I am not a prophet and, cannot tell you what the Lord has in store for you from here on, but I do know that He has chosen you for Himself and He is jealous of your love. If He has taken from you some of the joys of this world, it may be that He is making room for Himself in your heart.

I have found that the Lord has some very different ways. Rutherford said that Jesus has His own gate where He will come in. We wait for Him at one gate, but He comes in a different way. I am sure you are finding that to be true in your life.

Dear Gina, I have no idea how it is with your soul today, but all I can tell you is that Jesus is of unspeakable worth. Treasure Him. In Song of Sol. 3:4 we read where the Bride says, “But I found Him whom my soul loveth; I held Him, and would not let Him go.” Close the door. Don't let Him leave. The Lord has done an unusual thing for you. You are one of the most special persons it has been my privilege to know. If there is anything else in your hands, put it down so that you can grip Jesus with both hands. If you do this, He will bring you into a relationship with Himself that is beyond your highest dreams.

You may feel like you are in an airplane at 35,000 feet going through a thunder storm, being bounced off the ceiling, and wondering how much more this bird can take. Jesus never promised us balmy weather every day. But these storms will pass and we will see that He was doing a very special purpose in our lives through these hardships.

You are in my thoughts and prayers daily. It would be great to hear from you.

Your grateful brother,

In the bonds of our wonderful Lord Jesus,

                                                                                                          bill

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Written from my dusty shelf. Arigato, bill