finding God in prison

John Lawson

I got involved in the security industry straight from school. I was always interested in Martial arts and I guess like a lot of boys my age were turned onto it by Bruce Lee. I trained for a few years in different styles, eventually settling in a style called Bushido Buda Wasa. I was also interested in Firearms due to my upbringing in South Africa. I had always wanted to be a bodyguard but for many years I was content in the Security Industry. I worked as a bouncer for many years in Manchester and Merseyside and then in Edinburgh. This kind of work lead me into some bodyguard training and every now and then a job would come up. They were few and far between and because of my married life I was unable to travel extensively.

However I loved the excitement when the phone would ring and my friend would say there was a job working with the Rolling Stones during their UK tour and other big stars. I also protected some rich clients in London who had enemies for whatever reason. The job lacked the excitement I thought it would. In all honesty most of my time was spent sitting outside hotel rooms, and escorting clients to mundane places. I worked as part of a four man team and we became very close. There was an ex Para, an ex legionnaire and an ex South African Special Forces Guy.  We soon got into a bit of debt collecting from our clients and earned a reputation as guys who could deliver...we had no fear.

Soon our main source of income was from retrieving money from Gangsters who had ripped other gangsters off. Again the jobs were only every now and then and in-between I also held normal 9-5 security work as well as working as a bouncer at weekends.  I started getting involved with some real heavy work, involving shotguns and kidnappings of these gangsters.  I remember thinking I was doing a good thing as one of my team told me about a drug dealer in his town. He said the guys was peddling drugs to kids and flashing large sums of cash around in the pub. I thought we would kill two birds with one stone. I was going on holiday soon and needed to pay for it, so I thought great, take this drug dealers money then threaten him to get out of town. So we planned it and went round at 2am with balaclavas and shotguns and relieved him of his drug money. Even better he could not go to the cops and I had enough money to pay for a great holiday. Next day the Drug dealer moved out of town and I felt like I had done a service to the community. How arrogant!

We would often disguise ourselves as police officers and kidnap people in broad daylight by “placing then under arrest”. Our job was to locate these guys and then plan to bring them to account in front of the people they had stolen from.  I justified what I was doing by saying “well they deserve it”. Sometimes it would mean going abroad to find these guys and on one such occasion it was going to lead to murder. We were talking vast sums of money involved, millions of pounds. We decided that the only way we would be safe after the job was to shoot the intended victim. I was going to be the one who pulled the trigger and I was ready for that. We even went scouting for a location to bury him. The man to this day still does not know how close he came to death!  However the Lord had other plans and was not prepared to allow me to become a murderer.

I got involved in a personal situation at home where a friend of mine was being threatened by his partners ex husband. This guy had ripped her off and now refused to pay back the money. By now we were very experienced and thought we were totally untouchable. We paid this guy a visit and threatened to shoot him. Of course he was a “civilian” and ran straight to the police. A month later I found myself in a police station! I was sentenced to 4yrs for attempted extortion and then given another 15months for refusing to testify against my mates.

In Prison everything changed. My wife met someone else, my home was sold to pay for the court case and the proceeds of crime people took all my money. I was a fool and I could see that but I thought I would just get out of prison and rob a few more gangsters and get back on top. I still didn’t get it.

I was in prison for about two months when a Nigerian guy called Tony who was in for fraud started talking to me in the prison yard. We got on ok but he used to really annoy me with talk about Jesus. He kept asking me on a Thursday to come to the Prison Fellowship. He bugged me, I thought if he asks me one more week I will smash him up. However the following week Tony asked me again to go to the fellowship ... I reluctantly agreed to go just to stop myself from hitting him. That night at 7pm in Feb 2005 I put my name down to go to the stupid meeting. When my other mates asked where I was going I just lied to them. I did not want them to think I was going soft.

Well as I walked into the prison chapel, I was greeted by a stranger called Duncan Strathdee. He opened his arms and hugged me. I was taken by surprise after all here I was in a tough high security jail and men just did not hug each other. I thought if this namby pamby Christian dude hugs me again I would break his Jaw.

We sat down in a semi circle of chairs and Duncan handed out lyric sheets then sat down and got out his guitar. There was something about this guy,  I could see the goodness flowing out of him. He seemed so happy, considering he came from Dunblane, the community where that evil gunman went into the primary school and shot all those children and teachers. Duncan was a pastor there and was deeply affected by that tragedy. He found it a real struggle to go back into prison fellowship after that. Thank the Lord he did.

So anyway, we started to sing gospel songs and I hid behind the song sheets and began to sob like a baby..... real tears, I was in pieces. Something washed over me, a powerful feeling of emotion. I was amazed as I watched the other guys singing with such joy for the Lord. At the end of the service Duncan hugged me again and I did not break his jaw. I went back to my cell that night and cried more. I feel to my knees and screamed at God to just leave me alone... I did not want to feel weak and vulnerable. You see the lord wanted to touch my life and the only way to make me listen was to break me down, strip me bare and start again. The following day I started to read the Bible and I just became aware that everything was going to be ok from now on. It made the rest of my time bearable in prison. I remember reading about Jesus at the well with the Samarian woman and that story has now become very special to me. Prison was the best thing to happen to me. I have been out of prison for a year now and the Lord has blessed me in so many ways. I would love to tell you about it sometime.   

God bless you for now.

Yours in Christ

John Lawson