Chasing the Dragon Read Online Free PDF Page A

about the people who haven’t heard? Risotto?
    This resulted in my taking part in the kind of scene that I would have despised before my conversion. I found myself playing the piano for a youth squash evangelical tea party in Waddon. It was a Saturday afternoon, and I should have been at the Rugger International at Twickenham, yelling “shove” with the best of them. Instead, I was singing salvation songs and eating sausage-sizzles in Waddon. It was then that I was sure my life had really taken a new direction!
    Having gained my degree, I was enjoying a career teaching music. I wanted to give my whole life somewhere; I was free. Since I was not especially in love at the time, there was nothing to stop me from giving all my time in one place. The missionary idea came back.
    So I wrote to Africa (that’s where missionaries go)—to schools, societies and broadcasting companies. And they all wrote back no—they did not want me. One group explained, “If youcould teach English and math, then we could find a place for you, but we can’t afford musicians out here yet. Maybe in a few years.”
    Undeterred, I sought the best advice going. My idea was to get hold of the visiting speaker (or the good-looking curate) after a meeting and ask for a private audience.
    “What do you think I should do with my life?” I asked earnestly of each one.
    “Have you prayed about it?” they always replied. It was maddening, because I had prayed about it, but God did not give me a clear answer. My Bible told me to trust and He would lead me. 4 I used to dash down to fetch the post in the mornings, thinking guidance would come that way. But the replies were always negative.
    One night, I had a dream in which the family were all crowded around the dining room table looking at a map of Africa. In the middle of the different colored countries was a pink one. I leaned over to see what it was called. It said “Hong Kong.” I did not really believe this, but I did not want to show my ignorance.
    “Ah,” I tried to sound nonchalant, “I never knew Hong Kong was there.”
    “Yes, of course, it is, didn’t you know?” said my Aunty Dotty in a superior tone, and I did not dare argue.
    When I woke up, I wrote to the Hong Kong government explaining that I was a qualified musician and that I would like a teaching post. They wrote back saying that applications accompanied by three named references had to be handled through the Ministry of Overseas Development—and that they had no jobs for musicians. Then, I tried my old Missionary Society, stating that I wanted to go to Hong Kong. Impossible, they said—they did not accept would-be missionaries until the age of 25, so I would have to wait.
    “But I think Jesus might come back before I’m 25,” I said. “Couldn’t I go sooner? I don’t mind not being called a missionary—can’t I teach in one of your schools?” They said there was no way. I seemed to have misinterpreted my dream. I went to pray in a tiny, peaceful village church. There, I saw a visionof a woman—holding out her arms beseechingly as on a refugee poster. I wondered what she wanted—she looked desperate for something. Was it Christian aid?
    Then words moved past like a television credit. “What can you give us?” What did I honestly think I could give her? If I was going to be a missionary, what was I going to give anyone? Was it my ability to play the piano and oboe? Was I to pass on the benefit of my nice English background or my education? Was I to be a channel for food, or money or clothing? If I only gave her those things, then when I went away she would be hungry again. But the woman in the picture had been hungry for a food she did not know about.
    Then it came to me that what she needed was the love of Jesus; if she received that, then when I left her she would still be full and, even better, she would be able to share it with other people. I now knew what I had to do, but I still did not know where I was