Psalm 62:5-8, “Find rest, O my soul, in God alone’ my hope comes from him. He alone is my rock and my salvation; he is my fortress, I will not be shaken. My salvation and my honor depend on God; he is my mighty rock, my refuge. Trust him all times, O people; pour out your hearts to him for God is our refuge.” (NIV)

Bangkwang Central Prison is located in Nonthaburi Province, just the north of Bangkok City, Thailand. When I was transferred from Kanjanaburi Province Prison to Bangkwang Central Prison, in January 1989, it was the only place where they kept the worse and big criminals and the heavy sentence prisoners, such as those who were sentenced from 30 years to life or death sentences. There were 13 sections or buildings and I was sent to live in building#6. It was detained building and high security building and did not allow to go and work or visit outside the building and it was not allowed to contact the other buildings as well. Most prisoners were life sentence and the remaining were those who committed crime or committed inside cases from other buildings. I knew that I was one of the criminals in the sight of the law but my problem that moment was I was in the middle of the worse of the worst prisoners.

Nai in his bedroom/study room/prayer room

Since I was arrested in Three Pagoda Pass Village, Ampur Sankharaburi, Thai and Burma Border, I was lost all my money and properties. So when I came to Bangkwang Prison, I owned one old blanket, 2 shorts, and 2 T. shirts and an old New Testament in Burmese without cover which I brought from Kanjanaburi Prison. Other than those I had nothing including my daily necessities such as toothpaste, washing powder, soap, shampoo etc. I lived in Burma, all my family, relatives and friends were there. They did not know where I was.  Even though they knew where I was, there was no way to reach me. I did not have any stamps, envelopes to contact my family in Burma. No one could visit and help me from outside world.

I also could not communicate with other prisoners; I could not speak Thai at all. My two case-partners could speak Thai but since they even could not stand by themselves well, they could not help me too. And there were another 4 Burmese in the same building but they too had to struggling badly to pass on day by day to help themselves, so how they could help me. One of them, named Ko Tint Lwin, murder case, with life sentence, from Southern Burma, told me about the missionary who have came and visited prisoners once a month and he introduced me Mailbox Club Bible lessons from Pattaya City and he also handed me an Old and New Testament Bible. He made me to see the ray of hope and it became like the seed of my hope to stand and going on toward my uncertain future even though I had no opportunity for that moment to meet the missionary because of the fetter in my legs. Any prisoners with fetters were not allowed to go and meet the missionary. I was fettered since the day I was judged by Kanjanaburi court into life sentence but the court reduced and approved my sentence into 33 years 4 months, in December 26, 1988. I had to carry the fetter during my new-comers training period and until the authorities in the building #6 satisfy on my behaviors and give the permission to free of it. It was took me time around two months and I was free from the fetter at last and I got the right to meet the missionary like other prisoners once a month outside the building at the prison hall. I started to know Pastor Randy Bell and later Dr, Jim Bryant from Calvary Baptist Church, Soi 2, Bangkok. I started hearing the great and unlimited love of God and the redemptive work of Jesus Christ through the message from the missionaries. And I also did the Mailbox Clab Correspondence Course through Pattaya City Church which ministered and running by Rev. Jack and Glad Martin together Ms. Jane Galle, the grader of the lessons. And I had learned about Jesus Christ and His great work through the missionaries and the lessons and I accepted Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior and I was baptized in the pool near the prison hall, by Dr. U Kyaw Than who was given the authority to baptize from the Calvary Baptist Church, Soi 2, Bangkok, in June 26, 1989.

I have learned about the wonderful love of Jesus Christ who has given His life to the sinners through other missionaries as well especially who regularly visited the foreigners and later also Thai prisoners, as Charles and Lourdes Holmes and their team. They came and visited us weekly and taught us the Bible and also gave us the Rogma International Bible Correspondent two years Course for a diploma and other Bible courses and also helping us with our daily necessities that we need in prison. And there were also Burmese missionary groups from Calvary Baptist Church, Soi 2, Bangkok, leading by Pastor Too Jar, Pastor Zaw Min, Thramu Naw Tu Lu, Naw Mi Mi, Ko San Aung, pastor Parny Maung, including from the ministries of the Light of Mon People leading by Rev. Nai Tun Thein, Rev. Nai Tun Than, Ko Min Zaw Zaw and some other brothers and sisters in Christ as well came and visited regularly and occasionally and share the message of the love of God through their the words and deeds. I felt the love of God through the missionaries and I also longed and expected to receive the same love from the prisoners around me as well. But I found out that life in prison was just thoroughly different from the life of Jesus in the Bible. Prison taught and guided and pushed man directly or indirectly to be selfish. It looked like those who were more selfish were more suitable to live better life and to be survived in prison. Not only me, there were so many people, some people worse than me, who were in need. Many people wandered around and were talking alone in the building, eating rubbish from the cabbage, drinking dirty water from the drains. I had learned that all those men were just normal like us when they newly come to prison, and they later could not bear the situations and became like half crazy man.

When I was newly come to building #6, there were around 700 inmates and about 8 guards only looking at the prisoners. The guards were not always there; sometime there were only one or two guards and sometimes not even one guard in the buildings. The authorities appointed some prisoners to controls the remaining prisoners. Especially in the dormitory, there were no guards at all; we have to stay from 4:00 pm to next 7:00am. The building #6 dormitory was two stories building, and there was a corridor room at both stories and there were the cells both the left and the right side of the corridor. The trustees and those who can spend money were allowed to sleep in the corridor room and they were the persons who had broken the law. There were a few gangs moving around there especially the gang from Southern Thailand controlled the gambling party and drug (heroin) dealing and money lender in the building. The drug was so expensive in prison so they usually used needle to shoot into the veins to be effective with the small amount and it was one of the reasons transferring the HIV and AIDS to one another. And there were homosexual and man prostitutes as well transferring that kind of disease in the building. And there were many people who have suffered with T.B, Malaria, so many kinds of skin diseases, HIV and AIDS. For those who cause the disease seriously especially the TB, they had separated bed room for them but it seem could not control the infections.

The education system was so weak in my early years in Bangkwang prison, and there were a lot of illiterates among the prisoners. I saw often the beating, fighting, stabbing, and sometimes killing one another or among the gangs. Right after 20 days I reached to Bangkwang prison, there was a murder case in front of me. The man with the fetter used a cement dumbbell and beat the head of another man who was turning his face to the wall and eating his breakfast and as the man fainted and fell down on the grown, he grasped and pulled his hair and lifted the head up and put on his lap and cut the throat with a small knife and at the same time the blood was spurting out and hit on the murderer’s face but it was not disturbed him to continue cutting the throat. After he satisfied what he had done, he just pushed the body down and walked away to the building gate in order to go outside the building and to be surrendered at the central office. All the guards and the trustees at the building gate were run away out of the building when they saw the murderer was walking straight toward them with blood painted face and the whole body. The place where the murder killed the man was far from me only about three meters and the murderer was the same man who was my roommate and who slept close to me and he was from the southern of Thailand with murder and robbery case who was sentenced to life.

I realized myself that I was really in the mid of troubles, I had to worry for myself, for my daily need, for my family, for the secure of life and for my future and so many other things. And the shadow of fear was greatly control my mind and thoughts. I was asking myself and questioning in my heart, “Who can help me?” repeatedly—again and again. This question was pondered in my mind not just now in Bangkwang but since the first night I got my sentence in Kanjanaburi province. I was looking and searching for someone, the human being, who can help me but when I did not find anyone, my mind turn to looking for the supernatural things. I came from Buddha religion background and I seriously tried to practice the meditation to quiet my mind and anxiousness. I tried to pray the Buddha to help me, I tried to read the Bible and I tried to pray God to help me in the name of Jesus.

In Matthew 11:28-30, Jesus says, “Come to Me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For My yoke is easy and My burden is light.”

I had read the Bible verses but I didn’t understand well the real meaning. I kept depending only on myself by the works, by meditation, by praying the Buddha, by reading the Bible, praying in Jesus’ name, by keeping the commandments, by doing the Bible lessons regularly, even after I was baptized. All the works that trying to carry the burdens by myself could not work well. But I still kept going on without realizing myself and just with my sincere heart until the day I met Jesus in my vision in the early morning in my quiet time in October21, 1990. This thing made me to believe and trust Him with all my heart, my soul and my body and had made me to accept Him as the only One Lord and Savior of my life. At the same time I have got the new life and I have been saved both mentally and spiritually. I could say I have been saved physically as well. I was born-again and received the Holy Spirit on that day. My perspectives of life also changed and there was a new hope for the future. I could start to live with a smiling face in prison and the Holy Spirit gives me strength to endure as I had to pass through all the sufferings and temptations and tasting in prison. After I had stayed near ten years in Bangkwang prison, I was moved to Klong Prem Central Prison in Bangkok in April 22, 1998. And I was transferred again to Klong Pai Prison, the Northeastern of Thailand and after that to Nang Rong Prison, near Cambodia’s border again. I had faced different kinds of difficulties and sufferings in the different prisons among the different people and cultures. My faith also sometime was going up and down during those years. But the love of God is never changed and He is with me always since the day I was born again and until now. I had served 18 years and 9 months in prison and at last God answered my prayer and saved me not only spiritually but also physically and God allowed me to enjoy the freedom of life again. I can’t describe by the word how much I thank God but I know that I thank Him never enough from the bottom of my heart for His protections and providences and encouragements during my hardest 18 years and 9 month in the lion den. Today I found out myself as a final year student in KKBBSC Bible College in Burma and Thai border. This thing also was possible, not by my own—but only by God alone, not by my might but by His.

I give this testimony, I just want my beloved readers to know that God of the Bible is a Living God—He is with us, and He listens and answers our prayers in His time. He is so good to all of us.

May God Richly Bless you all always.

Psalm 116: 1-6, “I love the Lord, for He heard my voice; He heard my cry for mercy. Because He turned His ear to me, I will call on Him as long as I live. The cords of death entangled me, the anguish of the grave came upon me; I was overcome by trouble and sorrow. Then I called on the name of the Lord: “O Lord, save me!” The Lord is gracious and righteous; our God is full of compassion. The Lord protects the simple-hearted; when I was in great need, He saved me.”

With Love In Christ

Nai Thaung Myint

Final Year

KKBBSC