Finding the Grace to Die - Part 1 — Jackie Pullinger

She's scared of coming home. She's been so long alone. She sat up on her throne until it crumbled. And now she's got to choose. She's nothing left to lose. She's battered and she's bruised and feeling humbled and sad.

And there's this real expectancy that God was going to do something, that revival was going to somehow break out in this conference setting.

Jackie’s Challenge to the Church

And Jackie spoke one session and said some things that undid me and I believe most of the people that were at this conference. She challenged us with things that we had never been challenged with. She brought things to our mind that we had never thought of.

Our hearts were exposed. And it did. It undid me. It changed me. And part of what I recognized the Lord doing through Jackie as she spoke is bringing to the church a word of love and compassion, but with incredible authority.

This is not a message that you just say, oh, wasn't that nice and go home. You can't do it. And the authority that God has placed upon Jackie as she speaks is from Him, but it also is married with the things that she has done in her life.

As she has said over and over and over again, yes, yes, I will obey Lord. And so I know that what Jackie will share in the next number of days will challenge us. It will undo us. But it is the heart of the Father so that we as the people of God will represent Him as He wants.

And so I welcome you, Jackie, to Edmonton and we ask God's blessing upon you as you share with us this morning. Welcome, Jackie Bollinger-Toe.

Just so we can get the record straight, I've been in Hong Kong 30 years and I was two when I went. And I'm quite honestly admit to lying. I brought a team with me from Hong Kong and the great guys. I'm sorry to say I've not brought any of our ex-addicts.

We have an immigration problem. So it's very hard for us to bring, I think, some of the best people in the world. It's very hard for them to get into these countries here, even though you desperately need them.

But I've brought also some great guys with me and all of them are working with us in different ways. And in a minute some of them will share. I want to close your eyes because these are words from the Lord.

Bearing the Cross and Receiving a New Heart

Are you willing to bear my cross as I did once? If you say you love me, are you willing to bear my cross? Can you show me your love, not by word only, but also by your deed? As the way that I've shown you mine.

I just feel like there's fear in some of the people here, just not knowing what God is going to do to them. Or that He's going to send you to some place that you don't like or just serve people you don't like.

And that's also a thing about not wanting to face the own pain in your heart. But God just feel like He want to heal you. I will take away your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. And I will be your God and you will be my people.

So we thank you Jesus for dying for us and we ask that you continue to impart your heart to us. That we do have a heart of flesh like you. I ask that you work this in us this morning through the cross.

In Jesus name. So the Lord's spoken to us already about fear. And I believe that one of the great lies that the enemy bombards the church with is that to live the cross is hard. And what I want to share with you is that this is the better part to read from 1 Corinthians 1 .23.

The Foolishness and Power of the Cross

Start from 21. For since in the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom didn't know Him, God was pleased through the foolishness of what was preached to save those who believe. Jews demand miraculous signs and Greeks look for wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified.

A stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those whom God has called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. For the foolishness of God is wiser than man's wisdom and the weakness of God is stronger than man's strength.

Brothers, think of what you were when you were called. Not many of you were wise by human standards. Not many were influential. Not many were of noble birth. But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise.

God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong. He chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things and the things that are not to nullify the things that are so that no one may boast before Him.

It's because of Him that you are in Christ Jesus who has become for us wisdom from God. That is our righteousness, holiness and redemption. Therefore, as it is written, let him who boasts boast in the Lord.

Discovering Spiritual Poverty Among the Poor

Yesterday Gary was talking about admitting our poverty and I believe that one of the reasons why we should minister with the poor is because it's in our interest. It's because it's in this way that God allows us to understand Him better.

When I first got to Hong Kong, I met a man and he used to bang the pavement with his head. And he's a bit strange. But he thought if he could make enough noise and if he could hit the pavement and draw blood, he maybe, when he begged, he could get more money than if he just held out his tin.

So he used to wail like this. Ah! Ah! And that was his day as his head was bleeding. And I didn't know who he was or why he needed to bleed in the street. But somewhere there was something in that terrible groan that was calling out for the one I knew.

And I didn't know how to tell him at that time about the one I knew. If he'd spoken English, if he could have read, if he was well enough in his mind to sit in a room and hear a lecture, I could have explained about the unspotted lamb who bled for him.

But I couldn't do that. How would he know? How would he understand? I didn't know how to preach the Gospel. I only knew the theory. I only knew some words about it. I'd only done a two-week course. But the course was only for people who could read.

And I didn't know how to introduce a man who groaned and bled to another man who groaned and bled. Because he understood him. People, this is why Jesus tells us to go. The reason that he tells us to go is that it's when you see those that you know you cannot help that you realize your poverty.

And when you know you cannot help them, and when you know you have nothing of yourself, then you're made rich in every way. It's God's mercy to us. For he wants us to draw upon a love which is enough for us and enough for them.

For he said, you will always have enough to give away. And I had gone to Hong Kong with a little overflow. A little. I'd not known Jesus very long, but I'd been so surprised by his love. It was not what I had expected.

You know, I had grown up believing in God. I just hadn't liked him. And it was such a surprise to find out who he was and what a white place he brought me to. So I went with some overflow of gratitude.

Ministry in the Walled City

But so quickly, so quickly, I found that that which I thought I could give ran out. And I met a lady who took me to a place called the Walled City. And it's a very awful city. It was outside Hong Kong's law.

At that time, it's very difficult to imagine. When I've seen all your fields out there, I keep wanting to know what's in your fields. And I'm told it's grass. This is very hard for us to understand, you know, that you've actually got fields with grass in.

Because in Hong Kong, there isn't room for anyone. In the Walled City, there were about five or six acres containing 100 ,000 people. And with no light, no electricity, and no running water, just a public toilet where obviously it didn't flush.

And they would just collect the stuff once a week and pile up the bodies overnight, the ones who'd overdosed. Because as it was an illegal city, it was a very easy place to sell drugs because the police didn't officially go in there.

And so when they were selling bad heroin, the people would die. And so they just piled them up by the toilet. And this Christian lady found me, and she asked me to go visit some people. And she sent me to a family where the mother and father lived on a bed.

Actually, there are many people like this. They just had a bed, that's it. It's called a bed space. And they had 11 children. The reason they had 11 was that in Asia, it's very important to have sons, and they were girls.

So they kept trying. And the mother was pregnant again with twins. She's still trying to have a son because a son would make her rich in her old age. She would have someone to care for her, and that is what all mothers want.

So the father is out of work, and this Christian lady sends me to this family and says, you must do something. And then there's another family where the father had to give up his job because his wife went into the mental hospital, and he was looking after three children.

And then she sent me to another family where they live on the top of a roof. And in Wall City, like in other places, they just build on top of one another because there's no room anywhere else. So if you can squat on somebody's roof, it's cheap.

And they had a plastic tablecloth, which was to catch the rain. And they had a double bed, and everything they did, that family, they were called the Jung family, everything they did was on the bed. The mother had her baby on the bed, and the baby learned to walk on the bed.

And all the children ate on the bed, and they cooked on the bed. There wasn't anything else in the house. And I used to go visit this family, and all I ever saw them eat was rice gruel. It's kind of, you just make white rice wet, and it's sort of like porridge.

And they never had anything in it because the father was a drug addict. And I knew that if I took a tin or something like that of food, he would pawn it or sell it for drug money. So sometimes I took a sausage, and then they could cut up the sausage, and they could just have something else but white rice.

When I went to see the family, the five children are very shy. And I suppose if you've got shy children here, they can run to the bottom of the garden, or across the field, or sit in their room. But where do you go if you're shy and you live on a bed, and a Westerner comes to visit you?

When I used to go talk to the mother, all the children used to face the wall, a row of children's backs, and they just pretended they weren't there, because they were shy. And I used to tell the mother about Jesus, and she came to know Him, and we used to pray.

And then I would say to her, I'm so sorry, I'm so sorry, I've nothing else to give you. I didn't have any money at that time, and I'd just given her a sausage. I just prayed with her, that's all I could do.

And she would turn to me, and she was so sweet. And she would say to me, that's all right, that's all right. You see, when you've gone, Jesus comes and sits with me, and we talk. And I looked at her face, this poor lady, and I saw that she was so rich.

Jesus came and sat on her bed, and I was so jealous. She met Jesus in a way I'd not. She knew Him in a way I didn't. She was richer than I. And I went back to the lady that kept sending me to all these people.

And I can remember feeling nearly hysterical. And I said, why do you keep doing this? Why do you send me to these families? I haven't got anything. Hong Kong is thick on the ground with Christian agencies.

They're everywhere. All you have to do is visit Hong Kong and you can see every other block there's a Christian something. And they've got buildings, and they've got organizations, and they've got brochures, and they've got dentists, and they've got doctors, and they've got noodles, and they've got handouts.

And I said, why? Why would you send me? I haven't got any of these things. And this lady said, I send you because you care. And that was all I had. Having actually thought I could go to Hong Kong to share something, I found all I had when I got there was a broken heart.

And I must tell you this before you start. That's actually all you need. It's all you need. And it's where you start. It doesn't matter how much you know about spiritual gifts, spiritual warfare, or anything else.

If you haven't his broken heart, there's no starting place. Because it's that heart that they need. Only a broken heart understands a broken heart. Only a bleeding man understands a bleeding man. Only one who emptied himself understands one who has nothing.

Grace, Repentance, and Dying to Self

And so I found that having arrived with so much to give, I was very soon aware of my poverty. And then, because I was aware of my poverty, I became rich in grace. Now you see, grace, people often teach, is free.

Well, no, it's not. Grace comes after repentance. And repentance means a mind changed. And my mind and my heart says, God, I am deficient. I'm deficient in resources. I'm deficient in love. I'm deficient in patience.

God, I have run out. I'm made rich. Then, I receive grace. Then I can go on. Because now I use his heart, not the overflow of mine, yet making many rich, having nothing, and yet possessing everything.

So I understood a little bit, at least I was just learning, what it meant to die. Because the moment we understand dying, we're raised to life. But it's something that we all practice. And it's not a one-time thing.

It's not the day we come to Christ and then never again. It's an ongoing thing. You know, one of the things that I have liked the least in most of my years in Hong Kong was not having a room to myself.

Well, in God's mercy, I'm married to a man. But you know, for most of the years I was in Hong Kong, I had to share a bedroom with girls. And I didn't like sharing a bedroom with girls at all. Because you know what they want to do?

They want to talk. And they want to talk at night. And I don't want to talk at night, especially not about what they want to talk about. And I'm bored, you know. And I found at night time, when I was exhausted, this is what I want to do.

I want to read my book or go to sleep or pray. I do not want to talk. But they want to talk. I knew that's night, but morning's worse. I mean, morning's are bad enough anyway. And people are always sending me these terrible calendars, you know, about Jesus getting up early in the morning.

And so many times I woke up in the morning and I saw girls in my room. Well, it started because I got two girls who didn't have homes. And one of them, when she was small, her mother died and her father remarried.

And his second wife had her own children. And she didn't like the first wife's children. So they were not allowed to eat at home. She and her brother were sent out with begging bowls. They had to beg for their food while their stepmother's children ate food.

So she landed up in a children's home. And when she was too old for the children's home, she lived in Wall City and she was very vulnerable. So I took her to my home. And then there was another one. And then there was another one, you know.

And when I got flu, they thought the best thing they could do would be to get into bed with me and tickle me, you know. All I want to do is put the covers over my head and die. And they think it's nice to come and tickle me.

That's their understanding of giving me comfort, you know. And I would wake up in the morning. At one time, I was on the bottom bunk. And on the top bunk, there was a girl from England who'd heard that we got guys off drugs through praying in the power of the Spirit.

So she used to come and stay and learn. And there was another bed in the room with another friend of mine. And on the floor, we got a girl pregnant, a Chinese girl. And she was getting off heroin. And she was, I think she was six months pregnant and about 15 days constipated.

And if you know what that combination is, somebody who's actually coming off drugs, six months pregnant and constipated, that is the most ghastly combination. And we have somebody on duty with her, of course, every minute of the day.

But it also happened to be my bedroom. So I was trying to sleep. And she's groaning and screaming and refusing to pray. And I wake up in the morning, and I see this lot. And I say, Oh, God. Oh, God, I hate this.

Oh, God. And I'm wondering whether to turn over, you know, because I've got to look at these girls. And then I say, God, I just hate this. Please give me grace. And He does. See? But I need that every day.

I mean, I need that every day. For years and years and years, I didn't have a nightdress. The reason I didn't have a nightdress was that there were always people arriving in the middle of the night. And so for lots and lots of times, I had to get up at night.

I remember one time a guy rang me at 2 a .m., and he said, Oh, Puntius, which is my name, I think I've killed my wife. Would you mind coming round to see? And another time there are detectives knocking on the door and saying that we've just arrested one of your men or we're looking for someone, or the phone calls from the police station.

And at another time we've got all these people coming off drugs, and God was doing miracles, but we've got no one to help. So I slept on a sofa for a couple of years in the sitting room, because we at that time got no helpers.

So for obvious reasons, I didn't wear nightclothes, because I was always being called upon. So what happened was that at night I used to have my shower and get into tomorrow's clothes and then sleep on them.

So I was very, very deficient in nightclothes. I was very deficient in time to sleep. But you know something? I went back to England after about ten years of this, and I can remember wearing a nightdress.

And as I slept in it, I thought, nobody else enjoys their nightdress like me. You see, you think it's your right to have one, and you think it's your right to sleep at night, but the message of the Cross is no rights, no rights.

Giving Up Rights and Receiving Everything as a Gift

You lose all your rights, or rather maybe you don't lose them, you might choose to give them up. And if you choose to give them up, and there is no rights at all, not any, then you see everything after that, everything is a present.

Everything. And I can remember some friends, after I'd been in Hong Kong for about four years, they invited me to a steak restaurant, and it was the first time I'd been out to dinner in four years. And I was so enjoying the steak, you know.

And they were all saying to one another, oh, this restaurant isn't what it used to be, is it? Really poor service, you know. And I looked at them and I thought, poor things, poor things. But me, I mean, I'm the perfect person to take out to dinner.

You can't imagine, you see. Everything's wonderful for me. Everything's wonderful for me. You think it's your right to have a steak dinner. But me, I'm enjoying it. It's a gift. And when we learn that this is a choice to give up our rights to anything at all, then everything we ever have becomes a gift.

And we're grateful. And we're thankful. And we understand that we live by grace, and that God is constantly showering His heart and His provision an extra, extra, extra blessings all the time. And suddenly we learn that it's the opposite way around.

People look at us and they think, this is a hard life that you live. And the church preaches a strange message. A message that goes like, a few poor people are called to the mission field and they have to live harder than everyone else.

While most normal Christians stay at home. I tell you, you've got it wrong. You've got it wrong. We're the rich ones. We know God's grace. We know more of His heart. And that's why everyone's supposed to go.

This is not some people stay and some people go. This is why we were all told to go. This is why the Gospel is for every Christian. And this is why everyone must go. Must go. Must go somewhere. Because when we go, and most especially when we go outside our culture, outside our language, outside our comfort, outside our boundary lines, then we realize how deficient we are.

Then we repent. Then we call upon the Lord. And then unfairly, unfairly, we're made rich. But this is my longing for you. This is my longing for the church. And I believe the enemy has cheated us for so long.

Polly’s Testimony of Dying to Self

I'm going to introduce you to a couple of people now who are going to share a little bit of their experience in this so far. So I'm going to ask Polly to come first. Polly's from your country.

Hi. I was asked to talk about dying this morning. There's not much that I can say about myself, basically, but for the past couple of months that I've been in Hong Kong, it's been really hard, but it's been really awesome too because the first time I heard someone talk about you're supposed to die to yourself when you come to Christ, it's just like, what are you talking about?

But Jesus died for me and he gave me new life, so what do I do with the old one? It's kind of like an onion and how God just takes one layer off at a time and he does it for you, but you have to make the decision for him to let him do it and you have to take that one piece of onion skin and you have to go and take it to the cross.

And every time you do that, he just gives you more of himself and more of his grace and it's just so awesome. Sometimes it's just like, wow, you see God and he's just like, he's so amazing. Like, he is so cool.

And I mean, he's just so cool. Like, I don't know how to say it. It's just like, I mean, when you're worshiping, sometimes you feel big, like this, like this. It doesn't even describe how you feel. And every time you decide to let him work in you and let him kill you, basically, kill the old you, it's like taking 100 steps closer to where he wants you to be and that place, I don't even know how to describe.

Like, Brian Dirksen has a song and I was listening to it this morning and it says, there must be a place where dreams come true. There must be a time when I'm free to fly. And that doesn't even describe this place and how you're, like, what you're going to be and what you're going to feel when you get there.

And, I mean, you just can't describe it. And, I mean, every time you feel, like, really good and just, I mean, it feels horrible when you're dying. It's just like, God, I'm dying, you know. And sometimes you're like, I'm dead.

And he likes it and he goes, no, you're not. There's more to go. And you're just like, oh, my goodness. But you just got to keep your eyes on him and, like, just not look at the problem because the problem will just get bigger and bigger.

He just, you just got to trust him that he'll do it because he's not going to leave you hanging. And, um, what have I been doing? What have I been doing in Hong Kong? I've been dying. I've been living with a bunch of girls.

I'm really nervous. We get up and we go out and we go to methadone clinics and we meet drug addicts and we work with drug addicts. We live with drug addicts, well, ex-drug addicts. And it's really hard because God doesn't just kill you in one second and say, okay, here's the new you.

He does it slowly because if he did it just like that, I don't know, he just doesn't. But he's doing it in me and he's doing it in everyone I'm living with. And the thing is, while he's doing it, things like yucky stuff comes out and we all have to see it and we all have to deal with it and it's just really hard.

And, um, sometimes you feel like you're really happy and sometimes you feel like you're really low. And it's the low times, like the downers, that God really comes like this. He's like this close to you and he says, I'm here, I'm in your face, you need me, you want me.

And you're like, uh-huh, I do. And he says, okay, you can have me. And then when you look back and you're in your happy times, it's like, yeah, God was there and he's just totally there for you and he's not going to let you go.

Sometimes it feels like, God, hello, are you listening? But he's listening. And I know, like, I'm 18 years old and not one second of my life has he ever had his face turned away from me because he knows you and he knows what you need.

He knows what's in your heart. And sometimes you're hanging on by a really thin thread and he's that piece of thread. And it seems really thin, but it's stronger than any big, thick rope you'll ever hold on to.

The Cost of Successful Ministry

Actually, because of Polly and people like Polly, we have people who are alive today who would have been dead otherwise, I mean, both physically and for eternity. It's very simple for us now to save people through Jesus.

It's very simple. The difficulty for us is that Jesus is so successful. That's the difficulty. You see, last week, just three days earlier than this, I went to a drug addicts meeting and eight drug addicts came to know Jesus.

That's wonderful, but it's also awful. I don't know what you would feel like if eight came to know Jesus. You might say, thank God. But we say thank God with a qualification because they all want to live with us.

And the awful thing is that they find Jesus so sweet. The next time they come to a meeting, they bring their friends. It's just like Gary said yesterday. When they find the Savior, they don't shut up.

And they bring their friends, and they want Jesus, and they want to live with us too. And this goes on every week. And sometimes I've had mothers, and two mothers come. And I understand minutely how poor Solomon must have felt.

These two mothers come, and one of them actually kneels down in front of me. And they both say, my son, my son, let it be my son. How can you choose between two sons? How can you choose which one has life?

We don't know how to choose. I've never been clever at choosing this. Because they both seem to want Jesus. And we've only got one place in our house. Of course, God has a lot of room in His heart. So that's why our houses are always getting bigger.

That's why every year we add more. But you know the problem is when we add more, more people come to Christ. That's a great problem. Because the more successful that Jesus is, the more famous His heart is, the more people run after Him.

And we never quite... What a terrible problem. But we've had people like Polly. And we've had people like Johnny. And they give their lives. They practice, as Polly said, dying. Lots of people have heard that through the power of the Holy Spirit we can get people off drugs.

And I wrote about this. I remember the girl, who was sleeping on the upper bunk while I was trying to sleep on the lower bunk, leaning down one night and saying to me, Jackie, I thought you wrote in your book all you have to do is pray in tongues and people get off drugs.

Why does this seem so hard? And I said, I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to write that it's just praying in tongues that gets people off drugs. It's not. It's the love of God demonstrated by Jesus dying on the cross.

That's what changes people's hearts. Wonderful way of calling on that heart. That's it. But there isn't a quicker way. And you know, we've got so many poor people that live with us and drug addicts who've come off drugs with us.

And I often ask them, what was most important to you when you were coming off drugs? Because the world thinks that the testimony is, I prayed in tongues and I had a miraculous healing. No. Every single one would have said this.

The brothers loved me. They sat with me morning and night. They massaged me. They sang to me. They gave me baths. They prayed with me. They fed me noodles. They held me. They wouldn't let me go. It was the love of the brothers and the power of the Holy Spirit.

But you see, the love of the brothers is how they come to understand the love of Christ. And all we need is a few more people who'll do that. So thank God for Polly. And I'm going to ask Johnny to share his experience.

Johnny’s Testimony of Dependence on God

I spent my time in Hong Kong. I went with a group from my church that did a YWAM type school. I spent six months there working with Vietnamese refugees who were trying to get out of the refugee camp but first had to get off drugs so that they could get out.

It was a wonderful experience for me. I think like most people, I've grown up in a Christian family all my life. My dad's been a pastor for a lot of that. And I mean, I have seen myself as a sinful person and I recognize that I have failings.

But until I went and spent some time in Hong Kong, I didn't really understand that... I don't know, maybe just how sinful I was or just where my strength lie. And just spending time there showed me who I was.

I was able to just look inside and spending those nights in a hot room with a fan going and just a sheet over you and a mosquito trying to fly into your ear and six Vietnamese guys snoring. You need God.

And you know you need God. And you cry for all your worth. I remember sometimes just... I climbed a mountain one time and just spent some time up there with God and I could see all the way into China and I could see for miles everywhere.

I just had to cry out and say, God, come, I need you. I can't make it. Being a pastor's kid, you learn to make it in a lot of situations. You learn to look good. You learn to do the right things. You learn how to pray.

You learn how to talk. But when you come to a situation like that, God finds your heart and you realize, man, do I need God. And you learn to really trust in that. That was the biggest thing I came away with is just learning how to die to that self of, yeah, I'm good.

I think most people think, yeah, I sin. I do some things here and there. But I'm kind of better than most people. I'm not that bad. I do a lot of good things. I read the Bible and, hey, I was nice to that person that I don't really like.

But it's a lot more than that. It's can you die to all those little things, all those little desires, eating noodles for breakfast every day when you really like your toast or coffee or whatever it may be.

I wish everyone could go and spend some time with Jackie and her people, but it might either kill their ministry but be wonderful for you. I don't know who they minister to more, the people that come help them or the people that they get to come help.

Yeah, it was a wonderful experience for me. And after I came home from Hong Kong, I had a wonderful dream from God. I don't hardly ever remember my dreams because I'm about as good in the morning as Jackie is.

But I had a really vivid dream. I was just in this black space and just in the middle of nowhere, just kind of like in a dream state. But I could see myself, and I was myself in my dream. And all of a sudden, but at the same time, I was just feeling this complete fear of death and dying.

And, I mean, it's not something that normally controls my life where I like to have a bit of fun and jump off cliffs and I want to go skydiving and things like that. But I was just terrified of dying in this dream.

And this angel appeared. I mean, that's what I interpreted it to be. It was kind of this woman in white and glowing. You know, I mean, it's a dream, so it was an angel. And I was afraid of dying. And somehow just her being there enabled just a peace to come over me.

So I totally wasn't afraid anymore at all. And I had a complete peace. And just, I don't know, maybe the peace of God just came over me in this dream and I was no longer afraid. And then the angel took a sledgehammer and wailed me over the head.

And it was a weird dream. But as I was waking up, you know that waking up feeling when you're just kind of getting into waking, I don't know what it is, but it felt like I was drifting away from my body.