Wolf Creek Baptist Church, Wolf Creek MT

Our trip to Malaysia got interesting after we were robbed of everything
but the clothes on our back and stranded hundreds of miles from the US embassy     

           

August 14th 2008, Thursday

The day started out good on our last day at the Pulai Springs resort in Johor, Malaysia.  We woke up and met Tobin and Kristin for breakfast.  After breakfast everyone packed up and headed for the pool to swim before we left.  I stayed back to read my Bible with instructions from Kim to bring the suitcase and backpack down to the pool and check out.  I checked out and brought the bags to the pool and set them next to Kim’s chair.  We all swam and relaxed by the pool for an hour or so.  We were all lying in our chairs with our eyes closed.  Kim and Kristin went to change. Next, at some point in time, Tobin got up to go the bathroom.  This is when the thieves struck.  Apparently they were waiting for the right time.  They slipped in, dropped and empty backpack, picked up mine and left.  We never even knew they were there until it was time to go.  I decided to get my pack and go change.  I seen a black backpack sitting where mine should have been.  Tobin and I knew what had happened.  We ran to the girls to make sure they never took it for some reason, they didn’t.  We ran and got security and the hotel manager.  They never did much at all.  It was gone.  All our passports, credit cards, money, camcorder, camera, my Bible, gospel tracts, razor and other misc things.  Panic.  What happens when you lose passports in a foreign country?  We were about to find out. 

We started making calls, that were not cheap, to cancel credit cards and find out what to do.  We called the embassy and were told to get a policy report and report to the capital city of Malaysia, Kuala Lumpur at the US embassy with pictures for new passports.  The Hotel was no help at all.  They charged us for internet use and phone calls, even though we were robbed in their hotel.  I got on credit card canceled but not my debit card because the time difference meant by bank was closed.  I went with the security man to the police station.  The police wouldn’t even come to the resort.  The police station was as big as a small one story house with a couple kids running it.  It was worthless.  The security man made out a policy report, which would later prove to be extremely valuable, and printed it out and we went back.  Outside the resort, the town and country for the most part, is very poor and run down with lots of crime.  We got back and had to make a decision of what to do.  Kuala Lumpur was 4 ½ hours away on a crazy highway that is known for bad drivers.  Tobin had a car that belonged to his boss and wasn’t sure he was even insured in Malaysia.  Tobin decided to risk it and drive us all to Kuala Lumpur.  We found a place to get our pictures and drove for 4 ½ hours wondering what was going to happen next.  We had to be at the embassy first thing in the morning because it was Friday and if we never got there on time we would have to wait until Monday.  Our plane flies out Friday at 1:00PM and it was looking more and more likely that we would miss our flight. 

We drove into the big city of millions of people late that night.  The roads and traffic were crazy.  Very confusing exits and the exit signs were after the exits, which made no sense.  It was stressful trying to get where we need to be.  But by the grace of God we made it downtown to a hotel that looked good and stayed the night.  We spent hours more that night on the phone and internet trying to re-route flights and cancel hotels and credit cards.  We were supposed to fly out on China airlines and talking with them was useless.  They gave us no options. 

The next morning everyone but Tobin went to the embassy at 8:00am.  We explained our situation.  They started working on our passports.   The pictures were the wrong size and with the wrong background so we had to walk a half mile to get new pictures taken.  There was no phone or internet available for use at the embassy.  Kristin left to work at the hotel.  We had problems because we never had our old passport numbers or the boy’s social security numbers.  I had all this information written down but it was in the bag that was stolen.  Another almost devastating blow was the US passed a new law that both legal parents had to sign for the kids.  By the grace of God, again, they lady found in the computer that Kim had full custody and allowed us to get the passports. 

We were next informed that we had to get to the Malaysia Immigration office, which was an hour away, to get our passports stamped.  Again, if we never got this done today we would be stuck until Monday.  It looked like we had plenty of time because it was only 11:30am.  We then found out some more bad news.  Because Malaysia was an Islamic Government, all Government offices were closed on Friday from 12:00-2:30 for prayer day.  Immigration was the same.  We rushed back to the hotel to get Tobin and Kristen.  The cab driver we had was trying to rob us, as usual.  He was taking us far from the hotel to charge us more.  I seen he was doing this and told him to pull over.  We got out and tried to get another cab.  The cab drivers pretended they never knew where the hotel was because they never wanted to bring us there because it was too close.  We found a Muslim lady that took us there in her cab. 

We met Kristin and Tobin and they gave us money and sent us off in a cab to the immigration office early in hopes that we could get someone to help us early.  We had a good cab driver, who was Catholic.  He brought us right to there and waited for us.  We were in a 5000 acre government complex that was filled with all Muslims for the most part.  Nothing was in English.  We could get no one to help us.  We got set to the 3^rd floor, then to the 5^th, then the 1^st again, then the 3^rd again, then the 4^th again, then the 3^rd again.  Finally I just started pulling people aside and asking where I need to go.  Finally we found it on the fourth floor by the grace of God.  They were closed of course.  I found a man that was working and explained our situation and begged him to help us.  He started to but couldn’t find any of us in the system without our old passport numbers and told us to come back at 2:30.  It was only 12:30.  We waited for a long time.  The men looked like Bin Laden and the women were all covered from head to toe.  At 2:00 I begged the man again to help us and he did.  He started early but still couldn’t find us in the system.  I never ate hardly anything since the bag got stolen yesterday and had no appetite now.  God intervened and he found our names.  He didn’t understand how they got in there.  He blamed it on a glitch in the system.    He found us and got the process going.  We waited for two grueling hours.  The immigration office was like the court house when your renewing a license but with hundreds of more people and nothing in English.  We listened to people chattering in other languages for the two hours.  It was very unfamiliar and scary.  We already missed our plane but that was the last of our worries.  All we wanted to do is get out of Malaysia.  It was a bad feeling that we couldn’t buy our way out of the country with a million dollars.  Without a stamp we couldn’t leave.  We were forced to rely on God for everything.  He was in full control and ordained this to happen in the first place and we trusted in Him for deliverance. 

It wasn’t easy to trust in God and sit back and relax knowing everything would work out.  I certainly wasn’t like Jesus when He was in the boat with His disciples during the storm, sleeping.  It is easy to know something, but until you experience it, you won’t really know it.  I know God is in control of everything and that He is my Rock, my Fortress, and my Deliverer in whom I can trust but until God strips you of everything and leaves you stranded in a foreign country with your only hope to be Him, you then can only understand.  You move from the realm of belief to experience.  Praise God for that.  We were at our breaking point.  I was able to get a hold of Kristen from our cab drivers phone.  He called the bell boy and the bell boy got Kristin.  Kristen told us that Craig found plane tickets and that everyone was praying for us back home.  I broke down and fought tears.   I was so overwhelmed of God’s goodness and for His saints back home praying.

They called our name and gave us our stamped passports and we were off.  The cab driver was still waiting.  We got back late.  Tobin and Kristin were waiting.  We ate dinner and took off.  For once we never got lost on the confusing roads and made it onto the highway.  We now had to risk a 5 ½ hour drive on crazy roads with crazy drivers at night.  Tobin drove us home safe by the grace of God.  We got stopped leaving Malaysia at the border and had to go inside.  Were we ever going to get out of this country?  After some confusion and debate over our passports, they stamped them and we were free to go.  We had to fill out some papers to get back into Singapore and we were back at Tobin and Kristin’s apartment.  God delivered us. 

I grew a lot in my faith through this.  This is one of the reasons it happened.  If my bag was going to be stolen it was a good thing that it was filled with Gospel tracts in several different languages and a Bible.  I have been praying that God would use the Bible and tracts to save someone, even the thieves.  Sometimes we wonder why these things happen but we can never forget that we serve a big God that is in full control of all His creation and that He foreordains all things to happen for His glory and our good.  So we praise God for this experience.  The stolen bag cost me around $7000, but it was money well spent to directly experience God.  How much would you pay to experience the hand of God delivering you?





Southern most point of Asia





Handing out gospel tracts in Singapore