Chak Siu-ming remembers Jean and Rick Willans fondly. More than four decades ago, as a young man addicted to heroin, the American Christian couple helped him to kick his drug habit for good – using only the power of prayer.
Chak, who was orphaned as a teenager, regarded the Willans as his parents; in turn, they called him “son”. After the couple relocated to California in the United States in 1981, he visited them in the early 1990s, staying there for two decades before returning to Hong Kong.
Jean Willans died in Altadena, California, at the age of 95 on April 1. Her death has brought back heartfelt memories for many. Mourners at her funeral service paid tribute to her hospitality, religious devotion and for having saved many lives from drug addiction. She is survived by her husband, daughter Suzy, son-in-law Hugh and three grandchildren.
“If it wasn’t for Jean and Rick, I would be dead, either from the triads or from drugs,” Chak says. Now 66 years old, he manages a warehouse in Fo Tan, in Hong Kong’s New Territories, and is an active participant in his church.
In 1975, Chak – then 21 – met the Willans through Jackie Pullinger, a well-known Hong Kong-based missionary who runs the St Stephen’s Society, which helps recovering addicts.
Pullinger started helping drug users in the 1960s in the crime-riddled Kowloon Walled City in Hong Kong (which was demolished in 1994), and she took many of them to the Willans, who rented several flats for drug addicts to stay in for up to 10 days for daily prayer. After the 10 days were up, they were free to leave.
Chak joined a triad gang when he was 14, and its members would send him to buy heroin for them. Eventually, Chak himself got hooked on it.
“I started taking it casually at first, but I became addicted after a year. Every day I had to have it, and yet every day I wanted to quit. I was arrested three times, each time promising the probation officer I would get clean, but I always went back to drugs,” he recalls.
“The last time I was arrested, I told the probation officer I wanted to quit and he told me to go find Jackie [Pullinger] in Kowloon City. When the door opened, I was surprised to see other [former] triad guys there that I knew.
“They told me if I believed in Jesus, he would save me. The recovering addicts looked well, and they didn’t swear at all – I couldn’t believe it, because every other word they said before was a curse word.”
Pullinger took him to see the couple, who placed him in one of their rented flats where, as he suffered through the grips of withdrawal, a supervisor or “house mother” encouraged him to pray.
“I was a mess, violent and vomiting, but she kept encouraging me to pray whenever I was in pain,” he says. Then, a strange thing happened – he began to speak, but the words he uttered were neither Chinese nor English. A few minutes later, he fell asleep.
“I slept soundly and felt fine, though I woke up with the sweats in the morning,” Chak says. “I thought it was so strange that I was OK, because I had tried withdrawing before and I’d never had such a painless experience.”
Encouraged by the house mother, he continued to pray and left the flat 10 days later. He began reading the Bible, and like the other former gang members he had seen in Kowloon City, he also stopped cussing. Six months later, he started helping out in the church.
Chak is one of hundreds who Jean and Rick Willans helped during their 12 years in Hong Kong. The couple said they had received a “calling from God” to go to China in 1967. Before arriving in Hong Kong in 1968, they spent time in Indonesia and Taiwan.
Pullinger arrived in the city a year before the Willans. She taught at St Stephen’s Girls’ College, played oboe with the Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra, and volunteered in the Kowloon Walled City at weekends. She was introduced to the Willans soon after they arrived.
Pullinger had the ability to “speak in tongues” – a phenomenon in which a person utters words in languages they have no knowledge of. It was something that Jean Willans was able to do as well.
According to the Book of Acts, Chapter 2, in the Bible, Jesus’ disciples gathered at the feast of the Pentecost six weeks after he died. At one point, there was a “mighty rushing wind” – a reference to the Holy Spirit – and they began speaking in tongues.
Rick Willans says his wife did not have an affinity for languages, but when she spoke in tongues, linguists identified New Testament Greek and Latin words, as well as Spanish and French. It was Jean who encouraged Pullinger to use her ability to speak in tongues as a way of helping people. “[The Willans and I] learned to do this together,” Pullinger recalls.
The first person the Willans helped in Hong Kong was Yeung Hon-gei, or “Ah Gei”, a 14K triad gang member and drug addict who wanted to get clean.
Pullinger took him to see the couple. At the time, they had no experience of dealing with drug addicts, Rick says. “This was completely out of my depth and experience. I depended on God’s grace to bring him out of it.”
When Ah Gei suffered withdrawal symptoms, they prayed for him and read scriptures. “Jean said: ‘When I’m in trouble, I pray in tongues’,” Rick recalls. When they did that, Ah Gei’s pain immediately left him.
Pullinger remembers that Ah Gei slept peacefully throughout the night and, over the next few days, they prayed for him again. “God worked a miracle for him,” she says. They also helped Ah Gei’s nephew wean himself off drugs. Word spread of the trio’s ability to help, and donors came forward to help secure rental flats to shelter recovering addicts.
Sarah Craighead met the Willans as a teenager in Hong Kong, and was devoted to helping them and Pullinger with their mission, then called Society of Stephen. She remembers Jean as someone who was open with her faith.
“She was so generous and hospitable. She always offered something to eat and drink. [During prayer meetings] she sang songs with the guitar, not the kind of songs you would play with an organ. She had a real love and concern for people. Even if someone was a stranger, she would pray for that person,” Craighead says during a phone interview from Portland, Oregon.
When the Willans returned to the US in 1981, Pullinger continued their work in the name of the St Stephen’s Society.
“Jackie contributed to our work, and we contributed to hers,” Rick explains. “She had gone to Hong Kong on a dream a year before we left Los Angeles for Asia, and we had different cultural backgrounds, but were one in the Holy Spirit. We had one heart to do his work.”
Pullinger, born in Britain, is grateful that Jean encouraged her to use her ability to speak in tongues when they met back in 1968.
“I am always thankful for what she gave me. It was fun to meet Jesus in a small group and use the power of the spirit … people are lonely and frightened. They need to know they matter.”
Craighead says: “Jean was such a bold and vibrant personality. She was enthusiastic, telling everyone about Jesus, and wanted to reach out to people.”
In her final years, Jean developed dementia. “The last time I saw her was in February. She was frail and in pain, and she often didn’t recognise people,” Craighead adds. “But when she realised who I was, she said, ‘We had a lot of fun in Hong Kong, didn’t we?’”
