From the Gutter to the Pulpit

By John Miles
Special to ASSIST News Service

July 2008

BIRMINGHAM, UK (ANS) -- When the heavy steel door of the cell in Swansea prison clanged shut on Richard Taylor for the first time, he was only fifteen years old. In spite of his youth, his violent life of drug addiction and crime had finally caught up with him and landed him in this Victorian era jail. This was not the soft regime of a modern youth custody facility, but the youth wing of an ancient adult prison with all the deprivations of such a place.

Richard Taylor

He shared the cell with one other person and their toilet consisted of a bucket in the corner of the cell. "Slopping out" time was the first activity of the day. The inmates tried to avoid excreting into their bucket for obvious reasons. Instead they emptied themselves onto newspaper and folded it up into what they called a 'Packet' and dropped it out of the cell window. The next morning, some unfortunate prisoner was given the unenviable task of collecting them up! They occupied the cell for most of the day, only emerging for meals and one hour of exercise. Prisoners in Her Majesty's Prison Swansea, in South Wales, were allowed one shower and change of clothes a week. The all pervasive smell of the institution was a weapons grade mixture of urine, disinfectant and body odor. The year was 1991.

When the judge announced a prison sentence in the court, Richard's mother first gasped in shock then yelled at the judge, "You can't send my boy to prison, he is only fifteen." Richard had been prepared for the sentence. His lawyer had warned him it would happen; the astonishing length of his Rap sheet demanded that his criminal activities be stopped. What he wasn't prepared for was the presence of his mother in court and her emotional reaction. He couldn't bring himself to look in her direction or catch her eye, he was too ashamed.

Richard's mother had always done her best to raise her four lively boys alone and with very little money. She was a good mother trapped in a culture of poverty and state benefits. Richard was the oldest and he soon drifted into drugs and robbery to fund the purchase of heroin and alcohol. He was intelligent and soon became the leader and schemer of this particular gang.

Thoughts in prison mainly consisted of planning ways to obtain drugs. Richard had a reputation for toughness on the outside and he needed to maintain this on the inside. So he schemed, traded, bullied, and smuggled in a constant supply, and soon became one of the main dealers on the block.

After release, he returned to his lifestyle of violent crime. Inevitably, his offences became more serious, until he was back before the judge. This time he was put on remand to await more serious sentencing.

In jail he began attending the weekly Chapel service just as an opportunity to get out of his cell for a couple of hours. Yet, to his surprise, he began to experience a peace in his mind and soul while he was in the service, that he had not experienced before and it intrigued him. He soon became a friend and assistant to the minister, Reverend Ted Hunt. He dressed up in the vestments for the service and helped out with communion and other tasks. His mates soon began to tease him. Taylor has got religion - he's right off it man, the drugs have finally got to him." He didn't care, he was finding a new experience and he wanted more.

In every prison cell in Britain there is a Gideon's Bible. Whenever the prisoners ran out of cigarette papers to roll their smokes, they tore out a page and used it. The paper was thin and served as a reasonable substitute for the real thing. One evening Richard tore out a page as usual for a smoke. As he was about to roll it, a powerful thought came to his mind. "I should read this, not smoke it." He unrolled it, sat down and began to read. It was the Gospel of John chapter one. The content of the chapter so gripped him, that when he had read it, he read the rest of John's Gospel. Then he read on through the night, reading most of the New Testament. The next morning he looked out of the small window in his cell and he could see the sky and the tops of the beautiful Welsh mountains in the distance. He realized for the first time that someone must have created it all and that it must have been God.

His appearance before the judger for sentencing loomed as a dark cloud before him. His lawyer warned him that he should expect a three year sentence. He had been praying to God and asking for a way out of the mess he was in. Then God did a miracle. In court, he felt a hand on his shoulder. He looked round, but no one was there. He ignored it, but them he felt it again, still no one there. This was scary. Yet he felt a quiet assurance that things were going to be all right. The hand seemed to be giving him this assurance. At the same time, there was a middle aged lady in the court he didn't recognize, who kept smiling at him. He thought this was strange and ignored her.

As the sentencing was about to take place, his lawyer, who - unknown to Richard was a Christian - asked if another person in the courtroom could speak. The judge had been briefed about this and agreed. His lawyer asked for Dinah Sansome to speak. It was the middle aged lady with the smile. Dinah stood and explained that she was the director of 'Victory Outreach' which was a Christian drug rehabilitation centre. She explained to the court that Richard had been attending Chapel in prison and reading the Bible and she believed that he had the potential for his life to be changed, if the court released him into her custody. The judge agreed and to Richard's amazement he found himself in the court house restaurant, sitting opposite two strangers. He just did not know what was going on. Before he could ask any of the questions swirling in his mind, Dinah smiled at him and simply said "I have come to take you home." At this, Richard just dissolved into tears.

During the three years at the Victory Outreach centre, Richard committed his life to Christ and began to study the Bible. He was soon asked to go with teams of ex-addicts from the house to tell his story in churches. It became very obvious that he had a natural gift for communicating. His testimony expanded into full evangelistic sermons and he was soon bringing others to Christ. He became a member of staff at the centre and helped other young addicts to find release in Christ.

After three years, he felt the need to leave and Bible College beckoned. He enrolled at the Birmingham Bible Institute in central England. He found it difficult to keep to his studies because he was constantly in demand for his powerful preaching. He met and married Jill, a local girl from Hockley Pentecostal Church. While still at college he was asked to pastor a failing church in the nearby town of Tipton. Within two years, his powerful preaching had filled the church.

Book cover

The leaders and members of the church realized that Richard had to move on to wider ministry. He was asked to present a television program about crime prevention on a nationwide station. Many other opportunities came his way to travel the world preaching. His main ministry at this time is as associate pastor Of Renewal Christian Centre, the largest church in central England.

His testimony was in such demand, it became obvious that it should be written and published as a book. My son in law, Matt, was the youth pastor in the church and he suggested to Richard that I write it, because I had already written other books. I visited Richard for lunch each Monday armed with my tape recorder. With Richard passionately telling his story and me interrupting with questions and clarifications, the amazing account of how God turned his life around was committed to tape.

I worked from the tapes to write Richard's biography, called "To Catch a Thief." New Wine Publishers published it, but no one realized how successful it would become.

To date, over 80,000 copies have been sold. Many of them have gone into prisons. It has been translated into Norwegian, German, Romanian, Bulgarian, Serbian and Nepali. Richard was even asked to address the annual national conference of Police Chiefs.

The book has been awarded the annual prize for the best Christian biography for 2007 by the U.K. Christian Book Awards organization.

The book has been turned into a film script and Richard is currently seeking sponsorship to make, what would be, a powerful evangelistic film.