David Jackson – a Life on the Edge
I have been a member of the congregation of Hampstead Parish Church for nearly twenty years. In May this year I met at a nursing home in north London a man named David Jackson, Dave for short. He is 53 and entirely confined to a wheelchair, the consequence of meningitis.
Dave’s life story is extraordinary. He has been a transvestite, a heroin addict and a prisoner. Yet he is now a born-again Christian:
Dave began cross-dressing at the age of nine, wearing his sister’s clothes. When he was grown up he used to go round the West End, Soho and Shoreditch dressed as a woman.
He started begging when he was around 20 – he told me he could earn £10 per hour from this; one New Year’s Eve he earned £100, using the proceeds to buy heroin and crack cocaine. He served a two month sentence in Wormwood Scrubs for actual bodily harm, finding it a good experience as he had a cell-mate who told good jokes – not alas! printable in a church publication.
I asked Dave how he had become a born-again Christian. He said his conversion had been quite sudden. He started to pray and asked Jesus to come into his life. Jesus did so and Dave struck a deal with God saying that if he could become a Christian he would give up heroin. God said that was fine so Dave became a Christian and gave up heroin.
David said he had no fear of death – he was sure of everlasting life; Jesus would also provide him with a wife – that was why God had created Eve! He welcomed the idea of his life being described in a church publication as he would like to help people who had had similar experiences to his own, maybe by being a social worker specialising in addiction.