Our mission team will be operating under the auspices of TransformAsia, founded by Dr. Setan Lee and his wife Randa. I want to provide you with some background information on Dr. Lee in this post.
Setan (pronounced: see TAWN) joined us on the mission trip last year and I got to spend a good bit of time with him. He gave me a book and a dramatized video about his life and his wife Randa. As I read the book I could hardly believe it was about the person who was riding in the van with me and serving at the various medical clinics our Team was conducting! They described how God miraculously delivered him from being killed by the Khmer Rouge army in the 1970s and how his life was transformed by Jesus Christ. I was truly amazed by the story of how God saved Setan and Randa Lee to serve Jesus Christ in Cambodia. I extracted some information from his book and have written it in this blog post (some of it has been paraphrased) to give you a little background on how God miraculously worked in his life.
In 1975 the Khmer Rouge, led by Pol Pot, ended the five year Cambodian civil war only to unleash a reign of terror. Following Marxist Leninism Doctrine, Pol Pot attempted to transform Cambodia to a pure agrarian society. It was a reign of madness, evil, and terror. Anyone who was educated, anyone who lived in or was exposed to “city” life was considered an enemy of the state. They were either summarily executed or saved to work mercilessly in the rice fields until they died either by starvation, exhaustion or sickness. There were three rules as a prisoner of the Khmer Rouge: don’t ask questions, don’t show any emotion, do either and you die. Millions were killed by the Khmer Rouge, so many millions that much of the land in Cambodia became known as the “Killing Fields.” It is estimated that one quarter of the population was killed by the Khmer Rouge. Even now, I understand if you go out into just about any rice field and start digging you will soon uncover human bones.
Setan Lee’s father was a wealthy, well connected business man with many children. Setan, as a young teenager was well on his way to an education in the medical field in Paris along with his brother Monty. In April 1975 that all ended. Setan was rounded up with several other youth and ordered to work in the rice fields from 4:00 AM until Midnight every day with only soup to eat. Of the 1,000 youth in his particular group only 300 were left due to the harsh conditions. Then one day the guards found a student identification card in his pocket, this meant certain death. Setan was raised in a Buddhist family and had never been exposed to any form of Christianity whatsoever. He had never heard of the name of Jesus Christ, never knew there was a Bible, and never heard the word “Christianity.” As he was prepared for his execution he heard those beside them crying out to Buddha to save them. It was not working; one by one they were executed and he was the last in line. Out of shear desperation he cried out, “Lord of the universe, whoever you are, please spare my life.” As the guard lifted the bamboo rod to strike him on the back of the neck to break his spinal cord a loud voice screamed out, “Stop! We must investigate this man further!” They took Setan back to the concentration camp. He instantly knew that whoever he had screamed out to moments before had spared him. Eventually Setan was able to break free from the guards and decided to attempt an escape to Thailand. He would have to make a trek on foot that would take him over a month, across a land torn by war, with enemies on every side. To be captured meant certain death, he had no food, and the territory was filled with land mines, poisonous snakes and hungry tigers. He saw many on his trek that were killed by land mines, killed by snake bites, and mutilated by tigers. For his food he ate the leaves and whatever fruit he could find and drank water from the hollow of trees or from ditches. As he approached the Thailand border a wild man suddenly jumped out of the jungle and grabbed his arm. I’ll quote from the book now (in blue):
The man was dressed very poorly and seemed to be barely alive. After Setan gained his composure from being scared half to death, the man mumbled something that echoed peculiarly in his ears, “Do you believe in the Lord of the universe? Do you believe in the Lord of the universe?” As Setan searched his mind as to why these words rang so clear, he remembered what he had prayed before being spared from his execution. He had prayed for salvation from death to “the Lord of the universe.” As the man kept repeating “do you believe in the Lord of the universe?” Setan looked into his eyes and exclaimed, “Yes. I do believe in the Lord of the universe.” Then the man said to Setan, “his name is Jesus Christ.” And then almost as quickly as he had appeared, the tattered prophet disappeared. “I sincerely believe that that man was a messenger from God,” Setan explained. “I had never heard of Christianity, but that day I became a Christian. That was the moment of my conversion to Christianity.”
Setan Lee’s father was a wealthy, well connected business man with many children. Setan, as a young teenager was well on his way to an education in the medical field in Paris along with his brother Monty. In April 1975 that all ended. Setan was rounded up with several other youth and ordered to work in the rice fields from 4:00 AM until Midnight every day with only soup to eat. Of the 1,000 youth in his particular group only 300 were left due to the harsh conditions. Then one day the guards found a student identification card in his pocket, this meant certain death. Setan was raised in a Buddhist family and had never been exposed to any form of Christianity whatsoever. He had never heard of the name of Jesus Christ, never knew there was a Bible, and never heard the word “Christianity.” As he was prepared for his execution he heard those beside them crying out to Buddha to save them. It was not working; one by one they were executed and he was the last in line. Out of shear desperation he cried out, “Lord of the universe, whoever you are, please spare my life.” As the guard lifted the bamboo rod to strike him on the back of the neck to break his spinal cord a loud voice screamed out, “Stop! We must investigate this man further!” They took Setan back to the concentration camp. He instantly knew that whoever he had screamed out to moments before had spared him. Eventually Setan was able to break free from the guards and decided to attempt an escape to Thailand. He would have to make a trek on foot that would take him over a month, across a land torn by war, with enemies on every side. To be captured meant certain death, he had no food, and the territory was filled with land mines, poisonous snakes and hungry tigers. He saw many on his trek that were killed by land mines, killed by snake bites, and mutilated by tigers. For his food he ate the leaves and whatever fruit he could find and drank water from the hollow of trees or from ditches. As he approached the Thailand border a wild man suddenly jumped out of the jungle and grabbed his arm. I’ll quote from the book now (in blue):
The man was dressed very poorly and seemed to be barely alive. After Setan gained his composure from being scared half to death, the man mumbled something that echoed peculiarly in his ears, “Do you believe in the Lord of the universe? Do you believe in the Lord of the universe?” As Setan searched his mind as to why these words rang so clear, he remembered what he had prayed before being spared from his execution. He had prayed for salvation from death to “the Lord of the universe.” As the man kept repeating “do you believe in the Lord of the universe?” Setan looked into his eyes and exclaimed, “Yes. I do believe in the Lord of the universe.” Then the man said to Setan, “his name is Jesus Christ.” And then almost as quickly as he had appeared, the tattered prophet disappeared. “I sincerely believe that that man was a messenger from God,” Setan explained. “I had never heard of Christianity, but that day I became a Christian. That was the moment of my conversion to Christianity.”
Since that time God has done amazing things through Setan and Randa’s lives. They started TransformAsia for the purpose of reaching Cambodia for Christ. You can find more information about TransformAsia at their web site www.transformasia.us. You can also order the book about the Lees from Amazon.com, Miracles in the Forgotten Land and Beyond, by Setan and Randa Lee and Shelba Hammond. It is truly amazing what God has done through the lives of Setan and Randa Lee!
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