July 16, 2025

A Better Life

By ASR John Miskelly

This article was first published in our Spring 2025 Ready magazine.

Our newest Scripture Reader found a better life in Jesus and wants to tell others ‘behind the wire’ to do the same.

I grew up in East Belfast in a Christian home. Despite all the trouble in Northern Ireland, life for our family was good. My parents’ desire for my two sisters and I was that we would come to saving faith in the Lord Jesus. I remember my father bought us a very large and colourful illustrated Bible, which he would read to us each evening.

In April 1979, our world fell apart when my father passed away following an accident at work. My mother, two sisters and I were totally devastated. I was only eleven at the time and I remember asking my mother whether God loved us. ‘Of course, son’, was her reply. ‘Well, why has this happened mummy?’ My mother put her arm around me and just whispered in my ear. She said that there are things in this life that we can’t explain but that we always remember that God’s ways are best. This was just something I couldn’t even begin to understand. If there was a God, then I was blaming Him for what had happened.

If there was a God, then I was blaming Him for what had happened.

So, at that young age, I no longer wanted to hear my mother read from our illustrated Bible and I no longer wanted to attend church; I was looking for an escape from everything.

At sixteen-years-old, I joined the Royal Irish Rangers and trained at St Patrick’s Barracks. I loved the Army way of life and the camaraderie. After training, I was posted to the 1st Battalion who, at that time, had left Chester and so a six-year posting to Osnabruck in West Germany began. I did two MedMan Exercises in Canada and then I was off to Northern Ireland for the Op Banner Tour in Co. Fermanagh.

Life was good again, but I had made so many wrong choices, which had led to the wrong company.

Life was good again, but I had made so many wrong choices, which had led to the wrong company. Very soon I faced criminal charges, all related to the difficulties in Northern Ireland. At the close of my week-long trial, I changed my ‘not guilty’ plea to ‘guilty’, which resulted in serving a ten-year prison sentence.

With my Army background, I settled into prison life and just got on with it. But in a block of a few hundred men God had His man — a prisoner who had committed his life to the Lord Jesus.

Along with others, I mocked and ridiculed this lad, we went out of our way just to make life difficult for him. But no matter what, that lad still spoke of his faith and trust in the Lord and how a change for the better could take place in our lives. After several months, I was having a wash and shave at the sinks and a thought came into my mind. Why didn’t I just try going along to church with this lad?

‘I know why you’re up early this morning. You’re coming to church with me!’

Sure, if nothing else, it would get me out the block for an hour. Seconds later, the thought was gone but that lad passed the sinks, looked at me and said, ‘I know why you’re up early this morning. You’re coming to church with me!’ So off I went to church that morning — it wasn’t what I expected! Over fifty were there and when the prison Chaplain began to speak, no one said a word — all listened. For a number of months, I was off to church on Sunday mornings and like the rest, just sat and listened.

The prison Chaplain was a friendly man who always made time to speak to us. When on the block, he always popped his head into my cell and asked if he could come in for a chat. He’d sit on the end of the bed and before he left, he’d ask to read some Scripture and to pray. I never objected. Deep down, I knew I was under conviction of sin.

I knew my lifestyle was wrong but there was no way I was becoming a Christian. What would the others think?

From what my parents had told me, I knew that there was a God who had sent His Son into the world to take the place of sinners. I knew that if I continued to reject God, I’d be eternally separated from Him. I knew my lifestyle was wrong but there was no way I was becoming a Christian. What would the others think? For months, I kept putting up excuse after excuse. But as the excuses were going up, the Lord was taking them down.

Image: John remembers the prison Chaplain, who always made time to read from God’s Word with him and the other prisoners.

As I attended church again one Sunday, the Chaplain spoke of Christ’s love and how it was a first love and a forgiving love. I remembered a little song my father sang to us as children:

It was ringing in my ears and that morning, Isaiah 53:5–6 became so real:

‘But He was pierced for our transgressions; He was crushed for our iniquities; upon Him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with His wounds we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned — every one — to His own way; and the LORD has laid on Him the iniquity of us all.’
(Isaiah 53:5–6)

As I considered my life, I acknowledged there was certainly no rest nor peace. It was a total mess, all because I didn’t know the Prince of Peace, the Lord Jesus Christ. Following that service, I knelt in my cell and simply called upon the Lord for His mercy. I asked that He would take this mess of a life and change it. I asked that He would forgive me for the wrong choices and actions and make me a new person in Christ.

Shortly after becoming a Christian, I wrote a letter to SASRA telling them of my conversion. I asked that they’d pass this onto Scripture Reader Paul Somerville who I’d known from secondary school. SASRA wrote back and sent some books to read, which would help me in my walk with God. Paul also wrote and on occasions, visited me while in prison.

The Northern Ireland peace process brought in some changes, and I was released under the Good Friday agreement.

It has been a long journey with many twists and turns but a road knowing that God hears and answers prayer.

Now we’re into 2025. It has been a long journey with many twists and turns but a road knowing that God hears and answers prayer. Any man in Christ is a new creature; the old has passed away, he has been made new.

In the coming days, I’m looking forward to rolling up the sleeves of a barrack shirt and serving the Lord in Leuchars Army base in Fife, Scotland. I’m excited to work alongside faithful men and women and to be present as one who can tell others that there is a better life to live by simply following Jesus.