The Police Force

It was a pleasant visit back to my second home church in Shah Alam where I spend a good 1.5 years in. It certainly changed a lot in terms of the families and individuals that forms the community, yet the same few faithful are the ones who make the church memorable until today.

The service started with a congregational prayer, including prayer for our nation and also praying against the increasing crime rate in Malaysia. One aunty specifically prayed for the recent kidnapping case, that the kidnapper would have no rest until he releases the child, and pastor prayed for God's justice to prevail and to empower the police force.

The police force would surely be one of the biggest hopes that the society banks on, for which, if not the society would not be able to maintain peace and order. Despite of the fiasco behind IPCMC and the recent mishandling of public freedom of expression, it is still a credible and trustworthy force to look up to in times of civil unrest and crime.

Our christian passion to pray for peace, integrity and less-crime, I believe should also include a prayer that there would be more christians in the police force and other civil service. It is ridiculous if we expect our police and civil servants to give their best and most efficient service, if we ourselves are not willing to constructively build up the civil service through active engagement, feedback and more desperately involvement.

Our biblical call to be peace-makers and also to be intercessors of our cities, I believe, warrants for the christian community to consider taking seriously the need for more involvement in these service. While we may not have the luxury of changing our career in our old age, that doesn't mean that we cannot encourage our children, neighbours, friends and church family members to encourage them to pick up this road less taken.

It would surely be a tough call for many middle-class urban christians to respond to, in the midst of our competitive urban living, where high-income, white-collar corporate jobs are being favoured against the less favourable prospects of being a civil servant, especially in high risk jobs like the police, army or the fireperson, besides other myths like low income, lack of job prospects and promotion.

However, the myth of ill-prospect in the civil service is unfounded. My recent research into the PDRM website informed me that a starting salary for a diploma graduate is RM2100 which can go up to RM3700, as a police inspector. A SPM and PMR graduate can even enter the service with slightly lower income and academic qualification, but a stable job, steady income and prospects of free further studies should be a plus point to consider for moderate school achievers.

Besides the respect and the prestige credited to the police force, being a policeperson gives one the noble responsibility of protecting the general society and also to represent the voice of the minorities in the civil service. Extreme practices and ethnic discrimination would lessen if minority groups would engage and involve themselves in building up the civil service, with the good values of each ethnic groups bring into the service.

The Malay ethos of budi, muafakat (co-operation), calmness and loyalty to the King, can be perfectly complemented with the Chinese pragmatism, industriousness, respect for the elderly and love for education. Moreover, the Indian experience of rural and urban poverty, proximity with the grassroots and cultural/linguistic flexibility in a multiracial society is a plus point.

Certainly enough, christians comprising of various ethnic group can bring in their values of integrity, compassion, accountability and justice into the civil service, in the midst of corruption and social injustices. We need God-fearing christians in all levels of society, including the civil service to shape our nation to the values and virtues we dream for.

While encouraging our youths to consider the teaching profession is laudable, much more effort must be targetted to encourage youths to consider the police force, the army or other opportunities to serve the people. These jobs are not substandard jobs, but are respectable professions which are instrumental in "making a difference" in our nation. It is useless to shout slogans in our churches to idealistic youths of our day, but to discourage them to serve in less taken routes in the name of God-sanctioned job prospects.

It certainly requires a bit of sacrifice on our part and may limit our children's potential, but hey isn't it heroic? While we do not lack superheroes in blockbuster Hollywood movies today, where is our admiration for heroism, sacrifice, service and servanthood today?

The story of Christ as our hero, should ring close to our hearts and our children's, to learn to love and serve the people as Christ do, one way is through a lifelong simple career in the civil service, impacting the society as little Christ ambassadors in cities, towns and kampungs of our people.