'My life was changed in 3 minutes' From evil criminal to ...
My childhood was a strange one. My family didn’t really go to church, but I did go to Sunday school – mainly because Eddy Weir [a local boxing trainer] used to be a Sunday school teacher there. I knew him because he used to train boxers at West Hill gym in Hastings, which I joined when I was nine years old.
I was eleven when I started competition fighting. Everybody was cheering me on, I felt so good about it; I always wanted the attention, I wanted people to notice me. By the time I was 14 years old, I was the National Schoolboys’ British boxing champion.
The very next day, there was a knock on the door. It was a police officer and a probation officer. They took me to Redhill detention centre. I got locked up for stealing cars. It was the biggest comedown. I went off the rails for years and years.
I wasn’t a bad fighter. I made a good living, but in those days, you had to be world champion to make serious money.
When crime becomes a career
After boxing, I became head of an operation smuggling cannabis from Holland. I was earning more money than I ever did boxing. I was the most selfish person in the world. I lived a very violent life. The things you get up to in that game are horrible.
Eventually, I got arrested for a murder I never committed. A [man] was murdered in the park, and the police thought it was me because, a week earlier, I had been caught with a couple of ounces of cannabis on me and given a bail sheet. One night, after a party, I walked through that same park, and I had an urge to [go to the toilet]. I didn’t have anything else on me, so I wiped my backside with the bail sheet and left it there. After the murder, the police searched the park and found it – and I became the prime suspect.
They arrested me on suspicion of murder. When they went to search my house, they found a loaded, sawn-off shotgun.
I appeared before a judge [nicknamed] ‘Send-Him-Down-Brown’, who hated guns. I’m in the dungeons of Lewes Crown Court, and my solicitor says: “You’re going to get between five and seven years.” I was almost sobbing, thinking: What on earth am I going to do in prison for five years?
A desperate prayer
I got on my hands and knees in the holding cell and started praying: “Oh Lord, if you’re real – I’ve heard about you, I used to go to Sunday school – I don’t know who you are or what you are, but please help me out here. And I promise I’ll get myself a Bible and find out exactly who you are.”
When I stood in front of the judge, the police officers were sitting behind me, and everybody was rubbing their hands together thinking: We’ve got him at last. The judge flicked through my previous convictions, looked at me and said: “Stand up, Huggins. Something’s telling me something about you. I don’t know what it is. But I’ll tell you what I am going to do. I am going to give you nine…” He paused: “…months.”
I put my arms up in the air in victory and shouted: “God, bless you, your honour!”
I went into Wormwood Scrubs prison, and I knew the chaplain – Terry Tully – because he was also a boxing trainer. I asked him for a Bible. I said: “I want to get to know this Jesus bloke, because this sentence is a miracle. I should be doing seven years, not nine months.”
I started reading the book of John. “For God so loved the world…” And I said: “OK, Jesus, if you’re real, this is telling me you’re God, and I want to know you.” And then – I can’t explain it – all of a sudden, I burst into tears like a baby. It was like an awakening. My mind exploded into knowledge. This image of Jesus came in, and I started crying. My cellmate said: “What’s the matter with you?” I said: “I’ve just met Jesus.”
In about three minutes, my life was changed – from an evil, nasty, narcissistic criminal to a God-fearing, Spirit-filled person of God. It was a complete transformation.
When I [was released], I went straight to church on Sunday.
People knocked on my door: “Paul, there’s a shipload of cannabis coming in. We need you to shift it.” I said: “You must be joking. I’m not getting involved in that rubbish. You come to church with me!”
Every bit of criminality in me was gone. Today, I serve at Emmanuel Church in Hastings alongside my wife, Bernadette and we are founders of a ministry called Missionary SEED. Together, we work with young people in the slums of Antipolo City, Philippines, helping to advance their Christian faith, and to further their education, then onto a career to help support their families.
I’ve been asking the Lord what I should do when I retire in three years’ time, and I feel like he’s drawing me into prison work.
There are people out there who need Jesus. If we can plant some seeds, and the Lord brings the increase – that’s what I want to do. In retirement, I want to lead people to the Lord.
