Abandoned by his parents, he went in and out of prison 11 times – till he met his Heavenly Father behind bars

Jimmy Tng was three years old when his pregnant mother walked out on the family, taking two of her six children with her – Jimmy’s second brother and his youngest sister.

“I don’t know why she didn’t take me. I also wondered why. So I hated her for it. For a long time, I hated her a lot,” he told Salt&Light in Mandarin.

The Tng household was a rancorous one marked by constant quarrels.

“I was born into a broken home. My parents were gamblers. My father was a gangster and a drug addict. He also had affairs. My mother couldn’t take it anymore. So she left.”

With his mother’s departure, the family was torn asunder. The seven siblings were sent to live with various relatives and family friends. At the age of three, Jimmy did not understand much. But by the time he was five, he knew he was different from other children.

“I thought: How come I have no mother? I knew I had my nainai (paternal grandmother) and guma (grandaunt). But I had no memory of my mum.

“Other people had mothers to pick them up from kindergarten. I only had my nainai to pick me up. I lacked a mother’s love.”

Jimmy and his paternal grandmother who doted on him.

When he asked the elders in his family about her, he was told: “Your mother is a gambler. She’s no good. She doesn’t want all of you.”

Said Jimmy, now 61: “Those words stuck in my head, giving me a bad impression of my mum.”

Left to be raised by relatives, Jimmy felt an ache in his heart that he desperately tried to fill. That would lead him to a life of crime and drugs that would see him jailed 11 times in nearly 30 years.

From truant to toughie

Young Jimmy did not enjoy studying. In primary school, he could still get by without much effort. The same could not be said for secondary school.  

“I realised I didn’t understand anything the teachers were saying. The gap between primary school and secondary school was too wide,” he told Salt&Light.

“I decided I might as well stop schooling. So I played truant.”

Days were spent with friends in his neighbourhood who had also dropped out, hanging out at bowling alleys and billard halls. To eke out a living, they sold newspapers, washed cars, stole things to sell or simply stole money.

No one in his family could rein in the wild child.

“We would quarrel with people as well. One day, my friend suggested that we join a gang so that we would have someone to protect us.”

Just like that, they became part of a gang from the eastern part of Singapore. Gang life was full of fights.

By his teens, Jimmy was already in a gang.

“My laoda (gang leader) would train us to fight by asking us to pick on random people and beat them up. It was also to train us to be fearless.

“We fought with our fists, with sticks, with knives. We fought till we got better at it.”

Altercations would come with injuries. Jimmy hurt his head at least three times, each requiring stitches.

“When people beat me till my head broke, it only made me bolder.”

Eventually, the fights landed Jimmy in a boys’ home when he hurt someone in a knife fight. He was 15 years old and spent a year at the home.

“On the first night, I was a little scared because I had heard that the boys’ home had a lot of wayward boys. I also felt sad that I couldn’t hang out with my friends anymore.

“So I cried. I had not cried in a long time. But then I thought: I cannot give in to my feelings. I cannot cry anymore.

“That night, I made up my mind to never cry again. And I didn’t, not even when my nainai passed away, not even when my older sister passed away.”  

From bad to worse

The next time Jimmy was caught was for robbery. He was sent to the Reformative Training Centre (RTC) for 30 months. But this did nothing to put the brakes on his destructive behaviour.

When he was released, he served his National Service (NS) where he got sent to the Detention Barracks no fewer than three times.

“I was very rebellious. Each time it was for running away from the army, arguing with my officer or beating people up.”

Emboldened, Jimmy became a gang leader once he completed NS.  

“I started with about 10 followers and, within a few years, I had around 20 people under me.”

As the leader, Jimmy would usually pay for meals and nights out. Soon, it was clear that none of his illegal activities – soliciting protection money, money-lending, running gambling operations, pirating goods – was enough to finance his gang.

Soon, Jimmy worked his way to the position of gang leader.

“I wanted more money. So I sold drugs. Because I sold drugs, I also consumed them. That’s how I became an addict.”

The first time Jimmy was caught consuming drugs, he was sent to a rehabilitation centre for six months.

“It was hard. When you have withdrawal symptoms, your stomach churns, you vomit yellow and green bile till there is nothing left. You have diarrhoea. You have runny nose.

“At night, you can’t lie down. It feels like worms are eating you alive.”

But once released, Jimmy went back to his old ways.

“The high of the drugs makes you forget everything,” he told Salt&Light.

The next time and the four more times after that when Jimmy was arrested for consuming drugs, he was sent to prison. But until his last imprisonment in 2001, he never thought to mend his ways.

“I did have thoughts about changing. But they were fleeting. I couldn’t leave my past, my lifestyle behind.  

“I also had no idea of any other kind of life. So I made excuses, ‘I’m this sort of person. Everyone I know is like that.’”

The prodigal returns  

Out on bail after his last arrest, Jimmy was given a piece of sound advice by the most unlikely of people – his mother. Even though she was not a believer, she told him to listen to sermons when he got to prison to see if Jesus could change him.

Some years earlier when Jimmy was 30, his mother had reconnected with him. They maintained an uneasy relationship.

Though he would reconnect with his mother as a young adult, forgiveness was still long in coming.

For reasons even Jimmy cannot explain, his mother’s advice took root. In prison when he was asked for his religion, he picked Christianity.

“I wanted to give it a try. It must have been the work of God.”

Before he even started attending chapel, Jimmy asked for a Bible.

“I wanted to understand why so many people say you can change because of Christianity.”

He took his quest seriously. Every day, he would read the Bible. After a month, he got to the Gospel of Luke.

“I read about the prodigal son. When he returned, the father hugged him and treated him so well.

“I thought: ‘Wah, God is so good. I am like this prodigal. If I go back, this faith can accept me.’ I was so moved.”

The man who made a vow nearly 30 years before to never cry again finally wept. When he could, he registered to attend chapel. A month after listening diligently to the sermons, he asked to become a Christian.

“After the service, I went up to the counsellor and said, ‘Can you help me?’ He was taken aback. When prisoners asked him for help, it would usually be to get him to make a phone call or help their family members.

“I told him: ‘I want to believe in Jesus. What should I do?’”

The counsellor led him to say the Sinner’s Prayer.

Jimmy served about two years of his four-year sentence. In that time, he read the Bible cover to cover 13 times.

“I read the Bible every day. I really sought. People in prison would say, ‘Jimmy believed in Jesus till he became crazy.’

“I even fasted for three days. When you empty yourself and read the Bible, the experience is deeper. I felt … wow!

“And I would worship God and I would cry. I really experienced God and my life became different.”

Counting the cost

Conversion, however, was not enough for lasting change. Conviction was needed. Nine months before his release, Jimmy was doing his Quiet Time when God spoke to him.

“I felt this Voice in my head say: ‘Jimmy, when you come out of prison, will you give up your heroin, your drugs, your night life, your gang friends?’”

Jimmy was speechless because he could not give God a resounding “yes”.

“It made me nervous because I thought I had made up my mind to follow Jesus. I had read the Bible and prayed like no other.

“Yet in this environment without temptation, I couldn’t say, ‘Yes.’ What would happen when I got out and there are so many temptations?

“So I prayed seriously, ‘Please help me. Give me a way out.’ I prayed every day.”

A month in, Jimmy came to Luke 14:25-35 during his Quiet Time. The admonishment to count the cost before following Jesus shook him.

“I knew God was talking to me. I have to sit down and count the cost if I want to walk in God’s way.”

Jimmy took it literally and began drawing up a list of things that would prevent him from following Jesus: Drugs, gambling, the night life, his gang friends. He also had a list of things that would bring him closer to God: Church, church activities, baptism and a proper job. That list was decidedly shorter.

That act of counting the cost was what Jimmy clung to upon his release.

Jimmy at 37 before his last imprisonment where he encountered God and became determined to live life on the straight and narrow path after his release.

“I didn’t have to think hard. I never even considered because I had already counted the cost. So I just told God, ‘I want to walk this life of change.’

“I was tested a lot, but I didn’t give Satan a chance.”

Jimmy’s transformation did not go unnoticed. His parents became Christians after they saw his change.

“I finally found life’s meaning in prison. I discovered how real the Christian faith is.”

Look out for Part 2 of Jimmy’s story beyond prison.

RELATE STORIES:

He trafficked drugs to get rich quick, but in prison he realised he had been “chasing fantasies”

“Follow me”: In solitary confinement and on suicide watch, this hardened criminal heard a voice that would change his life

How God moved the heart of a gangster and gambling addict to start a shelter for ex-offenders

The post Abandoned by his parents, he went in and out of prison 11 times – till he met his Heavenly Father behind bars appeared first on Salt&Light.