The Choice is Yours

I don’t remember his name exactly but I think it was Alex. I was a junior in High School and it was 1969. He was a new student. The rumor was that he recently moved here from California. He had long hair and stayed to himself most of the time. He had a rough attitude that kept most other people away including teachers and the bus driver. He rode the bus to school with me but he always sat alone.

One morning Alex pulled the window down and lit up. A few people asked him to put the window up but he said he couldn’t and kept on smoking. I sat behind him and had grown up with smokers in the family. But this did not smell like any cigarette I had been around. It had a sickening sweet smell that I learned later was marijuana. It was the first time I had ever been around it.

I did not see Alex much after that. He was kicked off the bus and I think he dropped out of school. Then one summer day, over a year later, a car drove up my driveway. When the door open two guys got out, one of them was Alex. He was grinning from ear to ear. I knew who it was but I could see right away that he was a very different person than the Alex I had known from the school bus.

Alex had become a Christian and I was one of the first people he wanted to tell. I did not think he even knew who I was. Apparently he had been listening when I sat behind him and talked about Jesus and Church and the Lord’s call on my life to preach. He knew all about me and that was the reason he wanted me to know about his decision. He had joined a group of Christian youth in Edwardsville, Illinois, who had a similar background to his own and now they were going back to old friends and telling them how Jesus was better than the drugs and everything else in their life and that He had set them free in His salvation!

Alex is one of many people I have known over the years who have gone from drugs to Jesus. All of them, even the ones who had to go through a difficult rehab, knew that they could not serve Christ and drugs including marijuana, alcohol, and tobacco. Clean is clean, one of them used to say to me.

Every election is important and that makes our participation important. This year there are some local issues that are especially important. We need to stand against drug use of any kind whether it is alcohol, marijuana, or anything else. These are moral issues and not just political. As Christians we need to pray about how we vote and stand on Biblical principles.

Solomon said, “The lot is cast into the lap, but its every decision is from the LORD.” (Prov. 16:33 esv). We participate in the process and God controls the outcome. I am convinced that sometimes the outcome is for blessing and sometimes it is for judgment. We pray it is for blessing. Pray about your vote and pray for our country. We need Revival, not by vote, but by God’s Spirit.

Bro. Robin