Inside Story: Not-So-Smart Solomon Wises Up
As a teenager Solomon was not so smart. He let his peers influence his decisions and began smoking and taking drugs. He experimented with every drug he could get, and often he grew weak because he was not eating. Drugs were all he cared for.
Solomon and his friends were always together, smoking and taking drugs. They formed a gang and often fought with other teens. Once when he was high on drugs he picked up a machete, ready to strike his father. But a voice shouted to him, “Stop!” and he dropped the machete as if it were on fire.
“Help me, please!” he cried. His family took him to a mental hospital for treatment. But the hospital kept him for only a few days.
Solomon’s grandmother prayed for him constantly and encouraged him to attend church with her and let God heal him. Solomon went, and there he felt God’s love calling him. But he continued taking drugs for 10 more years. Then Solomon’s grandmother and father died. The two people who had tried to help him were gone. Finally Solomon could run away from God no longer. He gave up and gave his life to God. It had taken him years to heed the voice of God.
Solomon did not know which church to attend. He tried several before he visited an Adventist church. There he watched the pastor baptize someone, and instantly he knew what he must do. He went to the pastor and asked for baptism. The pastor reviewed the doctrines with him and baptized Solomon.
Solomon’s repentance was real. He serves his church and his God with joy and faithfulness as a deacon and an elder. Several members of his family have given their hearts to Christ because of his witness.
Recently he held his own evangelistic series and led seven people to Jesus.
He is trained as an accountant, but he has chosen simpler work that puts him in touch with people he can talk to about God. Solomon shares his faith on the bus, to strangers in the street. “For years I was compelled to take drugs; today I am by God compelled to preach,” he says. He is eager to redeem the time he has left for God.
10 years! If there is a thing that I have learnt from this story, then it is about being patient with people. God is patient with them
Speaking of wasted years, I’m sure many of us can identify with Solomon to some extent. It may not be years wasted on drugs but those missed opportunities to do something constructive for the LORD. Some of us have waited, hoping for a day when we’ll be old enough to work for the LORD.
Unfortunately, as we continue to wait and the years continue to fly by, we then begin to realize that our energies, time and wealth are far spent and that, we are not able to turn the clock backwards. For those (like Solomon & myself) who may be beginning to wake up to this reality, I would say, please do not despair. The LORD has promised to help us redeem those years that the ‘swarming locusts have eaten…’ (Joel 2:25). So, let’s wake up from our day dreaming and give Him our very best effective, immediately.