- Drugs
- Faith
Hello. My name is Dale. I’m going to discuss the dangers of involvement with illicit drugs, something I know a lot about from personal experience. Actually, taking risks with drugs and taking other kinds of risks are in some ways similar. In either case, when people act foolishly or hastily without thinking of the consequences they can cause themselves and others a great deal of grief.
A couple of true stories not involving drugs come to mind. In one case, two children were left unsupervised by their parents. They began to play with matches and a candle. They lit the candle and left it in a place where it went unnoticed for hours. During the night the family awoke and discovered that their house was on fire. The family escaped unharmed, but the house burned to the ground. It was a foolish act and it left the family homeless.
On another day in another city, two adult men, both highly respected in their professions, were examining a revolver one of the men had recently bought. It was a deadly .357 Magnum handgun. The owner handed it to his friend for a closer look. The gun was mishandled and fired accidentally, shooting the owner in his right thigh. He later said it was the most terrible pain he had ever experienced. It was a careless act in an unguarded moment and it could have been fatal.
All of you likely know of other tragedies that should not have happened but did. Now I’ll ask you to think back over your lives and try to remember whether you ever knew a man who set himself on fire. Do you personally know anyone who set themselves on fire?
Well, you do now. You’re looking at him. I was cooking up a batch of methamphetamine when the stuff exploded and instantly turned me into a human torch. I was engulfed in flames from my waist up. What I did was so dangerous that I might have died.
I had made meth many times and when I saw the spark that would trigger the explosion, I knew I was in trouble beyond my control. In less time than it takes to strike a match I was covered in flames and burning. I panicked and fell to the floor.
Then something extraordinary happened. Something I can’t adequately explain, other than by simply telling you that God stepped in and took control. And that really says it all.
I was on the floor and burning for 7 seconds. And then, whoosh, the fire was gone. It was if a mighty hand had brushed the flames away. I believe it was the hand of God. There is no way the fire would have died naturally and so quickly. If it had burned on, my life likely would have been over.
I suffered third degree burns on both arms and I am permanently scarred, so I can’t forget the agony of being wrapped in fire and the lasting effects. I have had numerous surgeries and skin grafts. I’m still trying to regain normal strength in my hands and arms. The road to recovery goes on. This long road began for me on December 14, 2011, a lonely night just 10 days before Christmas Eve. I was attempting to use meth to put myself on a high, I suppose as a way to start the holiday season. But I only put myself on a new low in my life.
That wasn’t the end of it. I soon sank lower. In addition to my injuries, pain and suffering, surgeries and skin grafts, all brought on by my own act, I had a big debt to pay. The judge sentenced me to serve 10 years in the Iowa State Prison for manufacturing Methamphetamine.
The good news is I’m now out on parole and I’m not wasting away in the state pen.
The best news of all, and it’s the best news anyone could hope for or pray for, is that I’ve come to understand that God is with me and always has been, in good times and bad, and He has a plan for me. Now I’ve started a far better kind of high in a new life. And I want to tell you about that.
I now know that I could have avoided many of the bad times I have been through. Planning ahead and setting long term goals weren’t in my thoughts. I just didn’t realize that what I needed most was a closer walk with the Lord. I should have known that from the beginning.
I was raised in a good and prosperous family. I became a Christian when I was 13 years old. My loving parents provided everything needed and most of what I wanted. I had good intentions as a kid. And I thought I had it made. Today, looking back on those times, I can see that I didn’t take seriously any difficulties I got into because there seemed to be no direct consequences. It didn’t occur to me that each time I got into trouble actually put another dent in my spirit.
So, as time went on, I got deeper and deeper into the habit of backsliding, letting the ways of the world influence me instead of following God’s will. Eventually, drugs took control of my life. As a result, over the years I have been locked up more times than I can count.
I became hooked on meth the first time I tried it. I had used marijuana and cocaine and everything else I could get my hands on. But meth was different. I was on it like a little fish on a big hook. And I couldn’t get off. My only goal was to get high. Before meth, my life was more or less normal. I would go fishing, take in a movie or hang out with my friends. When I discovered meth, all of that stopped. Meth was easy. I learned how to manufacture the stuff, so I no longer had to buy it. Whenever I wanted to get high I would just cook up a batch.
All that certainly had its downside. Each time I was arrested I would pray to God to just get me out of this mess and I would change my ways. While I was in custody someone would always say “God brought you here”.
At first I thought, “Are you crazy? Why would God do that?” And I was told that He had a reason. He had plans for me.
I began to ask myself and others, “What plans?” I would pray for an answer and I would sit and listen for the answer until my ears felt like they would fall off. In time I was always released back into the world, and I would seriously try to mend my ways.
On the outside and back in society I would try to do God’s will, go to church, and stop hanging around with the wrong crowd. But after a few weeks I would find myself back in my old ways and pushing God farther away, again. That is until the next time I was in trouble. Then, once again, it was “Oh God, please help me!”
Over the years I admitted myself to drug rehab on three separate occasions. And again I was always told “God brought you here for a reason. He has plans for you.”
So I thought, “Help me out here. What plans?” I kept trying, but I couldn’t find the answer. My mistake was that I was trying to figure it out on my own and I forgot about asking God to help me understand it.
Several years ago while I was heavy into manufacturing and using meth, the mobile home I was renting burned to the ground. Everything in it was lost, or so I thought. A few days later my landlord called and told me he had something that came out of the fire and I might want it. I went to pick it up and was shocked to see it was my new Bible. My mom had just given it to me. It was untouched in the fire. There was no fire damage, no water damage. The Bible came through the fire when nothing else did. My landlord told me how God burns the chaff off the wheat so that only the good will be left.
For several months I walked a straight line. But then I fell back into my old ways and was sent to prison. After being released, again, I decided to move out of Florida and try a fresh start in another state. I didn’t realize that unless I included God, the move would not help.
Almost immediately after making the move, on that cold December night in Iowa, I found myself cooking up more meth in an attempt to gain another cheap high. Then came the explosion that engulfed me in flames and put me on the floor like a fallen tree, burning and expecting to die.
Finally, I got it. The message was clear and horribly painful. God’s grace allowed me to live. Now I want others to know what I’ve learned. Hell is real. The fire and the pain are real. So, it’s obvious to me, Heaven is also very real.
My life changed forever the night the explosion set me on fire. It was a wake up call from God. And this time, I did wake up.
I can imagine God looking down and seeing the mess I was continuing to make of my life. He allowed me to feel the heat and pain of the flames. It was as if He was saying “If you don’t change your ways, this is what you will face for eternity. Choose me or or choose eternal fire.” I chose God.
What that means is I can experience God’s kingdom here on Earth and I have life after death for eternity. When I understood that, I sensed that everything was going to come out all right. And I knew that God wanted me to do something important with my life, for Him. He wanted me to tell people how I messed up for so many years, but that he was watching over me and had rescued me when my life seemed to be over. So I know that whatever happened from then on would be a part of His plan.
I thought I was ready to go out at once and counsel people on all the pitfalls of having anything to do with illicit drugs. In that way I would keep them from making the same terrible mistakes I had made over and over again.
But it wasn’t going to be that easy. It wasn’t time for that part of the plan to be put to work. First came the 10 year prison sentence. And I thought,“How is this helping the plan?” It did help, I soon discovered. In fact, going to prison turned out to be a real blessing instead of a curse. It was a sentence that gave me an opportunity for intense Bible study without distractions, and a chance to learn a lot more about God and His Word.
Late one night, while I was being treated in a hospital as an outpatient, I heard a sermon on TV. The preacher was talking about how God uses fire to purify, to take all the impurities out of something that is contaminated. I thought, “Huh? Can it be any clearer? God is speaking to me.”
Then along came a Christian program for prisoners, and through it God’s big picture for my life finally clicked into place in my brain. What helped me come out of the darkness and see the light was a message that one of the program’s inspirational speakers delivered to us.
The speaker used the game of golf in a symbolic illustration of how God works on our lives to improve us. He explained it this way: God first creates a shiny new golf ball and places it on a tee. The ball represents us. It can be any of us or anyone else that God is working to improve. Sitting on that tee, we get all excited. We’re ready to go and waiting for the blow of a big club to send us on our way. We will rise high in the sky and fly down the fairway to the green. But God says “STOP! Just sit right there.” In my case that meant a 10 year prison sentence to hold me in a place without distractions that would keep me from giving God my full attention. He wanted me to learn patience, to study Him and His Word, and to be cautious. He didn’t want me to go flying too fast down the fairway and miss the many wonderful things in life along my journey to the green. So, instead of taking off like a rocket, I should go a step at a time, pushed gently by a putter the whole length of the fairway. In that way I could study, learn and be filled with knowledge of God. This is continuing to improve me so that I can do His Work correctly and be fruitful in helping others to find Him.
My life has been a messy series of events that combined to create a mosaic as sordid and painful as some of my experiences. But I don’t have any regrets and I don’t look back in despair. Why? Simply stated, it is because the twisted path I was on for many years finally led me to Jesus Christ and salvation. Many people never find God. I did.
For decades I was always searching for something and was never satisfied with what I found. What I was really searching for but didn’t know it was Jesus Christ. Without Him my life was empty. I tried to fill the void with drugs, but that only made my life worse.
The bottom line of my story is that it isn’t about me. It is about Jesus and how He pulled me out of a hopeless lifestyle. I can never repay the love and faithfulness of Jesus. That’s the beauty of God’s grace. By His grace we are saved. One thing I hope my expedience will do is emphasize that no matter how bad things get you can change and restart with a clean slate.
It took me a long time to realize that to turn around a life gone wrong you have to make a firm decision for change and then act on that decision. I finally understood that I had to change because the further I traveled through life without God, the more difficult the road back would be and the more likely it was that I would not live to make it back.
We never know how much time we have on this earth. Life is a breath. You inhale your final breath and then release it. And that’s it. It’s all over. No more chances to change anything.
When I set myself on fire, I could have died in my sins with no time to put my life in order. But God brought me out of the fire and showed me the way to a life eternal.
I personally know that Jesus Christ is real and is waiting for each of us to come to Him and join His flock. He will make a way clear to anyone willing to follow Him. He is there for all of us and He will meet you and move into your life if you open yourself to Him.
In Revelation, chapter 3, verse 20, He said: “Behold, I stand at the door, and knock: if any man hears my voice, and opens the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me.”