Testimony Of Richard W. Baldwin, Jr.

I came to know the Lord in 1986. At the time I was a drug addict, alcoholic and a womanizer. My brother was going to a bible study at the time and I thought that he had lost his mind. My sister in law was also going. She told me that the minister had a good looking daughter so I thought that I should check it out. I had heard the rumors that if you wanted to have sex the easiest women are Preachers daughters, so I set out to find out. I went over to take his daughter out one night fully expecting to get lucky, when I got to their house I was met by this weird looking dude, he had coke bottle glasses and long hair. He let me inside and then yelled up to his daughter and said "There’s some long-haired hippy freak down here for you." This made me laugh because his hair wasn’t too much shorter than mine. Any way before I took her out he told me "don’t do anything to her that you wouldn’t do to me first and I’d better like it!" Again I laughed. To make a long story short I did not prove those rumors true.

Well I figured that I might have a chance if I hung around a little bit and tried to make a good impression. One night I happened to show up and unbeknownst to me they were going to have a bible study that night. If I had known I would have gotten out of there and gone off to get stoned. Next thing I knew a bunch of people started showing up and since I was trying to make a good impression I hung around and listened. Later on that night I decided to say something along the line of" I believe in god and have gone to church so what is the big deal, I am saved as much as you."

Well all of a sudden we had a topic to talk about, the minister then began to preach the gospel unto me and to share with me about Jesus. Afterwards he asked me if I wanted to accept Jesus as my Lord and Saviour and I said I don’t know, The next thing I know, my brother piped in and said "Rick’s problem is he likes to drink and smoke dope and chase after women and he doesn’t want to give that up." I was thinking, thanks big mouth, now they know. Just then the minister made a profound statement to me, he said that I didn’t have to give any of that up to accept Jesus as my Lord and Saviour, Well I thought great I can have my cake and eat it too. So I went ahead and accepted Jesus.

What the minister did not tell me was that the Lord would work on me down the road about all of the stuff that I was doing that he didn’t like. About three weeks later I had decided to quit buying drugs, but I would continue to do them. Well needless to say I never had so many drugs in my life as when I stopped buying them. It took about three weeks for me to realize that there was something wrong with the picture so as I was sitting at home one night I decided to quit doing drugs altogether. I was sitting in my chair and I said to God "I will quit smoking dope, but I expect you God to take away the urge" I went to bed and when I woke up in the morning the urge was gone. No more good morning bongs for me!

I am now married to a wonderful woman, have 2 beautiful little girls and am seeking to do all that the Lord has for me to do. I am not proud of all the things that I did in my past but they will not go to waste. I figure if God could save someone like me and Bless me the way he has then he can do it for anyone.