Lon Solomon - Liberty University Convocation

good morning Liberty good morning Liberty hey it's great to be with you this morning I'm so glad to be able to come down here and those are very kind words by Johnny but just remember what John Newton said at his deathbed the man who wrote Amazing Grace he said all I can remember is that I am a great sinner but I have an even greater Savior well that's my story pretty much that simple so Johnny I appreciate all the nice things you said about me but don't give me too much credit okay you know when you're Jewish and I'm Jewish you can only grow up to be one of three things and that is a doctor a lawyer or failure and being a preacher is definitely number three and so I want to take a little while to share with you how I an iced Jewish boy in fact I wasn't a nice boy but a Jewish boy ended up being a pastor and a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ I was born and raised in Portsmouth Virginia I was born in 1948 there you go I was born in 1948 that makes me 62 pay attention okay here we go so and my family was conservative Jewish that is they weren't reformed and super liberal they weren't Orthodox and super conservative we were in the middle we celebrated the Jewish holidays I had a Bar Mitzvah I went to synagogue and we did all the Jewish things and I remember when I was about 15 years old that I was in high school and a young lady while we were I was acted in plays I was in the thespian troupe while we were sitting and waiting to go on she said to me she said are you do you know for sure whether you're going to heaven or not I said I don't know so I went and asked my rabbi the next time I was at synagogue I said hey did you go to heaven or not and he said all Jews go to heaven and I said really and he said yeah we have a special covenant with God and he said hell is a Gentile problem so I thought that's wonderful I like that I said so you mean I could do almost anything I wanted to do I could cheat in school I could lie I could stop coming to synagogue and I would still go to heaven and he said yes and so that pretty well ended my career after synagogue if you understand what I'm saying and I went off to college I went to the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill yeah yeah god bless the Tar Heels and and when I got to Chapel Hill of course coming out of high school I wanted to do everything that a high school kid a profane ungodly high school kid wants to do when he gets to college and so I joined a social fraternity friends the fraternity I joined Pi Lambda Phi at Chapel Hill you know you maybe some of you have seen the movie Animal House well my fraternity made Animal House look like a Christian day school if you understand what I'm saying there was a wild place and not only did I join a fraternity I got deeply into drinking and partying and womanizing and and you name it playing cards gambling I had every addiction known to man just about and for the first couple years of college was a lot of fun but then as the Vietnam War was raging on and I was approaching graduation and the idea of having to go to Vietnam was becoming more and more real I began thinking about life you know why am I here what am i doing what is the purpose of life what's gonna happen to me after I die and so I began looking for some answers and I was in 1969 I was up in New York working at a resort hotel in the Catskill Mountains and a friend of mine said hey there is this music festival that they're gonna have up here this year called Woodstock how would you like to go and I said I don't know sounds cool to me and he said but we have to buy a ticket there $26 friends I may be one of the very few people in the whole world that ever bought a ticket to Woodstock I wish I still had it you know there were 50,000 tickets sold and half a million people who showed up tickets didn't matter well anyway we went to Woodstock I began getting into the drug culture at that point and I began thinking that this was really the secret to finding some answers in life to getting enlightened to figuring out why I was here and who I was but after several years of taking drugs using drugs smuggling drugs from Europe into the United States and selling them I put myself through my last two years of Chapel Hill by selling dope in Chapel Hill on the street and maybe I should show you what I look like when I was a student at Chapel Hill if we got that picture can we show everybody what I look like there was how about that see my hair my hair doesn't grow down it grows out and that is a legitimate fro that is not a wig that is the real McCoy my friends anyway that's what I look like you say lon you actually look better than than you do now well ok fair enough but anyway and and I I uh pushed open sold open smuggle dope but after a couple of years of smoking everything you can smoke and drop in everything you can drop you know I began to realize I don't think this is getting me anywhere and I'll remember sitting downtown on Franklin Street in Chapel Hill North Carolina two o'clock in the morning we were trip down on LSD I was with one of my good drug buddies and he turned and we were having a conversation and I'm sure he didn't understand the significance of what he was about to say but I said to him I said you know David I said we're doing all these drugs where the flower people were supposed to be all about love and peace and everything I said but I have to tell you after all of these drugs we're doing I don't think I'm getting better I think I'm getting worse I think I'm getting more selfish I think I'm getting more self-centered think I'm getting more evil and he said to me lon he said did it ever occur to you that you're not getting worse you're just getting more honest about what you've been the whole time Wow I said dude that's heavy man I can't think about that well I did think about that and it really shook me up because I began to realize he was right I began to realize that all this time I had convinced myself that I was this wonderful loving sweet kind a person who was going to heaven cuz my rabbi told me I was going to heaven but I began to realize none of that was really true and that I needed help but that I needed help from the outside because I couldn't change myself I've been trying to do that for years and so I decided I needed religion and so I went looking for religion I first got into Eastern religion into Buddhism and Daoism which by the way is spelled with a T I got into Confucianism I would do go out and sit all morning under a tree and sit in yoga position and read Zen Buddhism and then I'd get up and say I'm hungry what's for lunch and I'd blow my Zen for the whole day you understand what I'm trying to say anyway that didn't work I mean these Eastern religions sounded great but they didn't work I wanted to grow a ponytail and go dancing with the Hari Krishna's you know around the street the problem with the Hari Krishna's was I hated their food I would have starved to death as a hari Christian of the food was awful so I decided I can't be a Hari Krishna that won't work and so then I decided well I'll go back to my ace in the hole to Judaism so I went to see a campus rabbi there in Chapel Hill and I went in I sat in his office I plopped down I had hair out to my shoulders loved beads a tank top bell-bottoms and motorcycle boots on and smelled horrible and had a little goatee and I said to him rabbi I said I think God is calling me to be a rabbi and he said no I don't think so and I said well I've got this hole deep in my heart and I tried to explain to him this emptiness that I was feeling and this lack of purpose and this lack of meaning and and and I and I laid it all out for him and you know what he did he gave me a book on the festivals of Judaism I thought a book I don't need a book I need somebody to talk to me and tell me how to fix this hole inside of my heart so I got up went outside threw the book in the trashcan and said he's clueless and now I'm really desperate because now I don't know where to go I mean I've tried women and drinking and partying and alcohol I've tried drugs I've tried Eastern religions I've tried Judaism there's nothing left and so I decided I was gonna kill myself I decided what's the purpose I would sit with my fraternity brothers and we would smoke dope and after we got high I would say to them fellas we need to talk about what the purpose of life is and what we're really doing here and and where we're really going and what's gonna happen to us after I die and they would all say to us to me rather they'd say lon what is wrong with you you're bumming us all out why don't you just go grow up and get married have children grow old and have grandchildren and die like normal people why have you got to have answers to all these questions well I needed answers I figured what's the purpose of growing up and going through all that trouble if I don't even know what I'm doing here or why I exist so I decided I was going to kill myself of course in those days I could procrastinate anything so I hadn't gotten around to it yet but I was clearly planning to do that and so it was the spring of 1971 I was actually supposed to graduate in 1970 but I was doing my victory lap you understand you know my victory lap I was doing my victory lap around Chapel Hill my fifth year and and the reason was I hadn't finished all my courses and the reason was I didn't but never went to class and the reason was because I was Preston smoke dope all day so now you understand so I was on my victory lap in 1971 and it was I'll never forget it was a spring day and I was walking downtown a Franklin Street Chapel Hill North Carolina I had my dog Noah with me my dog was an 85-pound German Shepherd that someone had given me as a pup and he and I were walking down the street I was tripped out on LSD that day and he got into a dog fight and was mangling this dog right there on Franklin Street and it was right in front of the weirdest man in the world you say what do you mean by that well there was this guy who would drive in that spring into Chapel Hill in a little white Econoline Ford van he had scripture verses written all over the side in the front in the back of the van he had two big megaphone speakers mounted on the top of the van hooked up to a record player inside the van and he would play the scratchy old 33 rpm records with music that I don't know you know was hymns but I wasn't interested and then he would stand outside and hand out tracts on the street the weirdest man in the world and my dog got into a fight with dog fight right in front of him and so I pulled Noah off this poor animal that he was completely tearing to pieces and this this man helped me his name was Bob back hard and now I didn't know that at the time and he after we pulled the dogs apart we were nose-to-nose me and the weirdest man in the world and he looked at me and I looked at him and what do you say to the weirdest man in the world so III didn't want to say the wrong thing I said well I said hi and he said hello I said well thanks and he said you're welcome and I said goodbye and he said goodbye and that was it 20 seconds maybe but friends I want to tell you something as I walked away from that man I knew that man had what I was looking for I looked into his eyes I was around him I had given up hope I had begun to believe nobody had what I was looking for nobody had any real answers to what we're doing here but as I looked into that man's eyes something inside of my spirit testified this man has what you are looking for and so I every Saturday he would only come on Saturday I would make a point to pass by him and take one of his tracks now I never read them I piled him up at home I had a big pile of his tracks but and I wanted to talk to him but I was terrified to talk to this man finally after a few weeks I got up the courage to go up two in one day and I said you know I said I would love to talk to you sometime and he said fine he said how about this afternoon at 3:30 you know how a church you see people and you go I would love to have you over for dinner sometime and they say fine I'll be there this afternoon what time you want me well you don't mean today you're not talking about today you don't want him over for dinner today friends I didn't want to talk to him today I was scared to death so when he said come back at 3:30 I was like Hama Hama Hama Hama Hama Hama I was like well I know I said I got something else to do with 3:30 today I'm busy now what in the world is a hippie on drugs have to do with 3:30 on a Saturday afternoon I didn't have a thing in the world to do I was lying through my teeth but I was scared I said maybe next week and this I started walking down Franklin Street beautiful sunny day hundreds of people on the street this man cupped his hands around his mouth and screamed at me as I was walking down the street you may not be here next week and I was like oh oh no no no I don't want all those people knowing that the weirdest man in the world is screaming and me I hurried down the street ducked around the corner leaned up against the building and said that was horrible that was absolutely horrible what have I've done well but you know later that day I got to thinking I may not be here next week I mean I'd already had friends die from high school that I knew so I said I'm going back at 3:30 3:30 I went back guess what he wasn't there it's not his fault he didn't know I was coming he wasn't there friends I was devastated I thought this guy had laid a prophecy on me that I wasn't going to live another week I really did now I know that sounds strange but I was under real conviction of the holy spirit and I was were scared to death that entire next week I didn't have a phone number for him I didn't know how to call him I didn't know how to get in touch with him that whole next week I didn't walk under ladders I crossed the street looking both ways I climbed the steps one at a time I was terrified I wasn't gonna make it another week the next Saturday I was up at the crack of dawn which in those days was about 10:30 and I went downtown and sat down and next day I'm waiting for this guy to come into town he came into town I went up to him and I said because of you I have had the worst week of my entire life he's like what did I do I said forget it I said look I want to hear about this Jesus Christ character I said there's got to be a sales pitch that goes with all this stuff you do out here tell me about it and that man stood and for a two hours talk to me about Jesus Christ friends I'd never heard a thing about Jesus Christ in my life I didn't know a thing about Jesus Christ Jewish people don't read the Bible when I witness to my dad years later and showed him Isaiah 53 he said I don't believe in the New Testament I said dad what are you talking about this right in the middle of the Old Testament we don't know the Bible Jewish people don't know their Bible you know far more about the Bible than your Jewish friends do I didn't know anything he starts telling me about Christ I've never heard any of this stuff before finally at the end of two hours he said to me he said okay are you ready now to receive Jesus I was like well first of all I don't even know what that means and second of all no you know if you just said stand on your head and spit nickels at least I would have known what position to get in receive Jesus I don't know what that means what does it mean to receive Jesus but whatever it was I didn't want to do it I said are you crazy I'm Jewish Jewish people don't do this this is a wonderful thing for us to talk about Jewish people don't do this he said well I'll tell you what he said if I give you a Bible will you read it I said I don't know he said well I want to give you a Bible he gave me a Bible by the way I still have that Bible to this day that that gentleman gave me he said I want you to read the Bible I want you to promise me you'll read it I said all right I'll read it so you know I loved to read before I go to sleep at night so I put it on my nightstand and I started reading the Bible I've never read the Bible in my life in my own Jewish home we didn't even own a Bible so I started I didn't know where to start I don't know if this thing goes introduction main body conclusion anticlimax I don't know if it's an anthology of poems I don't know what this thing is so I figured okay start at the beginning right good idea in the beginning God created the heavens in the earth alright cool I could deal with that you know and I read a little bit more about the fall of Adam and Eve and I thought cool I can deal with that and then I got to so and so begat so and so begat so and so begat so and so and I thought man how long does this go on and so I figured all right all right all right I'm going into the New Testament that's where Jesus is anyway so I figured again I don't know where to start so I started in the Gospel of Matthew and you know that was a great place for a Jewish person to start because Matthew places such emphasis on how Jesus fulfilled the Old Testament and this gentleman had told me he said look you he gave me a King James Bible hahaha how about that and he said you're gonna see read a lot of things in there you may not understand like I wot not I'm an educated person I'm an honor student I never heard of the word wot wot I don't know what that word means he said to me you were gonna read a lot of things you don't understand you know what you'll understand enough just keep going so I did finally after about a month I got to Matthew chapter 11 verse 28 which says come to me all you who are weary and heavy-laden and I will give you rest you will find peace for your souls and I went bingo bingo that's me I said Lord I couldn't have even put it in words the way you did but that's exactly me I am weary I am heavy laden I need peace I need rest and so I got on my knees beside my bed never done that before in my life Jewish people don't get on their knees to pray and here's what I said I said now God I said I'm not even sure you exist and this Jesus character I am really confused about I said but here's the deal this man told me to receive Jesus I don't even know what that means but Lord I'm gonna give you my life for one month I'll go where you want me to go I'll do what you want me to do I don't know how you're gonna tell me what you want me to do but I'll do it and if there and at the end of that month if you haven't given me the peace and the rest that you promised in this verse I reserve the right to take my life back but if you give me that peace in that rest you can have my life for good amen you say Solomon that is the worst salvation prayer I have ever heard in my whole life well you're right it wasn't a great prayer but you know aren't you glad for first Samuel 16:7 which says man looks on the outward appearance but the Lord looks at the heart I believe God up in heaven said Solomon that is the worst salvation prayer I've ever heard in my life but your hearts right son so I'm gonna honor your heart even though the prayer stinks and then I gotta tell you stuff started happening in my life if you've ever given your life to Jesus you know what happened next I mean God moved into my life hook line sinker boat anchor oars everything but there was one other thing I did right after I prayed that prayer I thought you know what I need more than that I got back on my knees and I said you know Lord my dog here has the mains you know what the mange is the hair starts falling off your dog and I've been using salve on Noah that was my dog's name Noah and and so I said god if you're really God I'm gonna stop using the salve on my dog and I want you to heal my dog all by yourself and prove to me you're really real amen then I got up and I thought boy I'm putting my dog's life at risk maybe I should have asked God to do something like levitate the bed or you know or something where I wasn't endangering my dog's life but I said nope a prayer is a prayer it's done well you know what you can believe whatever you want to believe I don't really care but I'm telling you in three days my dog's mange was gone the hair was back you believe whatever you belong want to believe but I'm telling you the Lord Jesus Christ healed my dog if it bothers your theology if it bothers your theology that God would heal a dog I'm sorry God's not limited by your theology God does what he wants to do amen and so at the end of about a week I was like oh my gosh I have just backed into the answer to the universe well how did this happen so the next Saturday this guy came to town I still didn't know how to get in touch with him Bob that car I went up to him and I told him this whole story he starts dancing around in the street yelling praise the Lord hallelujah he got his wife out of the back of the band and said tell her tell her and I said I told her and she starts praising around there hugging each other kissing each other dancing around in the street I thought oh my gosh what have I gotten myself into here what kind of cult is this you know these people are nuts where are the snakes where is the hemlock does that come next oh my gosh what's going on anyway now I understand why they were so excited don't you you bet do you know that man came to Chapel Hill for six straight months every single Saturday and as far as we know he went to be with the Lord last year as far as we know I'm the only person that came to Christ through his ministry I like to think that maybe God sent Bob Eckhart to Chapel Hill just from me and even if he didn't I'm glad he sent him for me and whoever else came to Christ and the only picture I have a Bob Eckhart and it's not a good one is him baptizing me let me show it to you Bob Eckhart is on the left I'm in the middle you see the hair right yeah there I am my good friend David who said to me the problem is you sitting on the wall is on the other side and Noah is just having fun swimming in the lake he's getting baptized too it's the only picture I have of my friend Bob Eckhart now I got a lot more I can tell you and what I want you to do we brought a lot of these CDs of my whole life story that you can pick up out in the lobby at 101 when you leave or you can go right on our website McClain Bible org and you can download and podcast the entire story because I can't I don't have time to tell it all but I got two more things I want to tell you number one I'm not my relatives weren't particularly excited about this when I went to tell my well relatives that I believed in Jesus one of my my uncle said to me he said okay he said so now it's you and Adolf Hitler and I'm like Adolf Hitler what's Adolf Hitler got to do with anything he said well he was a Christian - I said Adolf Hitler was not a Christian he said well he wasn't Jewish and he wasn't Muslim so he was Jewish I said no he wasn't he was Gentile he wasn't a Christian he was a Gentile well let's just say it didn't go over real great with my family that I come to Christ but two years after I came to Christ my family set me up with a deprogrammer a rabbi deprogrammer to get my mind right young Stan and I'll never forget I met him I'll cut the story short we were at a meeting I didn't know he was there to deprogram me everybody else knew not me he says to me we start talking around the Dove the little table the buffet table and he goes so I knew he was a rabbi he said so he said I understand that you're Jewish I said I am he said I understand that you are believe Jesus I said I do he said I understand that you're a pastor of a church I said that's right he said how could you do this he said how could you betray your people like this and he says voice starts going up he goes how could you turn your turncoat how could you sell your people out and now he's screaming at me and he said finally he said and I believe that if you would have really checked it out you could have found in Orthodox Judaism every single thing you say you found in Jesus and I said okay okay that's enough I said rabbi I said look I want you to look me right here in the eyes now I learned to do this from my wife cuz she says this to me all the time she said look me in the eyes and I know that's generally not a good thing so so anyway I said rabbi I want you to look me right here in the eyes and he said I said I want to ask you a question I said if going home tonight some guy hits you and kills you or you choke on your shrimp right here at the buffet table I said and you're dead I said I want you to tell me do you know that the last breath you breathe here on earth will be followed by the next breath you take on the shores of heaven with God in his presence look me right here in the eyes I said and tell me you know that he said I can't tell you that I said all right look here I said look here said I want to tell you that because of what Jesus Christ has done in my life covering my sin with his blood as the Messiah of Israel I can look you right in the eyes and tell you that I know that I said so rabbi I don't think you and Orthodox Judaism have anything to offer me I think I've got something to offer you amen well that pretty well ended the conversation but it's true isn't it hello is it true you bet it is for this is the record that God has given us his son first John 5:11 and that he's given us life in his son he who has the son of God has eternal life jesus said John 5:20 for he who believes in Me has eternal life present tense and will never come into condemnation hey praise God for that got one more thing to tell you and then I'm done just of the records that this man would play you know those songs like Fanny Crosby and blessed assurance Jesus is mine you know I knew those songs I didn't know the words but I knew the melody you say how did you did they sing it in synagogue no they didn't sing it in synagogue what's wrong with you no I know I knew it because I had an african-american lady named Cora Lee Goodman we called her a maid back in the 1950s today we called her a household employee but she was basically they are made Coralie Goodman worked for me from the time I was six months old till the time I went to college and I remember her humming and singing those melodies I didn't know the words but I knew the melody so I figure she's got to be a Christian I hitchhiked to Portsmouth Virginia Portsmouth Virginia yeah okay and I found her house and she hadn't seen me in five years I had hair out to my shoulders bill bottoms boots Noah the whole nine yards and I went to her front door and I knocked on her door and she pulled back the little curtain look close the curtain wouldn't open the door I knocked again I said cor its Loni that's what they call me I said it was Loni she opened the door she said what are you doing here I said cor I came up here to tell you that I've asked Jesus Christ into my life to be my Lord to be my savior she said good God Almighty honey she said I've been praying for you for 22 years she said but I never thought I'd see the day you come to Christ you were bad ban true let me tell you something about Corley Goodman she didn't finish the third grade Corley Goodman couldn't read Corley Goodman couldn't write Corley Goodman couldn't drive a car because she couldn't pass the driver's license test but Corley Goodman could pray she prayed for 22 years for me she prayed me into the kingdom of God my dad came to Christ before he died my mom came to Christ before she died my only brother is an active believer today this woman prayed my entire nuclear family into the kingdom of God here's the point listen listen so many times when we try to reach people for Christ we attacked the wrong thing we attacked their head we give them evidence that demands a verdict and then when they've read that book we given them we give them new evidence that demands a verdict and we keep trying to get them to come to Christ by attacking their head friends the problem is not in people's head the problem is in people's hearts it only takes a thimble full of information to come to Christ it doesn't take much and we attack with the wrong weapon the weapon we need to use is prayer prayer that God would open our friends eyes remove the scales from their eyes remove their blindness so that they see Christ and understand their need for Christ when it comes to reaching your friends for Christ use the right weapon amen amen all right now huh take a breath a couple of quick things to tell you and we're done in just a moment we're gonna have prayer and I'm gonna ask you to take the people that you care and love about either carry the people you care about love that are not Christians and I'm gonna ask you to make a decision to become a prayer warrior for them to stop giving them books and start giving them prayer but I have two quick announcements number one we have a Future Leaders program at MacLaine Bible Church I want you to know about you know most of you graduating from here if you go to the average local church you'll be lucky if they let you run the Xerox machine you got to work your way up cuz everybody's got their realtor anyway and McClane Bible Church we don't do that we're looking for the brightest and the best people who believe God's called them into the ministry in any area administration music a kids quest teenagers we don't care any area of ministry and we'll put you to work and find out how good you really are and if you're really a leader a big leader will keep you go on out to 101 and you'll find about all of all about our future leaders program and the other quick thing is we've got something called Jill's house check it out it's called Jill's house org it is an overnight respite center for children with disabilities we're looking to staff it with people who have a heart for children with disabilities if you want more information go to 101 and we'll tell you all about it okay let's pray and with our heads bowed and our eyes closed I want you to pick out some of the people that you love a mother a father a sister a brother a friend somebody here at school that you are burdened about them coming to Christ and I want you to do what corley goodman did and that is stop giving them information and start giving them prayer and I want you to consider becoming a prayer warrior for these people so let's take a moment and let's pray and if you want to do that you tell God that dear Lord Jesus I don't believe that anybody ever gets saved but that somebody isn't praying for for every one of us here that knows Christ it was a mother or father or brother or sister or friend or neighbor or fellow student who held us up before the throne of God and prayed for the Holy Spirit to remove the blindness from our eyes to drop the scales so that we could see and understand our need for Jesus now Lord there's nothing wrong with giving people information but information is not the problem it's not ignorant that's the problem it's stubbornness it's the heart not the head and so god help us to use the right weapon and it's seeing our friends come to Christ make us prayer warriors who stay on our knees for years seven I stayed on my knees from my dad twenty-two years I stayed on my knees from my mom lord help us to be prayer warriors for these people accept our commitment to do that we pray in Jesus name and what a delivery unit Liberty University say oh you can do better than that what did you say all right don't forget one oh one god bless you guys see you

Channel: Liberty University

Views: 22,598

Rating: 4.7847533 out of 5

Keywords: Convocation, Liberty University, College, Student, School, Campus, Graduation, Education, Community, Liberty, LU, convo, Christian, Lon Solomon, pastor, McLean, Bible, church, megachurch, disciple, Jesus, Jewish, seeker

Id: zR5y3MZEfzs

Length: 36min 14sec (2174 seconds)

Published: Thu Jan 12 2012