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Olexandr Sloboda

I was born in a good family and was raised just like every one else. I was not different, but when I was older I wanted to be different. I wanted to be cool and modern. My friends had the same desires.

First, we drank and smoked cigarettes. Later, it was cool to smoke drugs. We learned how to do it and we liked it. That was our life: alcohol + drugs = life. I tried to live like this.

I finished school and entered the university in the department of Romance-Germanic philology. My new life started. I found new friends and instead of using light drugs, I used hard ones. I did not want to study. After the first year of my education, I took academic leave for a year. During this break from my study, a second radical change entered my life. I began to do injections. My friend suggested this to me. He had been a drug addict for a long time and I still remember how he tried to persuade me and I surrendered.

After the first time, I did it a second, third, fifth, tenth time….and became a drug addict.

I did not know the things drugs would bring me to. In the beginning, everything was like a fairy tale: new feelings, new thoughts…I thought it would always be this way. I was mistaken.

I used more and more drugs everyday. I did not even notice.

After a year I began to study at the university again. But how can a drug addict study? When you experience a drug craving, this feeling leads you not to the university but to the drug addict’s den.

I began to degrade. My nervous system changed. I was aggressive and I had bad thoughts. (I do not mention my memory because it disappeared somewhere.) I was afraid that I forgot simple things which normal people remember…

Each day was a copy of the previous one: wake up - look for money - look for drugs - do drugs – night - sleep. Every day was the same. I quit my studies at the university. My parents learned about it and were disappointed and began to look for a way out of my situation. I went to a hospital for drug addicts. They helped me physically, but I still had a psychological addiction. Drug addiction was in my brain and dictated my lifestyle.

I almost died twice because of drug overdose. The glory goes to God that I am still alive.

My situation was worse and worse. DRUGs were eating me up. I wanted to die.

But God had different plans for my life. My mother began visiting Central Baptist Church. I became acquainted with a former drug addict. He came to my house and began to talk about God, Who gives power to not use drugs and drink…All I could say at that time was, “Good for you. Behold. I can handle it on my own…”

One evening I was going home high on drugs and tipsy. I thought about what to tell my mother who would ask me many questions. I was passing by a local church and I knew that there were Christians. I knew nothing and no one.

As I passed by the street, I saw a light inside the church. I was driven by an invisible power to go inside that church. I came in and stopped, not knowing what to do. There were Christian girls and boys who I got to know later. The pastor was also there. I said that I was a drug addict and wanted to quit. They suggested that I take a rehabilitation course and I agreed. That very evening I went to rehabilitation.

Two day passed and on the third day I told them that I would go. They persuaded me to stay. But I (Satan in me) tried to do what I wanted. I went and began to do drugs again, this time even more. But I visited church services and read the Bible. I went to rehabilitation again.

I am free now for more than 8 years. Jesus Christ made me completely free. It was not easy, but I prayed and God blessed me and gave me relief. The rehabilitation course lasted 7 months. God made a new person out of me. He gave me new family and friends. I believed and I do not regret it. I have immeasurable joy. I will be with Jesus Christ Himself in paradise after my death. The Bible tells me so. I believe in it.

After rehabilitation, I was the first former drug addict. There are now more than 30. They are my friends, with whom I previously did drugs. We praise God together for His awesome salvation.


 

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