Michael Goldstone | God Pursued Me As I Hitchhiked South!

We felt, what if we went to Mexico? Of course we couldn't afford to get there, so we had to hitchhike. What if we hitchhiked to Mexico? We found out from some friends that in southern Mexico there were magic mushrooms. And I thought, if we can get to southern Mexico and try those mushrooms, maybe those would help Ron and I understand who we were even better, and maybe understand who God was better.

I went to the University of Buffalo. When I was at Buffalo, that was a time in my life when I was particularly really, really searching for God. There was just this deep longing in my soul, wanting to know that there was more to life than what I had experienced. Growing up in my Jewish faith served a purpose and was good, but I just felt there was so much more there, so much more that I wanted to know about God, and myself, and life. So when I was at Buffalo, I was experimenting with drugs, marijuana, even LSD. I had many relationships with girls, and I read a lot of books, primarily Eastern books, all with the purpose of trying to understand and find God. And then I realized, maybe if I left the city and moved out to the country, maybe a place that was very remote, that maybe I could find God in a more intimate way.

A close friend of mine, Ron, was going to Syracuse, and of course I was in Buffalo. We decided that we wanted to go to an area where it was more remote, where it was more nature. And we decided, of course we had to make a living, so we decided that we were going to raise tomatoes. And we found 20 acres of land, Ron and I, in southern Oregon, and it was beautiful, a creek and a log house. And it was there we thought we would put the greenhouse and start this little tomato business. What happened was, when we got there and we had our dream realized, I began to see that this was not satisfying, that I was more depressed, more discouraged than ever before in my life.

Now we come up with another idea. We decided we were going to hitchhike down to Mexico, and we did. On our way down to Mexico, almost every ride we were getting were from these long-haired hippies. Almost every ride, they were talking to us about the Bible, about Jesus. I couldn't relate at all. It just didn't make any sense to me. I was Jewish. Ron was asking a lot more questions than me. I just kind of shut them out. We get down to Mexico, we hitch all the way down to almost Central America. And as it turns out, just when we were about to go up to the mountain to get these mushrooms, we find out that they were busting all these long hairs from America, and they said, 'Don't go up the mountain because you'll wind up in jail in Mexico.' So on our way back from Mexico, because that trip was a total disaster, we stopped in San Francisco. Ron had introduced me to a girl, Deborah, so we spent a whole weekend together at his brother's place. And in the course of that weekend, I had opened my heart to this girl Deborah and started sharing with her all of the things that I was feeling, all these bottled up feelings, feelings about God, feelings about my own insecurities, my fears, my dreams. And we spent hours and hours together that weekend talking and just sharing with each other. At the end of that weekend, I was in love with her. I asked her to marry me. She said no, of course, she thought I was nuts. But something happened in my heart that weekend. Something shifted in me. And I was in love, and I had never experienced this incredible feeling before. But I knew, I knew that I knew that God had brought her into my life. I knew it wasn't me, I knew it wasn't my personality, my looks, my sports athleticism. It was God. I knew God just miraculously arranged me to go to Mexico, her to be in San Francisco, and for us to meet. I wanted to give something back to God. I didn't know how, but someone had given me a Bible several months earlier. And I thought, all right, I'm going to read the Bible. And of course I was familiar with the Old Testament, and I started reading the Old Testament. And in college I couldn't relate, but now the Bible was coming alive. Anything that I read, Genesis, Exodus, Psalms, anything, it just was so meaningful to me, and I just felt so close to God. And then I get to the New Testament. Now, being raised Jewish, I knew nothing about the New Testament or Jesus. Some of the things he said really disturbed me. He said, 'I am the way, the truth, and the life, and no man can come to the Father but through me.' And I said, 'How could this be?' And he said, 'The Father and I are one.' And I said, 'But there's only one God. Jesus may be a great man.' And I was so confused. I wasn't sharing this with anyone. Ron and I had a close relationship, but I just felt that I couldn't talk to him about these particular things. And then one night, I was standing under the stars near our little cabin, and I said, 'God, if you and Jesus are the same, you've got to show me that this is the right thing to do.' Because I was really scared.

[Music] Something happened in my heart that night. The next morning, I shared with Ron what had happened that night before. And he had tears in his eyes, and he said, 'When we were hitchhiking down to Mexico and we were getting picked up, I started reading the Bible and I started also to talk to God, and I also believed in Jesus. But I didn't share this with you, Mike, because I was afraid.' And here we are, that next day, just embracing each other and crying and sharing with each other how God had met us and how we both asked Jesus to come into our life. And we couldn't believe it. We went to this church. It was life-changing for us. But I was still asking God to show me that this was the right decision. Well, the pastor from that church, he was retired, he was in his early 70s. He came out to our cabin one day to see me. And he didn't know what I was wrestling with, but he started to read a portion of scripture to me. It was, 'Who hath believed our report? And to whom is the arm of the Lord revealed? And he shall grow up before him as a tender plant, a root out of dry ground. And he was wounded for our transgressions, and by his stripes we are healed.' And he said, 'Brother Michael, where do you think this is?' And I said, 'I don't know, Matthew, Luke.' And he hands me the Bible, and I looked, and it said Isaiah. And I said, 'You're kidding. This is in the Old Testament?' Because it was so obvious to me that it was talking about Jesus. And he started to share with me scriptures from all over the Old Testament, showing me that Jesus was the Messiah. And that prayer that I had asked God, 'God, show me that this is the right decision,' that day I felt so secure and so satisfied as this pastor started sharing with me from the Old Testament about those scriptures. And I was so thankful to God that he had answered my prayer. Deborah came up to visit us up in Oregon, and I started to read to her from the scriptures. And she also started to believe in Jesus. And a few months later, we got married. She's still my best friend to this day. We have an amazing, amazing marriage.

My friend Ron, instead of the tomatoes, we decided to start a little business together. So we started a lighting business. And I guess I took the Lord literally when he said, 'Be lights of the world,' and we went into the lighting business. And that little tiny seed has grown into one of the largest lighting companies in the United States. And when we went back to share with our family, my mom and my dad and my brother have also come to believe in Jesus. And that is tremendous. I know that Christianity, I know that believing in Jesus, there's so much from the past with the Holocaust and what Christians have done. But this has nothing to do with Jesus. This has nothing to do with the Bible and the Messiah that was prophesied long, long ago. If you, I just would encourage you and challenge you, like I did, to search and ask and read the scriptures for yourself, with just asking God with an open heart and an open mind, 'Could Jesus really be the Messiah?'