Member-only story
Lessons from My Drug-Dealer Friend and a Christian Roommate
Salvation just means we’ve awakened to who we are.
In college, my soulful dead-head friend grew marijuana in his off-campus backyard. What he didn’t smoke, like other cash-strapped kids, he sold for books.
It was the 80’s. Not radical activity.
Yet for someone like me —a shy Christian girl who abstained from jay-walking, much less mind-altering substances — it was rule-breaking of the highest order just short of turning water into wine.
Still, how different were we at a soul level?
How different are any of us at a soul level? It’s an important question, especially now with our distinct religious divisiveness inflamed by social media.
One thing was certain. He didn’t know Jesus, didn’t care, and kept acing his tests. Last I heard, he was a happily married professor at UC Santa Barbara.
On the other hand, my Evangelical Christian roommate used to ask us on Sunday mornings what we’d done the night before. She knew… but wanted verbal confessions all the same.
Ours was a predominantly male campus with engineering majors. Chances hovered at a thousand percent that every young man had sex on his mind on Saturday nights, as did eighty…
