P.O. Box 328
Unicoi, TN 37692
(423)612-1011

I have known our Lord for over 30 years. Yet, in the last few years I have had a conviction to tell my story to the world. To some it is a shock, to some a blessing. When I think about Job 13:15, my mind goes to Job 42:2 cause I have fought many battles and I give God the glory for the victory.

When I think back as a child, as a 9 year old boy and how my mother drug me to church, the Spirit falls upon me. We had to walk to church. I was saved and baptized when I was nine. I grew in the church. When I was just a teenager, I was teaching and speaking in other churches.

When I was 18, I went into the Army. They were glad to get this hillbilly. As everybody knows, us old country boys were born with a fishing pole in one hand and a rifle in the other. There was hardly nothing I couldn’t do. I became a sharp shooter of our outfit. I had a great carrier going.

Then one night while we were out on maneuvers, my buddy and I ended up in live tank fire. I could hear the tanks coming and feel the blast from their cannons but couldn’t get away.

Then all of a sudden, a mortar landed next to me. As a teenager, the fear of death changes you. I was almost killed. Next thing I knew, I was going home. This seems like the start of my downfall.

In less than a year, I would watch my firstborn child die. Nothing I could do but stand and watch as life leaves that little body. I pick her up and hold her, knowing she will never know this pain I felt.

At age 20 or maybe 21, I had a very bad car wreck. My face was very seriously injured. My teeth were knocked out but that wasn’t the worse of it all. My forehead struck the dash while my face took the blow from the steering wheel.

In six months my face was healed but I had problems. I started having seizures.

My God, I would not wish such a thing on anyone. These were not the Grand Mal seizure but to me much worse.

I would be working and all of a sudden I would hear a ringing in my ears or a smell I would have and then time would just lapse. Sometimes an hour or more would just disappear. Then I would come to my senses and be some where else miles from my home.

Year after year went by. I had people tell me I had a demon. Friends I knew left me. I started on prescription drugs. After a few years, I was eating them like candy. No one knew the pain I was suffering; rejection of some church people, people I highly respected no longer cared. I cried in my heart.

I had two children at home. They would climb upon my lap and say, “Daddy, what’s wrong?” I sank deep into depression. I was taking so many drugs at times that I couldn’t tell you my name. Years were by, day after day, the same thing.

One dark night in 1986 in the early fall, I said, “God, if this is all the life You have for me, I just as soon be dead.” These were my very words. I had a pistol lying beside my chair on a shelf. I picked it up, pulled back the slide, stuck it to my chest, and pulled the trigger twice.

Two bullets pierced my lung. One went all the way through and one lodged in my shoulder blade. I found the peace I had been searching for, for only a short time – only a few seconds.

Somehow I can’t explain but I know that I died that night. My Spirit left my body. I went down this gray, long, dark tunnel. I ended up in this room made of stone. There was a man standing there in a black robe. He said, “Sit”. I sat down. When I did, he started pushing me toward this door. As I got closer, it began to open.

A smell of burning came from it and all I could see is darkness. Fear overwhelmed me and I screamed “O GOD SAVE ME!” I woke up in the ambulance. The paramedic was yelling my name and I said “what.” He said, “do you know me?” I said, “yes.” He said, “welcome back, you were gone for 90 seconds.”

I want to tell you this was the hardest healing I ever had but God in all His Glory saved me. Tears fill my eyes. Two months I lay not knowing if I was going to live or not. Tubes hanging out my side, surgery, doubt, but God saved me.

You know what, I haven’t had a seizure since the fall of 1986!!!!! I now work a full time job and also trying to start a ministry. In the last 3 to 5 years, I battled sugar diabetes and claimed victory over it.