(About an 8 min read… Do You Have Stories Like This? Or Am I The Only One?)
Some said I was fearless… others said I was an idiot… I like to think of myself as surrounded by angels…
I know it isn’t true… however, with all of the hare-brained things I’ve done… I like to think my angels are missing limbs, limping and wearing eye-patches… due to my incessant need to take risks…
I’ve often wondered about angels… I’ve had so many “impossible experiences” where I should have died… but there was so much protection… let me share a few with you:
22 Feet Down:
I went to measure a roof for someone I knew… they needed help and didn’t have the money to do it… it was at least 20 years expired… the shingles were disintegrating under my feet as I slowly made my way across the roof ridge… cautious with every move, I tensely extended my measuring tape to collect my necessary data… after about an hour of a substantial core workout from balancing so intensely… I had just about gathered what I needed when suddenly, I felt the shingles give way under my feet… it was like someone poured pea gravel on the roof top and took my feet right out from underneath me…
Now… I had fallen off rooftops too many times to count… so I knew what to do… the first thing was to instantly regret my decision to be up there in the first place… but then I grabbed my hammer and attempted to sink it into the roof sheeting… over and over again I slammed the hammer claw with absolutely no bite…
The roof was a 10/12 pitch… which usually wouldn’t be a problem if not for the roller skates that seemed to effortlessly carry me to the roofs edge…
My feet hit the gutters… my sigh of relief was cut short when the gutters gave way as if they weren’t attached at all… I swung my hammer in hopes to catch the slowly detaching gutter and ride it to the ground… however… it didn’t happen… I looked down and saw a 22’ distance between me and the quickly approaching deck below… the deck was old and dilapidated… also in much need of repair…
Now in mid air I was falling face first… but somehow managed to roll, curl my knees in and tuck my head into a fetal position with my back now facing down… I felt the rush of air leave my lungs and hit the deck hard… instantly, everything went black…
When I first arrived at the home it was about 7am… the owners weren’t home and had left for the weekend…
I remember waking up to the worst pain I’ve ever felt… I let out an excruciating yell… and slowly realized what happened… it took a few mins to be able to move… I was wedged down between two deck joists as I’d broken the boards from my impact… I was numb… I was certain I’d broken my back… then suddenly I realized that the sun had gone down… I looked at my watch and it said 9pm…
I slowly forced myself up to my feet… and one foot in front of the other… I made my way to my truck and drove an hour home…
When I arrived home… my late wife had gone to bed… this was her usual response in those days… I hobbled to the bathroom, took a shower and noticed blood in my urine…
I remember going to bed and sleeping for two days… I was out of work for two weeks, but I recovered quickly… I’ve known people to die from an 8’ fall… and I’m certain the prayers of those who loved me had kept me alive….
There’s a Right Way… and a Stupid Way:
Shortly after I was first married, I was given a 1994 Ford Taurus Wagon… it was navy blue with a white front door… I’m sure you’ve seen cars like that… and judged them… lol…
I was broken in those days and developed my MacGyver skills in the school of hard knocks… this was long before YouTube…
My car was on its last leg… I’m certain it was running on 2 cylinders… it knocked and thudded until one day it officially died… as life would have it… I had just filled the gas tank to the top… right before it gave up the ghost… I was so frustrated… I thought to myself “I have got to get that gas out before I scrap it”…
So I looked around the car… under the car… in the car… to see if there was anything I could use to siphon the gas… then I suddenly had an idea… a incredibly wonderful awful idea…
I went into the house and grabbed a hose… I’d seen someone do this on TV… so it had to work… I came outside with a bucket and shoved the hose down into the tank… I proceeded to suck on the hose until the gas started to come out… it didn’t… so I sucked harder and suddenly I received an excoriating mouthful of gas with no benefit to me… because the gas didn’t keep coming out… frustrated and gagging from the experience, I had yet another marvelous idea…
I ran into the house again, and grabbed my cordless drill… I thought to myself “I’m scrapping it anyway… why not try to drill a hole in the tank”… I jacked up the car and got my buckets ready… determined to retrieve my lost investment…
I started slow… small sparks started to spray… but I didn’t think anything of it… after about 5 mins of oblivious determination… the hot bit punctured the tank and gas began to flow out… I quickly positioned my buckets and swapped them out as they would fill… three buckets later I cleaned myself up and went to bed… looking back, I imagine my angels blowing on that bit and catching every spark…
God has this way of protecting us… to this day, I covet the prayers of those who would pray for me… I deeply believe in angels and that God sends them to protect His kids and work on their behalf…
For more stories like this you can visit amburnministries.com/blog
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