Friday's Devotional - 10/02/2026

Good morning! Every year, I read this verse on this day knowing how important it is to my own story. Twenty four years ago today, I was working in a sandpaper manufacturing plant near Alliance, OH, when about three in the afternoon, I had an industrial accident that changed my life forever.

While trying to wrap up finished sandpaper on winder machine, at the start of a new roll, my left hand became trapped between the roll and the sandpaper. It began wrapping my arm around the roll until it wrapped my entire arm around the roll. It then pulled my whole body into the machine where it literally crushed me to death inside a roll of sandpaper.

I died inside that roll, went to heaven briefly, saw Jesus and received the command to go back and do the work He had prepared for me to do. There was no more running from my calling. I had to preach the gospel. After raising me from the dead, a long process of healing began. My left arm was broken in nine places. It had the radial nerve severed, the muscles and tendons in my forearm were beyond repair, and both legs were broken at the mid-point of my thighs.

My eyes were swollen so badly, they could not close. A rib was broken that normally punctures internal organs in a fatal way, but yet I was alive and had nothing punctured. Jesus did many miracles in healing my body. But beyond that, PTSD had my mind broken and fractured to the point I could not function normally. I went to many doctors and therapists to seek healing and treatment.

I was told I would suffer the rest of my life with symptoms of this disorder. But I believed God gives us a sound mind, not a broken one. So, I went to the altar after church and stayed for hours until He answered me. He gave me a plan on how to heal and eventually teach others how to be healed. But it started with the hardest thing I had to do: Forgive.

It was just before Christmas and I got the news my lawsuit was thrown out against the company. I had been fired because I couldn't do the job anymore. I was broke, had bills, no income, fired, unable to work and now, had a five million dollar lawsuit thrown out. I was angry and bitter. But when I drove past the place that broke me, I forgave them.

No, it wasn't face-to-face. It was me driving past the very doors they wheeled my broken body out of where the helicopter picked me up and saying, "I forgive you." It lifted a weight off of me I didn't know was there until it left. And now, I decided to keep doing that until I was completely free. Then, God was able to heal me and make me whole again.

I don't know what you need to forgive today, but I can tell you, forgiveness is the key to freedom and the entry point of healing and wholeness. Whatever was dead can be made alive again through Jesus. Let His love be greater than the things that happened to you. It is freeing! Be free today as you forgive and receive the freedom needed to make a great day!