Bruce Van Natta was a self-employed diesel mechanic, who loved his work. The possible danger of working on huge engines weighing thousands of pounds never crossed his mind—until the day of November 16, 2006.
Here is Bruce Van Natta’s story:
He was asked to work on the engine of a huge PeterBuilt logging truck. Bruce describes that day: “I slipped underneath the great big bumper feet first. The driver of the truck had the front axle jacked up in the air and the passenger side wheel removed. I said to him, ‘You jump up inside and see what the temp of the engine is.’ The axle is going right across my chest at this point—maybe an inch or two above my chest.” At that moment the 20-ton capacity jack holding up the truck gave way.
“This 10,000 to 12,000 pounds of weight that is on these two front wheels, on this axle, came down across my mid-section, basically like a blunt guillotine, and just crushed me in half. Blood had splattered into my throat when it fell. I looked down and I could see that there was less than an inch of air space between the bottom of the axle and the cement. I knew the thickest part of my body was maybe two inches thick.
“The vertebrae in my spine were cracked the width of the axle. I tried to pull myself out from under the truck. It was the most incredible pain you can think of. I got myself just to the point where my head is sticking out from underneath the front bumper of the truck. The very next thing, I just called out, ‘Lord, help me.’ I called it out twice.
Suddenly all pain left Bruce’s body. “At that point, I became unconscious. My spirit left my body and floated to the ceiling, and now my spirit is looking at the accident scene from above.”
At this point, Bruce recalls seeing two huge angels, each about eight feet tall. “There was a bright light shining around each one of them. They were matching bookends. They didn’t budge; I never heard them say anything. They just had their arms underneath the truck, not holding the truck up…but they had their arms angled in toward my body. There was no pain, just peace. I can’t even describe the peace I felt in the ceiling up in the garage.”
Bruce knew he had a choice to make…shut his eyes, die and go to heaven, or listen to a quieter voice that said, “If you want to live, you’re going to have to fight and you are going to have to fight hard.” Bruce says, “The next thing I knew, my spirit went back down into my body just like a shot.”
Bruce was rushed to the hospital, where doctors did not expect him to live. His ribs were broken, his pancreas and spleen crushed, and several major arteries severed. A comparison of his case to a medical study done in 2001 at the University of South California could not find anyone who had ever lived after five major arteries were severed. “I should have bled to death in a few minutes. So, my thought is the angels were there to somehow hold me together.”
Bruce was in the hospital for over two months and had five major surgeries resulting in the removal of almost 75 percent of his crushed small intestines. He dropped weight rapidly and was close to starvation. He could only be fed intravenously.
One day Bruce had an unexpected visitor, and he tells about what happened. “The Lord woke up a man in New York two days in a row. He was someone that I met one time on vacation. He came and prayed for me in the hospital. He put his palm on my forehead and when he prayed, he prayed the way Jesus taught us to pray.
He spoke to the mountain, in this case my small intestine, ‘I command you to supernaturally grow back length in the name of Jesus Christ.’ When he did, I felt like 200 volts come out of his palm into my forehead, right into my body. I could feel my intestines moving around and up and down.”
Nine months later, after additional surgeries and hospital stays, Bruce had gained weight and was eating by himself. Radiology tests verified that he now had almost nine feet of small intestine—double the amount that he had after the first surgeries. “When they tested me, they said that the small intestines the Lord gave back to me were twice as good as normal. They absorb, even though it is half the amount…they work just as well if I had all of it, so they are twice as good as normal.”
The doctors were amazed and astounded over and over again that Bruce lived through this trauma, as he should have died within 8-10 minutes after the accident. God performed miracle after miracle. Bruce could have bled to death, but didn’t; extended and better-functioning intestines grew back; his pancreas and spleen were restored. Bruce proclaims, “God was just showing up and showing Himself very real and very strong. He is a miracle worker.”
Bruce wrote a book about this journey called Saved By Angels To Share How God Talks to Everyday People. It is published by Destiny Image. The book tells of his experience. He and his family have gone into full-time ministry to share their testimony wherever the Lord leads them. They call their non-denominational, evangelistic organization SweetBread Ministries. It is based in Wisconsin.
Bruce and his wife and four children travel together witnessing to gatherings of people about how God worked in his life to heal him and how they, too, can have a closer relationship with the Lord. They testify how God’s love and power meet each of us at our point of need.
Their ministry not only ministers to the body of Christ, but also to those in need. The organization has built an orphanage in Honduras and a church in India. Additionally they sponsor prison and jail ministries.
Read more at the web site: http://www.sweetbreadministries.com/