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John Ramstead  
I am blessed to share an inspiring story that touched my soul and filled my heart. John overcame tremendous injury in an accident that he miraculously survived. This is a story not only about becoming Christian but also really connecting and feeling our creators love.

Today he is the co-host of The Eternal Leadership podcast, as well as a successful business coach.

 


As a kid, he had a dream to be a fighter pilot and never thought he could achieve it. John went to college on a ROTC scholarship, then Navy Flight school and through a lot of hard work became a F14 pilot. He flew in desert storm, flew combat sorties.
Then he had been given dream orders to go back and instruct at Top Gun, but he had a softball accident and suffered nerve damage to his eye.
No longer able to fly, John was completely unsure about the path of his life. His dreams were taken away and that was the only thing he wanted to do since being a child.
He needed help, direction, and purpose as his life didn't have any meaning. John was lead to the Gospel in April of 1995 and he became a Christian. It gave him a foundation and a grounding for the rest of his life that was invaluable for him. It opened incredible doors.
A year later his wife became a Christian, he tells us it was an interesting year!
Imagine what it would be like, being given orders to go to Top Gun, flying F14's and F16's to selling cell phones door to door, with the planes flying above.
"When you don't have a purpose in your life you don't understand who you are, what you want to do and the meaning you want your life to have."
This was 1995 and he started his own company.
He did three different tech start-up companies, then worked for a fortune 100 company, then to a Wall Street firm, then in 2011, he left to start a new company. Then 5 1/2 month into it, he was involved in an accident that radically changed his life.


The Horse Ride That Changed John's Life
John was invited by a friend to a non-profit called Family Talk. He was invited to learn more, and perhaps become more involved. He flew himself up, and they gathered at a Ranch in Montana.
Friday, they were going to ride to the back of the Ranch, and John had his horse saddled first. He had a picture taken just before, and he had a big smile on his face, having no idea that in the next five minutes his life was going to change permanently.
John's horse began to trot, then all of a sudden the horse did a 90-degree turn and bolted and threw him backward. John was holding on with his legs, as hard as he could.  John was able to get himself back up in time to see a steel fence coming up.
John grabbed the reins and pulled left, the horse nearly pulled the reins out of John's hands. John pulled the horse's head left again, but the horse pulled his head back and kept going towards the fence.
John was thinking he needed to jump, starting to panic, but would have broken his neck. He didn't feel the horse would be suicidal and run into the wall. Soon John realized there was no way one of them wasn't going to get really hurt.
He was a fighter pilot, he flew in combat; low-level missions, 500 mph at 100 feet and never felt this feeling before in his life.
About 20 yards from the fence, it was as if someone hit the pause button and everything slowed down. John recalls thinking, "this is not going to end well."
The horse bucked so hard he slammed into the fence rump first. He launched John into the top bar of the fence. About a 3" solid steel beam.

After The Accident
The beam hit John across the face, from his teeth to his left eye.
I can hardly type as I listen to this, let alone imagine what it must have been like to go through.
John lost 7  teeth,  shattered his cheek, crushed his left eye orbit, --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/lvmountaintops/message