Former NFL player Jordan Shipley shares how faith sustained him after fiery accident

More than eight months after suffering third-degree burns on more than 20% of his body in an accident on his ranch in Texas, former University of Texas Longhorn and NFL wide receiver Jordan Shipley said he desperately called on the Lord for help during the life-threatening ordeal and experienced a “miracle.”

The 40-year-old Shipley, considered one of the greatest wide receivers in Texas Longhorns history, recently said during the Toolbox Christian outreach ministry event at the Austin Country Club that he sees life differently since the January accident while cleaering land on his ranch near Burnet and believes God spared him.

“I saw people I know praying who don’t ever pray,” he was quoted as saying by the Houston Chronicle. “The fact that I’m here is a miracle.”

Hours before the Jan. 6 accident, Shipley said, his then-5-year-old son, Swayde, asked him on the way to school, “When are you going to go to Heaven? And who’s going to take care of me if something happens?”

Shipley said he chuckled at the questions that morning because he wasn’t sure how to answer. But those questions came back to Shipley's mind when he was trapped in the cab of a bulldozer during the fire that injured him.

“The door wouldn’t open,” Shipley said. “It was stuck. I was scared. I was praying and screaming. I was yelling ‘Please let me out, Lord’ at the top of my lungs.”

Shipley said he eventually freed the jammed door and escaped the cab. But the ordeal wasn’t over. He walked for 45 minutes before finding a colleague, who drove him to a local hospital. He was then airlifted to Austin.

Doctors told him the burns on his arms, legs, hands and the side of his face would require a series of skin grafts. They estimated he would be hospitalized for at least three months.

Instead, Shipley said, he was released after 11 days in the ICU without needing surgery or skin grafts.

“This week has been life changing in many ways. … But because I know so many are praying, I wanted to let you know that we left the hospital. I still can’t believe it,” his wife, Sunny, shared in a Jan. 17 post on Facebook. “Numerous doctors, nurses, and specialists kept telling us, as we were being discharged, that he is nothing short of a miracle and they’ve never seen someone come into their care in his condition and leave this soon ... much less be out of the hospital bed.”

His faith did not keep fear away during his recovery, however. Shipley said he had nightmares for two months, and his wife became claustrophobic.

“We were all scared to death and heartbroken,” former Texas quarterback Case McCoy said at the event. “Talk about the power of prayer. A lot of people are a fan of Jesus, but it’s a whole other thing to be a follower.”

Shipley isn’t sure he could have recovered so quickly without his faith in Christ.

“I was stuck in a place where I’m about to end my life, thinking, 'What’s my wife going to do?'” he said. “My kids are about to live their whole life without a dad.”

Shipley’s burned hands have healed, and he has regained some of the weight he lost. He has also made his faith a higher priority and talks with his sons, Swayde and Shield, about the importance of God in their lives.

“I take every moment I can get with my family now, and it’s changed everything about the way I think about time and work-life balance,” he said. “I know enough that I’m not in control. God is. A lot of times I think he uses struggles that we have to walk through to bring us closer to him.”

Shipley played parts of three seasons in the NFL with Cincinnati, Tampa Bay and Jacksonville.