Near-drowning experience of Scott Hayes — Scott Hayes

I'm certainly certainly glad for everyone who's made an effort to come along tonight to Listen to my testimony and a little bit of my past experience. I assume everybody pretty well knows a little bit of what I want to talk about.

Salvation from Sin and Death

But let's start reading from verse from psalm 69 the 69th psalm. I want to tell you a little bit about my Growing up years and a few things there and my mother. My mother hasn't been out of the home for quite a while, but she's my honored guest and she's here tonight.

So She'll keep me truthful. Okay psalm 69 verse 1. Save me. Oh god for the waters are come into my soul. I sink in deep mire where there's no standing. I am come into deep waters where the floods overflow me.

Let's go to romans chapter 5. Romans chapter 5. Some of you have heard me read these verses many times and I like to read them backwards of the order they're found in romans chapter 5 and verse 12. Wherefore as by one man sin entered into the world and death by sin and so death passed upon all men for that all have sinned.

There's my beginning at verse 12. Now here's the answer to that problem in verse 6. For when we were yet without strength in due time Christ died for the ungodly for scarcely for a righteous man will one die yet peradventure for a good man.

Some would even dare to die. But god and that's in contrast that's in contrast to man in verse 7. But god commendeth his love toward us and now while we were yet sinners christ died for us. And if we have taken advantage of that simple fact and put our trust in him then we have verse 1 Therefore being justified by faith.

We have peace with god through our lord jesus christ. Now I haven't been checked for quite a while, but I don't think I have any Water left in my lungs. I don't think I have any residual whatsoever from my my near drowning accident except for one thing it's left me a little bit more emotional than I used to be and so We may have to deal with that.

We may not it kind of is unpredictable, but i'll just i'll just warn you. But it is there. Okay I want to ask to start off by asking you a simple question. It's unusual to start off with this question in the gospel media, but do you know how to swim?

No. All right. Well, that's a simple answer. That's exactly what I was looking for a simple answer now. Somebody else might say yes. But i'll bet you if it was one-on-one and I says do you know how to swim out in the hall after well?

I would get all these answers like kind of a little bit some depending. Yeah, for me it was like well. Yeah, if nobody gets in my way in a calm pool, I can swim across but i've always said if I ever fall out of a boat i'm dead.

Now last night we were over at my. My mom's were visiting my mom's there and I got you know, she reminds pretty good when you go back 50 years and I says 50 years ago mom. I was taking swimming lessons.

Whatever possessed you to think I needed to swim in lessons. What was that about that was that was out of character for me to go to ryanbeck and go swimming the swimming lessons. And she says well, you know, I just think everybody else was I guess we thought all the other kids were doing it would send you over to swimming lessons too with your brothers there.

And said probably he remembers these details much better than I do. Of course, he'll fill me in later what i'm missing but I remember going to the swimming lessons. And she said well, I don't think it hurt you any I think it.

Kind of you kind of learned a little bit how to swim. Now here's the difference between your mother and your wife. My mother she's trying to find the good and give me a little credit and my wife looks like he don't know how to swim.

The Question of Eternal Destiny

Let's go to a let's go to a different type of question that question. That question is not a good question because it has too many answers. See a swim a little over kind or a little bit or conditions.

I give you a different question. This is the kind of question. I grew up facing more than than swimming. Are you going to heaven? Well, well kind of well, well maybe well it depends on the conditions.

I don't know that that's kind of hard, isn't it? Is it no? Is the answer still no? See, I grew up I grew up in a in a home. Where those answers where I knew the answer to that question. I didn't have to stop and think like maybe some of you.

You're not sure. Um I sometimes wonder what are the priorities? In our lives. So I grew up on a farm not about you know, 15 miles west of here just out of stout. And swimming was not a priority for me that was not important.

The creek was a was about six inches deep down the road that we played in and I didn't really have to Know how to swim there and I never went to a swimming pool. No priority was not there. It was far more important for me that I know how to drive a john deere 50 with a hand clutch that was real.

That was what I did. That's what I love to do. That was what was important. That was my priority. But mom had a little bit different priorities for us mom and dad both and that priority was. Wasn't swimming wasn't the tractor.

It was our soul. Are we right with god are we prepared to meet god as young boys growing up? And so what that involved was was going to sunday school going to gospel meetings. Looking at a chart like this while some of you have perhaps.

If this would be an unusual thing to look at a chart like this for me that would that would then nothing new. There was that broad way. There was that narrow way. And it wasn't complicated to me and you could ask me on any day when I was quite young.

Which road are you on. I said i'm on that broad road i'm going down to hell. Do you want to be there? I don't know. What do you got to do? I don't when you're gonna get up. I don't know. But I just knew that it was there and that's what we were brought up with.

So, let me go back let me go back those 50 years. I think I was maybe nine. Sid helped me out if I was I nine years old. I went to swimming lessons probably pretty close 50 years ago exactly. And Like I say I didn't.

I should have been in the younger kids with him. I should have been in there with the water wings, I suppose but nine you don't want to wear water wings anymore. So yeah, they stuck me in an older class and I didn't do very well.

And I remember on the last day we kind of had to take this test and here's here's scott. You can walk in water, you know that three feet deep. I could just walk across. I had my head in the water. And there I go across the pool and.

Do you think anybody called home and said hey, he didn't pass the test. Who cares it doesn't matter it doesn't matter if you know how to swim or not does it for the most part. For the most part doesn't matter so here two months ago.

The Near-Drowning in Mexico

Here I am on the the beach in mexico two o 'clock on a monday afternoon 80 Degrees and the sun is shining and it's absolutely perfect. And and there we are and we're walking down the beach. We get clear down to this point where there's a where the river runs into the into the ocean and it was Extreme low tide.

I've never been there. It was quite that. Far down before I checked out the tides it drops about five feet from high to low tide and this river is. Got all these little fingers going across this big huge sandbar.

And I know some of you have been there and you've seen it. You know exactly what i'm talking about and somebody last week says you're were you crazy to go? You know that little stream was about a foot deep maybe a little more.

Two ladies had just walked across it. And they came back with these shells and I wasn't. What did you go. Why don't you go across and get me a couple of those? Well, no problem. I would do that for her if that's what she wanted i'll do it.

And you know, I stepped out in there and within two three steps I have to say the closest thing it felt like was was when I was sitting on a sitting on a bench at a at a dunk tank. And you know when that dunk tank is tripped if you've ever been there.

Wham you're in the water and you're no you're you're faster than you can even think you're under the water. It's that quick and that's. Instead of being in a dunk tank. I found myself in the pacific ocean.

Now all of a sudden. You want a little more relevant question all of a sudden in your life. Do you know how to swim scott? Do you know how to swim? Yeah, kind of. My mother says i'll help you a little bit.

Well when the real test came. It wasn't enough. I didn't know how to swim. My wife. She knows me far better knows what I act like in the water. She's no you can't swim. So there I was. One big gulp the first time I went under one big gulp of water.

And I came up and I wasn't very far away, but I could immediately feel that man. There is this water. This isn't like being in a swimming pool. The water was just like it was pulling me Down the water that was pouring over from that river and a riptide coming across the other way and there I was and I thought I looked at my wife just a few feet away and she's looking at me.

I says kim I'm going to drown. I can't make it. That was my first I remember scanning across the beach looking across there. And you know what? I saw this beach probably was 90 people that were over 70 years old.

And of course half of them would be women. And the amount of people that would be able to jump in there and swim me I could was going to be extremely extremely small. And I just looked across that beach and I was.

There's nobody here. There's nobody here and I remember. Very clearly in my mind my last thought being. This is where it all ends. You know what. None of you know how much money I have in my 401k. I just last week I can start using that now.

I've got some money in there. I own some land. I've got some of the greatest grandkids in the world still find my wife's still an attractive young lady to me. But you know what? It was over. It was life was over right there.

I knew I was done. You know the lord jesus himself asked a very important question. What shall it profit a man? What shall profit a man if he gained the whole world and lost his soul? You could bring that into.

Take that a little out of context. What was it? What was everything I had saved up? Here I was enjoying my early retirement on the beach in Mexico. And what was it in comparison to drowning in the ocean?

He said that's kind of. Kind of uh, kind of a strange sad ending wouldn't it be? One thing one thing I'd changed if I could have those five seconds back. One thing I would have done I would said kim. I love you.

I didn't do it. You know, I didn't have time to think there wasn't enough time. But you know what, you know why I wish they would have said why I don't think I didn't say that. Because so ingrained in me and you and every one of us is that thought I still have.

I have 15 seconds. I have one more breath and with my next breath. I'll tell her that. No, I didn't have time to think that but I think in the unconsciously. That's why I didn't unconsciously I still surely I can fight this off.

I can tread water for 30 seconds. Can I. And you know, I remember looking and and I was about this deep in the water because I I couldn't do any better. And the next wave came and it went right over my head and gulp.

I would like to have thought i'm ashamed. I'm ashamed as I stand here. I've been. I've had nearly a car accident. I remember driving a little volkswagen rabbit about the worst thing you could be in for a head-on collision and seeing a car straight in front of me his headlights coming at me and I swerved and it swerved and we Made it and then that car was right there.

I think god helped me. You know, that was my thought but you notice I was there in that water. I'm afraid i'm afraid my real thought was even god. Even god can't help me in this one. I'm done. And you know that next wave?

Went over my head. I always thought if you if you drown that there must be there must be that struggle. I was thinking the the intense pain the agony and the struggle of trying to fight your way through it.

And it wasn't there. I was just unconscious. You know i've asked a doctor friend I says do you think my mind do you think I was able to block that out of my memory. The the pain of of what I was going through is that water as I sucked that salt water in.

Do you think I Blocked that out or was I really unconscious? She said you're unconscious. She says that's how long it takes. You ran out of oxygen and you are immediately unconscious. And so there I was.

Rescue and the Men Who Saved Him

Now why? For the next five minutes. For the next five minutes i'm unconscious underwater in the pacific ocean. And they said I I floated. As if I was standing on the bottom with the water at about. The top of my head between my forehead right somewhere in here and there I am bobbing up and down.

Now why you couldn't float six inches higher than that? I have no idea. But I never disappeared. I never went under and did not come back up. I stayed right there and meanwhile. A few minutes before this back up at the resort swimming pool.

There was a. There was two families there. They had boys. Two boys eight and a boy ten. Two young couples. And somebody told them they should take those boys down to the river. Down at the end of the beach and they might see stingrays down there if they're low tide at this time of the day.

They might see them stingrays down there. And so they thought that sounded like something unique to do they Were going to head down there and they thought you know, just in case the boys get in the water.

We'll make sure they take their life preservers along. Now I looked before and i've looked every day since on the beach and I haven't seen a life preserve on that beach one single time. But here come a boy here come three boys with life preservers.

And they get down to the beach about the time kim is frantically trying to find somebody that might be able to rescue me and They come to the end. Here kim pleading for help and the first man his name is is pat and he can swim.

His wife told me she could swim better, but she didn't try it. Pat jumped into the ocean. And you know what? He immediately had to try and get back out. He immediately tried to save himself. Climbing back out and he was surprised at how steep the drop-off was and how steep the steep the current was.

And it took everything he had to get himself out of that water. And he realized he was never going to try and save me. They started calling For a man by the name of stewart swenson the other father and he's off by himself about 50 yards away.

I understood it from him and remembered he's maybe 50 yards down and he gets in the ocean down there. And he's like whoa this this isn't safe. There's a this is a strong current and this is a a sharp drop off and he gets back out of the water and he hears his wife Hollering for him to come to help to save this person.

And his first thought is it's his boy or one of the three boys is in the water. He's like, how did they ever let them boys into the water like that? And well, it turned out it was me, but his wife had just enough.

She made him stop. They took the life vest off of the boy. And he took that life vest with him and now Approximately five minutes has passed and i'm still Starting to drift away and he jumps in. Comes to me with the life vest and pulls me pulls me up.

Now I didn't think at first that this is the right timing for this but it seemed like at that time I was having this Nightmare, it'd be the best way to describe it. You know if you've ever had a bad dream and like you've you've just trying to force yourself to wake up to get out of This thing and it was just like I was kicking and pushing and and for all I was worth.

And I had to wake myself up. I had to get out of this darkness and For just a split second. I woke up and I looked at this man. And the reason I think it was at this point in the time because I heard somebody say Don't fight him.

Don't fight him. Because and that was my wife. Because she had tried to rescue somebody once upon once a time when she was a youngster. And you know what they did they climbed on top of her head. And held her down to boost themselves to lift themselves up and she knew Don't fight him.

Just go with whatever he does. And you know, I was immediately unconscious and stewart thought that he was going to just pull me back into the shore. And he realized with that current it was hopeless.

There was nothing he could do. And for the next 15 minutes we drifted away. We drifted approximately. I don't know how You can figure it out. However far you can see to where you can't see a person's head in the ocean anymore.

Probably close to a mile and we're out there a mile away. And I was hoping when I met stewart that he was going to say I was it was a piece of cake. You know, I could have gone stayed out there all day.

And he said no. He says I didn't know you don't know how many times I thought I was going to have to let you go. He says his first impression when he first got to me was the man's already dead. What is the point?

And he said how why should I? Risk my life. I have a wife and a young son there. Why should I risk my life to save a dead person? But then he thought how can I go back? How can I ever go back to my wife and to my boy and and tell him?

I let him go without even trying and so away we went. You know my I had the easy part. I had the easy part of this whole thing. I didn't have any work to do. I wasn't conscious. So I didn't know what was going on.

I was very comfortable and Stewart's wife had a terrible time with it. My wife was watching The three boys they had the three boys praying the three boys told me afterwards. He said we filled we filled that boat up with prayers.

You know, I appreciate that tonight. And those boys praying for me, but there we were drifting away. You know, I Regained consciousness somehow at that somewhere along the line toward the end of those 15 minutes.

I regained consciousness and to listen to stewart Screaming at a fishing boat way off in the distance. And now pat the other man he had gone along was running along the shore waving his arms. Trying to attract the attention of a of small just a little tiny Old old fishing boat with three men in it going across the bay out there and he finally got those men's attention and painfully slow.

That boat stopped. Turned and started coming back and you know, that's the point. I I regained a little consciousness was listening to stewart Screaming at this boat for those guys to to hurry up. He couldn't take it anymore.

He said every time he couldn't hold on any longer and he'd have to switch hands and i'd go back under the water every time. A little bigger wave would come i'd be back underneath the water again. But you know, then he started having me Count and a few things like that and I I was a little bit conscious, but you know that that fishing boat eventually got got there and I remember My consciousness getting a little clearer and I remember being two feet in front of that Piece of junk boat that meant the world to me at that moment and there was that boat right there.

But you know what I could do to save myself. I couldn't even I couldn't even keep my eyes open let alone save myself. You know, there was a man. Somebody has asked me if I thought stewart was an angel.

And i'll leave that to theologians. I don't know. He seems like a normal person to me. He happened to be Although I I missed this who was who was stewart swenson? Out of all the people on that place. That couldn't have saved me stewart swenson's got a he's got a purpose in life.

He has inherited through a bankruptcy a gym. And he is training to be a he wants to do an iron man triathlon where they swim. What is it? Three miles and bike a hundred and run 26 miles. And so that's what the man's training for.

So he has purchased a swimming pool. That is an endless pool where the waves do the current just comes at you and you just swim and swim and swim and swim. And I had a little contact with him friday. I guess it wasn't he says i'm on my way to the i'm on the way to a college to train today with a college Swimming coach.

He says I need to get better. I need to get better at swimming. That's the man that's the man that was there when I needed him and you know, so there To me is a an incredible thing out of all the people in the world.

There was one person there when I needed him and that was that was stewart, but there was another man in this boat and They referred to him as mexican gq. He was they called him. They said he was just dressed immaculately groomed everything perfect.

And when he was in that boat and they thought you know how our minds work we run through the negative side. He says I bet the guy was maybe he was a drug dealer and when he because as soon as we got there He was gone.

He just disappeared. And he didn't want to talk to anybody. He didn't want to be seen must have been a drug dealer. You know, I was talking I think it was gary gary southard. I was telling him about this man when that that man in his beautiful clothes when he saw me in the water.

They said he never hesitated. He was off that boat. He just dove headfirst into the water. He was there the man he Raised me up. He was the man that put me in the boat. Gary says that wasn't a drug dealer.

That's your angel lair. Well, I I appreciate him whatever I never never caught up with him. I never caught up with the man on the boat. But I appreciate what they did you know, they as soon as they got me in the boat, I we took off for the For the uh for the dock a few miles away.

And I remember the waves come I regained enough consciousness to feel that I can remember hitting those waves lying on that hard boat with the ribs on the bottom of the boat and then I remember I started to to cough up all this this blood and And water and it was it was a mess.

But for the most part I was I was unconscious but I I remember somebody saying at some point these little lines would come out that I could remember and somebody say You know all that blood can't be a good sign and I thought whoa, I was starting to think maybe.

And here's and here's stewart and he's he's just hollering at me. You're not dying today, buddy. You're not gonna die today. And you know, I eventually I think I started to believe yeah, i'm not gonna die today.

I've got another chance here. I'm gonna make it. And you know by the time we got to the got to the ambulance all I could say was the man saved my life. I'm telling these guys this man just saved my life.

And and stewart still saying you're not gonna die today. But then I remember hearing this about the blood and some of these things. They got me into the ambulance and I kind of seemed like I was fairly clear there, but then I was gone again.

But then I remember in the in the emergency room. I hear one thing. I remember hearing somebody say This man either does a lot of cardio exercise or he's dying right now because he doesn't have much a very.

He's got a very slow heart rate. And I remember thinking i'm okay on that one. Yeah I'm, okay I have a slow heart rate. But you know I was in a in a coma the doctor says you're in a in a coma for the next for the next 10 hours.

Survival, Providence, and a Second Chance

I woke up in the middle of the night after after those 10 hours and I was I was wide awake. I didn't went back to sleep. I was extremely conscious. And uh It was not a good night I had I had a lot of thoughts of you know I was supposed to be on this machine and I couldn't take it anymore.

And this this nurse couldn't speak english and I don't speak spanish and I don't know if we communicated right or not but I was supposed to be on this machine, which was helping pump the water out of me and it was Got incredibly uncomfortable and she tightened that up and I was just like I was drowning all over again in oxygen.

And she finally just ripped the machine off shut the machine off. Went over went back to her desk went back to sleep. And all I could think of was what am I doing now? Am I killing myself by not having this machine on and it was a miserable time.

But by the morning I had to say I felt I felt pretty good. And I went I the doctor come in I says doc when you think when you think i'm getting out of here well, I didn't realize I didn't have much oxygen in my blood, but He says listen.

I want you to know something. You have been extremely and I said extremely close to death. Just because you've made you've made a dramatic recovery, but you were extremely close to death. He said now just relax and you know, it wasn't too hard for the next few days.

I just sat there. I don't know how many times you know, you rerun it over and over in your mind. Finally after two days, they stuck me into a room where I had a a window. That was first. I couldn't see anything.

They put me in a room with a window and I could see people walking out their ways. You can't imagine I didn't I didn't it didn't bother me at all to be in there. I thought just just to be able to see them out there.

Everything was real. Everything was was you know, what over and over and over i'm alive. I'm alive. So a few days later, I they Checked my oxygen. I was just about. Okay, I had a little water left in one lung.

I was dismissed. I was saved. But I want to look at a few things now go back go back 50 years ago again 50 years ago. How was I brought up? I was brought up knowing I needed to be saved. Saved from drowning.

No, never entered my mind. Saved from what? Saved from my sins. I knew I was going to hell. You could have told me that but you really didn't have to and if you would have told me you wouldn't have had to Convince me because see every day in my life.

I lived out those things. That proved I was a sinner. I was not like god and so Here we have these verses verse 12. We read that all have sinned. And what was the answer to that in verse 6 for when we were yet without strength?

Talk about being without strength when I was in that water. I've never felt so hopeless so helpless. I could not do one single thing to save myself. And that's the beauty of this verse here. That that is when christ died for us when there was nothing we could do ourselves.

That's when christ died. Now look at this for scarcely. For a righteous man will one die. There are people willing to give their life to die for somebody else. I wonder if you would do that. Would you be willing to die for somebody else?

Maybe somebody really close to us. Maybe somebody really special. But you know when I think of when I think of stewart I think of a man who jumped in to save a total stranger and I realized. He never thought it was going to be like it was.

He thought it was only going to last a minute. He thought he was going to jump in and we were going to be back out but at the same time. Whatever lay before him. He could have left me go. He could have left me go at any time.

What was another thing about the man who saved me? He could have stayed on the beach. He could have looked out there. And what a fantastic person he would have been if he could win the escape from alcatraz swimming race.

Which he's training for now if he could win that race. Man he'd probably get his name in the in the local paper up there in minnesota. What an athlete he would be. What a capable swimmer. And he could have stayed on the beach.

But you know what he did. He came to where I was. And that was the low place. And you know, I think of the lord jesus. You see the savior had to be most both capable and willing. Whatever that cost whatever it was going to entail he was willing to do it.

And that's when stewart jumped into that water. He came down. What's the water? Just go to baptism for a minute. What when we think of baptism? What does the water speak of of going under the it's a place of death.

And you know, that's where I was. I was in the place of death. He left to myself. It was inevitable. Probably another minute maybe less. And that's the place stewart came to. And where did the lord jesus come to.

Came into this sinful world. What did that entail? Going to calvary. You know, I had somebody ask me another question. I'll ask this one to you now. You didn't answer verbally and I don't want you to but the first question was can you swim.

It doesn't matter. Does it not much for most of you it'll never matter. Are you saved. Some of you would say yes. And some of you would say no. Now i've got a question for you. Here's the question that was asked to me.

The Call to Be Saved

I was a senior in high school. Now I could look back on a calendar. I could come up with the same exact date. It was just before christmas of 1972. And I came home from school. I rode the bus and I came home and this was a setup deal.

My mom's got fresh chocolate chip cookies my favorites on the kitchen table and she's in the other room. With this gospel preacher's wife and i'm left here. Where the gospel preacher is sitting in the rocking chair in the corner and he looks at me and says scott.

Would you like? Would you like to be saved? Is that a fair question today? Would you like to be saved? If you're not saved and you know what you need to be saved. And it should be an easy question. Would you like to be saved?

Now, I hope you weren't aren't tonight like I was then see i'm always afraid when I look at an audience like this and I say Those people if they think like I do then we're hurting we're in trouble here tonight because you know what I told the preacher.

No. He says I don't want to be saved because. Look, I know how to get saved and if I wanted to be saved I would be saved well, that's. That's a pretty cocky attitude, isn't it for a young man to have towards god?

But yet that's that's what the way I was. I don't know if I really felt that way, but that's what I told him that night. But you know, I was going to a series of meetings there in 72 that started in stout with gay scoff and and uh, Robert oar and robert oar was the preacher that asked me the question and uh.

Those meetings went on and I started thinking. One night was a pretty small crowd and I thought i'm about the only unsaved person here. I thought this is they should have canceled the meeting tonight and you know all the christians they could have had the night off and I could have went to the basketball game.

That's why there wasn't my brothers were there. They would go to the basketball game. Sip was playing basketball. I could have went to the basketball game. Everybody could have been happy. And I thought what if what if they're having this meeting for one?

Person. What if they're having this gospel meeting for me? And I don't even care wouldn't that be kind of crazy? And you know what I kind of started listening that was a it was a bad snowstorm that night.

That's why there were so few people there. I remember. And you know Gaius had a lot of stories that seemed like about snowmobiles going through the ice and people Dying in newfoundland and fishing boats lost in the fog and people perishing nice.

I could listen to those stories. But then I had to switch and I just shut the gospel back off and it seemed like it just seemed like in my mind I cannot have fun. I cannot have fun in this world. And be a christian.