Trading Ford Baptist Church pastor Mike Motley avoided the first deer he saw while riding his motorcycle home March 31, but collided with the second and did a belly flop on asphalt at 30 miles per hour.
According to a story in the Salisbury Post, Motley, 48, was wearing a leather jacket he’d owned for 20 years. It was shredded by the asphalt, but did what it was supposed to do, leaving Motley “with a basic road rash.”
Motley resisted a trip to the hospital that night, but the next day he was in so much pain his nurse wife Sandy drove him to the hospital in Lexington, where a CT scan revealed a ruptured spleen.
During the night he’d lost 20 percent of his blood through internal bleeding.
Doctors told him he needed to go immediately to Wake Forest University Baptist Medical Center in Winston-Salem to have his spleen removed.
But a miraculous thing happened en route to Winston-Salem. Motley’s spleen quit bleeding. He said a doctor at Baptist gave him some encouraging news.
“Someone who knows more than I do wants you to keep your spleen,” Motley said, and paused: “He was referring to the Lord.”
Motley said his full recovery will take several months, but not a day passes that he doesn’t pause to give thanks that his injuries weren’t more severe than they were.
“I’m a believer in Jesus Christ,” Motley said. “My life is in His hands. If He was through with me, I’d be with Him in heaven.
“The fact that I’m here, that shows He’s got more for me to do.”
Motley has been minister at Trading Ford Baptist for 10 years.
The church is one of Rowan County’s fastest-growing, drawing about 350 people on a typical Sunday. A new sanctuary was completed just last year.
“The Lord has been good to us,” Motley said. “We’re very grateful.”
Motley plans to continue riding motorcycles, something he’s done since age 19.
The Bandit on which he crashed is a big 1200 cc model that he just purchased in February. Motley also kept his previous motorcycle, a Suzuki 1100 that has 67,000 miles showing on its odometer.
“I’ve ridden thousands and thousands and thousands of miles,” he said. “I’m more wary now, especially when I’m riding through highly populated deer areas.”
(EDITOR’S NOTE — Huffman writes for the Salisbury Post.)