Bill Sawyer’s Story
Dragged 40 Feet Under the Ocean by a 300 Pound Swordfish, But God . . .

The following miraculous experience launched my search to find God. Although my mother told me that I expressed an interest in being a minister as a young child, my spiritual journey got a jump start when, at age twenty-five, I got dragged forty feet under the Atlantic Ocean by a three hundred pound Swordfish I had harpooned.

My father, a successful Boston banker, had purchased a commercial sword fishing boat and given it to me to captain and to chase swordfish for a summer job. My interest was more in chasing girls every night at various Martha’s Vineyard beach parties.

Just a few hours after inebriated sleep, just before dawn, we cranked up the powerful Diesel engine of the vessel Cachalot. Sleepy seagulls began to make their noise as other sword fishing boats all over Menemsha Bight fired up their engines. After we got under way and just a few hundred yards outside of the breakwater, I handed over the wheel to one of my mates and went below to get some more sleep.

I guess I had been sleeping for about two hours. Cachalot had entered the fishing grounds about 40 miles South of Noman’s Island and I was awakened with a start and the cry of “Swordfish!” I had removed my sheath knife for comfort while sleeping and neglected to strap it back on as I scrambled on deck and rapidly out to the pulpit.

It’s interesting that I spent so much time in something known as a pulpit so many years before being ordained as a minister of the Gospel. The “pulpit” was a 20-foot plank extending off the bow of the Cachalot with metal railings for protection and guide wires to hold it up.

Our spotter plane, by CB radio, began to call us down on the fish. Adrenalin within me began to pump as I steadied myself at the end of the pulpit and grasped the 10-foot harpoon. I then fastened the dart to the 6-inch malleable, metal shank at the end of the harpoon and positioned myself to strike the fish.

“Bring her hard to starboard Cachalot,” came the voice of our pilot. “Okay, now steady as she goes” “20 boat lengths straight ahead” “The fish is swimming from left to right and appears to be finning up” “18 boat lengths,” “15 boat lengths,” “Keep her coming.” All of us, including my two mates in hoops up on the mast, were straining our eyes trying to be the first to spot the fins.

“Got him!”  Kim cried out. “He’s at two o’clock about 10 boat lengths.” And then I spotted him, rapidly cutting water with his dorsal and tail fin. Raising the harpoon high above my head, I let it fly with all I had and immediately ran back to make sure the line cleared okay. A swordfish can travel up to 85 mph in almost an instant with a sweep of its massive tail. Four hundred feet of quarter inch manila rope, ultimately attached to something like a beer keg, almost smokes as it runs out after the fish and has been known to fetch up on a cleat.

About 30 feet from the dart, now imbedded in my speeding prey, was fastened an auxiliary rope and inflated inner tube. Someone had foul rigged it and, as I ran back, I got a foot tangled in the rope and was jerked overboard.  A half hitch of quarter inch manila rope was tight around my right leg and as the fish momentarily dragged me along the surface, I cried to my mates to throw me a knife. And then, as Kim later explained to a newspaper reporter, “Bill’s red shirt disappeared from view like the after burner on a jet”.

As I plunged to what I knew was certain death, the pressure was so intense, I thought my head was going to burst! I had no relationship with God, yet in desperation, uttered the universal cry of the stricken: God help me! I cried out to Him, and then, for the first time in my life, I experienced His Manifest Presence. The instant I cried out, for me, time ceased to exist. The seconds became eternity and I was encompassed by an incredible sense of love, joy and peace. My thought sequence was as follows: “What’s it going be like being dead? Mom and Dad have lost their boy. I feel so good, maybe I’m in heaven”…….and then the rope broke and I made it to the surface.

I had knowledge of the existence of heaven as I had attended an Episcopal church in my youth and served as a “Choir Boy.” However, I had little knowledge of the Lord, no relationship with Him and no experience of His Manifest Presence. When we returned to our port at Martha’s Vineyard Island in Massachusetts, reporters were waiting to interview me. Present also was a Christian evangelist who wanted to visit with me. I talked with the reporters but would have nothing to do with the evangelist. The Christians I had known at the Episcopal Church I attended were, in my opinion, hypocritical.

I knew God had saved me, but I didn’t know who God was. Thus, began a 20-year search for God. My goal was to recapture that incredible peace and well-being I had experienced 40 feet beneath the surface of the Atlantic Ocean. God had a plan for my life but so did Satan. So, because of my anger towards what I perceived to be a judgmental attitude of Christians, I searched for peace in all the wrong places.

I took college courses in parapsychology and practiced astral travel, mental telepathy, and past life regression. I attended Maharishi International University in Fairfield Iowa and Vittel France and became a teacher of Transcendental Meditation. While practicing TM, I learned to levitate and utilize a flying technique whereby I was able to lift off for a few seconds and fly forward for a few feet. Everywhere I looked, I thought it was there that I would recapture my Atlantic Ocean peace but eventually found my goal to be illusive.

Connie, a backslidden Christian who had known the peace of the Lord, saw how tormented I was and desperate for peace. So, with love and compassion for me, she suggested we attend a nearby Christian church. We had been dating for about a year. We got together because she had an interest in my knowledge of esoteric things and I was beginning to wonder if my disdain for Christians was justified. I was reluctant to attend a Christian church service but agreed to check it out. When Pastor Phil Hyde gave his altar call, I felt a hand on my shoulder pushing me up out of my seat and down the aisle. I knew something supernatural was going on so agreed to recite a prayer asking Jesus Christ to take control of my life and be my Lord and Savior.

Then, for the second time in twenty years, I experienced that peace that surpasses understanding! Wow! I was instantly on fire for God and zealous to do whatever I could do to serve Him. So, for the next decade, I studied my Bible daily and faithfully served several traveling evangelists. And I wish I could say that was the end of the story. I wish I could say that I settled into that Bible believing church, faithfully attended services, and read my Bible every day. I did for a season, but our enemy never gives up! Once he gets his claws into us, he does not easily let go. As the years passed and life plodded on, my zeal for church attendance and Bible study yielded to enemy attack. My walk with the Lord was not as exciting as it used to be as I gave in to an ever-increasing critical attitude. Serving traveling evangelists and the pastors of my church had previously been fun, but, as the enemy advanced, serving became a suffocating burden. Eventually, my daily routine of studying the Bible came to a halt and I again shifted gears to the study of new age books and their counterfeit Jesus.

If it had not been for the unfailing Christian witness of my dear friends Barbara Dyche and Elwood Trost, I would probably again be hopelessly ensnared in new age deception. Thanks to Barbara, Elwood and a former new age guru turned Christian evangelist, true peace, joy, and faith in the real Jesus has returned. After watching a television interview by Doreen Virtue of former new age leader named Mike Shreve, I ordered and read his book, In Search of The True Light.

Because our stories were so similar, I attempted to communicate with him by email. Assuming he would be too busy to respond, I thought nothing ventured, nothing gained and completed a contact form on his website. When he responded, I was blown away that a successful author and conference speaker would take the time to talk with me personally. By unique emails not just canned responses! Just as Jesus did with the prostitute at the well, Mike related to me as if we were old friends. So, when he asked me to write this story of how the real peace of resting in Jesus compares with the counterfeit peace of the new age, I was honored and excited to share my story. Writing my story has given me greater clarity on the Truth of the Bible and the deception of new age teachings. My prayer is that it will help others who are struggling as I have. Please receive the following as my humble opinion and ask God to confirm what is of Him:

• In new age deception, reincarnation is proposed journey of the soul and salvation is by works. What we think, say, and do in this life and have thought, said and done in past lives determines how far we have advanced and will advance toward our salvation, also known as enlightenment. Karma and reincarnation hold center stage, not Jesus. Not the real Jesus, but a counterfeit channeled Jesus is cited to reinforce many areas of new age deception. That became evident in my study of A Course in Miracles!  Salvation, as taught in the Holy Bible, is only obtainable by the shed blood of Jesus.
•      The Bible teaches that all good things come by faith, that all things work for good for those who trust Jesus and are called according to His purpose.
•      Jesus, the Son of God, humbled himself to come to earth, suffer humiliation and pain beyond description and die for our sins.
•      Humility is the foundation of the grace God wants us to show towards one another. Pride is the foundation of new age deception.
•      The Word of God is compromised when Christians focus more on works than faith, when doing for God becomes more important than being with God in prayer and Bible study.
•     The Bible teaches that it is more blessed to give than to receive, whereas new age deception leads us to be more and more self-centered. “It’s all about me” is the cry of the new age.
•      The Word of God, the Holy Bible, is a compass God has given us so we can choose to go the right way. New age deception alters the true direction of that compass. Sometimes so much that North becomes South and East becomes West!
•      Satan cannot create anything of true value. Everything he creates is a counterfeit of truth. Throughout history, he has repeatedly voiced the same lie he told in the Garden of Eden, that we can become gods.
•      Those who do not feed on the truth of the Bible every day will easily fall victim to the plan of God’s enemy.

My prayer for everyone who reads my personal testimony is that they will know the Truth and the Truth will set them free…and keep them free! Anyone can know the peace that surpasses understanding that I experienced when God saved me spiritually at church and when I was physically ensnared by a harpoon rope and dragged to the depths of the Atlantic Ocean.

Questions and comments are welcome.

With Love in Christ,
Bill Sawyer

BillSawyer3@gmail.com

(707) 714-7378