Bennie Patrick --- Personal Faith

     Blood and pain:  Two elements often found in the sport of rodeo, especially in the bull riding.  When 14 year old Bennie Patrick decided he wanted to be a bull rider, and later at 16, a bullfighter, blood and pain became a regular part of life.  However, it was the unlikely path of rodeo that eventually led Bennie to the Cross and the realization that the blood and pain of another had literally saved his life.
     "I started asking questions about Jesus when I was a senior in high school,"  says Bennie.  "But is wasn't a personal relationship.  I'd heard about it and it was something that I said:  'Well, okay Jesus, come into my life.' I might have said a prayer every once in a while, but it was more of a religious prayer.  It was just the same thing rattled over and over and over again.  It wasn't coming from my heart."
     In June of 1986 Bennie met a young woman named Johnie at a local rodeo where he was entered in the bull riding.  She was one of two very important things that happened to Bennie that night, which had an impact on the rest of his life. 
     "One of the first seeds that was planted in me that night was right before the bull riding when a guy came up to me and asked me what I drew," recalls Bennie.  "Just common bull rider curiosity.  I told him and he said, 'Well, praise the Lord, make a ride!'  That was the neatest thing anyone had ever said to me before I rode.  I met Johnie that night too, so it was all kind of in God's timing."
     Less than a year later, Bennie and Johnie were married.  They began their relationship as best friends, and started attending church together.  Raised in a Christian home and accustomed to "being different" as a Christian in high school, Johnie was comfortable spending Sunday mornings in church, whether it was in a building, or at Cowboy Church at a rodeo.
     When the Patrick's first child, Kelsie, came along in 1989, they dedicated her to the Lord with the best of intentions in their hearts.  But life got busy, schedules became cramped.  The church they attended was on the other side of town and the fire in their hearts for the Lord began to dim.  It was with this faint glow of a once brighter flame that Bennie headed for Lyle Sankey's bullfighting school that spring.
     Bennie expected to polish his profession as a bullfighter.  He expected to hear tips on bettering his skill. And he did.  But he got more than he bargained for when a man named Wes Neal stood up to speak.
     "When Wes talked about what Jesus went through in the crucifixion, that's when it became personal to me,"  Bennie explains.  "He was beat with a cat-o' nine-tails and it pulled the skin literally off His back....they pulled His beard out....they made him carry the cross.  And how He had to make Himself breathe by pulling Himself up because there was no support --- what the bodily functions go through and how they begin to break down --- that's when it became real personal to me.  At that time it almost made me sick to think about, but I knew He did it for me.  He did it for my kids and for everyone.
     "I remember being there and seeing guys that loved what I loved --- rodeoing.  But there was something else that they had, and it was Jesus.  I think when I drove home from that school, when I came back, I was pretty much different.
     "Then God started bringing people into our life:  people like Ted and Linda Wiese.  Their life style and what they had coming out of them just appealed to me so much.  It drew me to them. I wanted to know what they had.  I started reading the Word and getting into it.  The first Bible I ever read was a Cowboy Chapter Living Testament.  I read that from cover to cover."
     God didn't take Bennie out of rodeo and put him in a suit and tie.  And He didn't take rodeo out of Bennie.  Instead, He put a new heart and a new direction in Bennie's life.
     "In 1986 I set a goal to work the Little Britches National Finals.  When I went to Sankey's school in 1989, I'd already been selected to work the Finals.  Back then I was really searching for a bullfighting buckle.  I've got three of them now, but they can't replace the 'buckle' that Jesus has given me.  I have eternal life in Him.
     "If I had to quit now, I think I still would be happy, because I've accomplished a lot.  But through it, I've learned more about the Lord.  It's strengthened my walk."
     This past winter, Bennie and Johnie experienced what Bennie refers to as a 'walking on water' experience during the birth of their second child, Jake.  After Kelsie was born, Johnie was advised to not try to have another baby because of her protein F deficiency, and the medication she is required to take.  However, after visiting several specialists, Johnie was assured that the risks were minimal, and only to her, not to the baby.
     "I had to switch medicine to have the baby," explains Johnie.  The medicine I switched to was an intravenous medicine. I had a needle in my stomach all the time:  they gave me medicine 24 hours a day.  They were worried about me going into pre-term labor.
     "I didn't go into pre-term labor.  They did all the tests at three weeks (before full term) to make sure he was ready to be born.  He was suppose to be fine, completely developed and everything."
     But that was not the way it turned out.  When Jake was born he went straight into ICU because his lungs were underdeveloped.  He also had an open valve in his heart.
     Johnie's bed was wheeled into ICU when she came out of recovery, and she remembers looking at Jake through the clear walls of his special crib, tubes taped to his tiny body:  "I couldn't even touch him.  It was really hard for me to accept at first.  I was looking at the world's side of it --- they told me he was fine.  They did all the tests and told me he was fine.... that nothing would be wrong.
     The first couple of days I was a wreck.  I couldn't pray, I couldn't get anything straight in my head.  Once I did, we went down and Bennie and I laid hands on him and from then on everything was turned around.
     "Being in that situation I think I learned more about God's love for us.  When your son's lying in ICU --- what you'd do just to get him out!  I can't say I know exactly, but it made me understand a lot more about God's love."
     Choosing to keep their eyes on Jesus was the ultimate challenge for Bennie and Johnie through those seemingly endless days and nights.  Bennie describes the darkest moments:  "You saw what the doctors were coming up and telling you, but you had to keep your eyes focused on the Lord.  You go through practices, (saying) 'Well, I'll trust God with this little area of my life.  We'll practice here.'  When you've got your kid in ICU, or your wife lying in the hospital for a week, it's game time, and there's no time for practice.  You've got to keep your eyes focused where they need to be."
     A week later, the Patrick's took home a 'perfect' baby boy --- a testimony to a loving God and the prayers of countless friends as well as a Christian nurse at the hospital.  Bennie and Johnie were grateful for the years of knowing Jesus and their 'practice' times of strengthening their personal faith --- building that faith into a reflex action much the same way Bennie's bullfighting has become a reflex response over the years. 
     Bennie Patrick continues to fight bulls at Little Britches and other youth rodeos in his home state of Colorado and neighboring states.  You'll see him at Cowboy Church on Sunday morning, and out behind the chutes before the bull riding praying with young cowboys and encouraging them in their faith. 
     "It's nice to see kids gettin' turned on to Jesus instead of gettin' turned on to dope and booze,"  says Patrick.  "As adults, we're these young kids' heroes.  We stumble and fall, but we've got to try and walk that walk.  We can be a spiritual hero as well as being a physical hero.  I hope the kids see me as more than just a clown or bullfighter:  a Christian who loves Jesus Christ."