The Hand of God Protected Him

“I just remember a lot of burning in my facial area, my sinuses, my neck, side of my head. The pain was excruciating. It was like falling into a black tunnel. Bamm! I blacked out. Everything went black,” Buck Hornsby recalls. 

September 12th, 2017. Buck Hornsby had been enjoying a morning walk near his home in Clinton, Louisiana, fully unaware of the danger nearby. “Around 60 feet from the highway, and out of the corner of my eye, I saw a car suddenly pull up on the edge of the highway. And as soon as I looked that way-- two gunshots."

Two shotgun blasts from an unknown attacker left his body riddled with pellets and Buck fighting for his life. Intense pain set in as he regained consciousness. “I lost sight in my right eye automatically, and then the blood started coming from everywhere. I couldn't breathe well. My heart rate was racing. I knew that I had major damage on this side of my body, mainly around my neck and carotid artery,” he says. 

Fueled by adrenaline, Buck tried to reach a nearby house, yet no one was home. Collapsing to the ground, Buck crawled nearly 600 yards to reach his uncle’s home.

“I heard somebody banging on the door, and I looked up and he was at the back door and he was just covered with blood,” his Uncle Leon recalls. “I opened the door, and he said, ‘Somebody shot me. Get me to the hospital.’ So we jumped in the truck and took off. If the inside looked anything worse than the outside, then he was in trouble.”

After reaching Baton Rouge General Hospital, Buck was taken in for X-Rays to evaluate the extent of his injuries. Buck had nearly 50 pellets lodged throughout his body. “The pellets landed in areas that could be life-threatening,” says Dr. Robert Krupkin. “The most potentially lethal injury is the proximity of the pellets to the carotid vessel that they overlay.”

“Then a vascular surgeon comes in,” Buck recalls. “He says, 'Mr. Hornsby, you have serious damage to your carotid artery in your neck. We're going to have to do an MRI.' I told them not to give me any pain medication at all because I wanted to be able to talk to my wife and my kids and tell them I love them. I didn't know if I would be there to be able to do that."

When Buck’s father got the news of his son’s injuries, the pastor of over 40 years knew exactly what to do. “We started praying right away," Scott Hornsby says. “And we already had a team in place, intercessors that began to pray for Buck and everything that was going on in this whole area, this whole situation. There's a scripture that says there's a peace that passes all understanding. At certain times you don't understand what's going on, but there's a peace that gives you faith to believe that God is going to take care of the situation that you're involved in.”

Thirty minutes after Buck’s MRI, the surgeon came back with telling results. Buck remembers, “He said it could have been a 50/50 chance of you living if this carotid artery would have been penetrated.” 

“Had that vessel been pierced by one of the pellets, he could have bled out in a matter of just a couple of minutes,” Dr. Hornsby adds. “It's miraculous that he survived this injury.”

Buck adds, “He tells me, ‘You were a 16th of an inch from bleeding out on your property and not being here.' And he says, 'You are a true miracle.' I was thankful.”

Doctors removed what pellets they could, treated his wounds, and sent Buck home to recover the very same day.

"I just want to thank God for His faithfulness to us and to our family,” Pastor Hornsby says. "We know that prayer can change things in your life.”

“There was probably close to a hundred thousand people praying for me, and that really meant a lot to me,” Buck says. “I believe God intervened through those prayers."

Buck’s attacker was later apprehended and charged with the serial murders of three other men in the area, all who were similarly targeted like Buck.

Buck says, “A lot of anger built up in me because of what he did, mainly to these people for no reason. But I know that God had His hand on me, so there's no way I can hold any grudge or be angry at him in any way because I survived."

Though there’s no explanation for the senseless attacks, Buck takes comfort in placing his trust in something he knows for certain – the goodness of God.

“The Word of God is true. The steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord. Sixty-two feet and the doctor tells me I'm a 16th of an inch from dying. And I know if I'd have been walking and jogging, I'd have been 20 feet from the highway and I wouldn't be here,” Buck says. “I truly believe God had His hand on me. That's why I'm talking to you today. This life is just a vapor. And if you live that way, and you trust God, ‘O death, where is thy sting?’"