Real Life Stories
From the frying pan into the Fire with Faith Intact
Honister Horror
Having narrowly escaped two IRA bombs and witnessed its drastic effects on his favourite teacher, Kelvin Burke experienced a tragedy of his own in the beautiful Lake District in England.
When the car in which he and his companions were traveling stalled on a one-in-three incline and then began rolling backwards, eventually pinning him to the beck below, all he could do was call on the name of Jesus as he desperately fought for breath. He later referred to the 1979 accident as his Honister horror, as it happened on the scary pass below Honister Cragg, leaving him a paraplegic, aged just 23, with sporting dreams dashed and an able-bodied future seemingly in tatters.
Olympic hopes dashed
Already playing hockey at a high level, he had entertained hopes of the Moscow Olympics but instead had to settle for cheering on his colleagues who subsequently won bronze at the Los Angeles Games of 1984.
Growing up on a farm in Armagh, Northern Ireland, Kelvin followed his parents into a dynamic Christian faith, kneeling beside his bed and asking Jesus into his life as a ten-year-old, as he records in his book Lake of Tears (Springmead Publishing 2024).
Mum and dad were both involved in the Full Gospel Business Men’s Fellowship International, committed in part to a restoration of the gifts of the Holy Spirit which propelled the early church to extraordinary growth. He had his own experience of the baptism of the Spirit as a teenager and was greatly encouraged in his faith by his maths teacher Barbara Burgess, who was severely injured by an IRA bomb.
Kelvin came to England to study accountancy, eventually building up a successful business, and became youth leader of St Andrew’s Church in the Yorkshire city of Wakefield. It was on a Lake District youth camp in May 1979 that the tragic accident took place. Thankfully, he was surrounded by young people of fervent faith and, through his mum’s international contacts, prayers from around the world were soon bearing him up as he fought for his life in the Whitehaven hospital’s Intensive Care Unit.
He was transferred to Pinderfields Hospital’s Spinal Injuries Unit in Wakefield where he spent the next eight months, gradually recovering and learning to adapt to his disability. Though his faith was undimmed, the future looked bleak at times.
A lake of tears and a call to ordained ministry
A turning point came when, in the depths of despair, he had a vision of a lake of tears, representing not only his own struggles but also the Lord Jesus weeping with him. In the same context, he envisioned Jesus’ agony in the Garden of Gethsemane as he prepared to lay down his life for us. And in all the years since the crash, he has known the reality of Christ’s promise to be with him always.
Believing he was being called to the ordained ministry, he sold his business and soon became Vicar of St Andrew’s and another church in Wakefield, later specialising in hospital chaplaincy with the Leeds NHS Trust, though now based on the Isle of Wight.
His mom Rita, who had a ministry of praying for the sick, struggled with the idea that her son remained disabled – until it finally clicked that, as a hospital chaplain, he too was reaching out to the sick. And he has seen more people come to faith in his years as a chaplain than in his time as a vicar.
“To date, I have not received the physical healing that I would dearly love, but day by day he (the Lord) satisfies and renews me, and he is all I need,” he writes.
As for the gifts of the Spirit, at least two personal prophecies have been fulfilled in remarkable ways since his accident – that he would one day be involved in ministering to the sick and that he would get married, something he didn’t think possible in view of his condition. But it happened, after he met Jennie in Wakefield, and they now have three grown-up daughters!
Healing the sick
One of his ‘patients’, Steve, was suffering from liver cancer which he felt he deserved through indulging in ‘drink, drugs and rock-n-roll’. But he trusted in Jesus and, at St Helen’s Church in the city some while later, sought prayer for healing. As people prayed for him, he heard an audible voice, saying ‘You’ve been healed’ and never looked back, subsequently (in 2010) getting married in the same church and continuing to walk the rugged path of discipleship as Kelvin’s book went to press 14 years later.
I conclude with Kelvin’s own words:
“Ever since I knelt as a ten-year-old to invite Jesus Christ into my life, the Scriptures have nourished me, the Lord has guided me, and as he spoke to me on Honister, he has always been with me. I cannot say, in hindsight, like some Paralympians, that I would do it all again. No, I wouldn’t wish paralysis on anyone, but if it means I can be an ambassador for God or the finest way that he can be glorified in my life or to ensure that in all things he can have the pre-eminence, then I would reply every time – ‘Not my will but yours be done’.”
