Eight months ago, Arthur Featherston was badly burned in a fire in Webb that left him unconscious for more than three weeks.
But during his time "out," as he calls it, he walked with God and experienced a spiritual awakening.
Before the fire, he says, he considered himself a spiritual man but was "living in sin." Now, given new life, he wants to tell his story to others and encourage them to "keep the faith and hold on to God's unchanging hand."
Back in October, Featherston was living in Webb with his wife, Creolor, and his 26-year-old stepson, Tyrone McIntosh.
Featherston, 51, said he had been providing food, clothing and shelter for McIntosh for about six years because the stepson had trouble holding on to money. McIntosh would take a job, "work enough to buy him a blunt" and then quit until the money ran out again, Featherston said.
On Oct. 1, the two had an argument. McIntosh asked Featherston for money again, and the stepfather refused.
"I said, 'Well, I'm not going to give you anything else,'" Featherston said. "I said, 'I've been taking care of you ever since you were 20 years old. Now you're 26, and you won't hold a job.'"
Featherston recalls that McIntosh became angry and stormed out of the house, after which Featherston went to bed early.
Later, he woke up, and his wife told him that someone was in the room. It turned out to be Tony Smith, who was a friend of Featherston's, and McIntosh. Featherston said Smith's situation was similar to McIntosh's: Featherston had given him money to pay bills but announced that he wouldn't do it anymore.
Smith and Featherston scuffled, and Smith and McIntosh struck Featherston in the head, knocking him out.
When Featherston came to, he smelled smoke and went into the front room, where he saw his stepson lighting some paper on fire.
"He was trying to burn me up," Featherston said.
Featherston said he caught fire when his stepson sprayed lighter fluid on his face, head and back, and his feet also were burned by the heat. Featherston ran out of the house and jumped into a pile of leaves, where he rolled until the fire was out.
He went back into the house to look through the smoke for his wife, not knowing she was dead. After catching fire again, he ran to the neighbors for help but collapsed near their house. Before he knew what had happened, the fire chief was picking him up to put him in an ambulance.
For more than three weeks, he lay unconscious in Mississippi Firefighters' Memorial Burn Center in Greenville, bandaged from head to foot, with six machines keeping different parts of his body functioning.
"My skin had melted," he said, "and I didn't have no eyes, no nose, and no mouth - just a little small hole."
He didn't regain consciousness until Oct. 24. By then, his condition had become so dire that the doctors were about to disconnect him from the machines. But just at that moment, he spit out his breathing tube.
"I waved to let them know that I was all right," he said. "It was a miracle, because I was paralyzed."
But he has vivid memories of where he was before he woke up.
"During this time, my body separated," he said. "And I went with God."
Featherston said he remembers heavenly sights and sounds vividly - a soft wind, a green pasture with tall grass and a garden with giant pink and white roses. He saw a bridge made of pearls, leading to a city of gold where the saints sang and rejoiced.
He remembers it as a very peaceful place. "I didn't have to worry about paying no rent, no light, no gas bill, no water bill - just live with God," he said.
He remembers God's image as one of power and light - "instant energy" - and said God showed him the wrongdoings of his past, like a movie.
At one point, God asked him whether he wanted to remain there. He replied that he would like to stay but didn't think he had fulfilled his obligations on earth.
"He said, 'I want you to go back and tell my saints what you have seen,'" Featherston said. "'Go back and tell the saints the story, and tell them that they are not working in vain when they fall on their knees to pray.'"
After leaving the burn center, Featherston lived with his sister in Memphis for about three weeks. Then he came to Greenwood in December to stay with his daughter, Carolyn Prayer.
He wanted to go to church to share his experience with someone, but he couldn't get anyone to take him.
"I had been wanting to tell the story for six months, but nobody would carry me to church," he said. "They always disappointed me."
Finally, about three weeks ago, he told a woman what had happened to him and why he wanted to speak out. That woman, Alicia Smith, agreed to take him to Faith Temple Full Gospel church in Grenada.
That night, the church's congregation heard Featherston give his testimony. After hearing that he had lost his supply of clothes in the smoke and flames, they even took up a collection to replace some of them. "I wanted me a suit, so (they) dressed me from head to foot," he said.
Mary Johnson, a member at Faith Temple who heard him speak, now has him in her home often as a guest. Unlike the others, she was not deterred by the wounds on his body.
"Sometimes people look at your outer appearance and not what's going on on the inside," she said.
Featherston is continuing to mend physically.
The disabled Army veteran, who served for 16 months in Vietnam, said he is especially grateful to Dr. Robert Love III at the burn center, who rebuilt his eyes, nose and ears.
He said his wounds itch a lot, but the doctors have told him that that indicates healing. His arms, which were burned to the bone, still must be bandaged, and he goes to Greenwood Leflore Hospital three times a week to have them cleaned and rewrapped.
He can dress himself - although it takes longer than it once did - and he can fix his bed in the morning. He has built up enough strength that he can walk at a normal speed again, although his feet swell sometimes.
His sight is getting better, too; he can't see small writing clearly, but he can handle large writing. And he believes God and the prayers of others had a hand in that.
For a time, he said, he wore glasses, until God told him others' prayers had healed his eyes.
"God spoke to me," he recalled, "and told me, 'Pull the glasses off. Do you believe in what you asked me for?' I told him, 'Yes, Lord, I do.'
"'Do you believe in what the saints prayed for?' I said, 'Yes, Lord, I do.'
"'Do you believe what your pastor prayed for and what she represents?' I said, 'Yes, Lord, I do.'
"He said, 'Pull your glasses off. You don't need them no more.' I can see."
Featherston said he last saw his stepson in court. Despite all that has happened, he said, "I have forgiven him."
Featherston said he didn't believe McIntosh should be put to death.
"My God tells me, Christ tells me, 'Don't take nothing that you can't give,'" he said. "So I cannot tell you to take a life, because I can't give life.
"Whatever time he has, I guess he has time to think about his wrongdoing. I'm not agreeing with taking his life."
Featherston's next big task is finding a place to live.
The house in Webb, which he had inherited from his parents, was damaged so badly that it will have to be torn down. Now the Johnsons, the Smiths and others are trying to help him find a new home.
"I'm praying to the good Lord that I find me somewhere to stay," he said. "I need my own privacy."
He also is focused on God's plan for his life.
"Whenever I get through doing what God wants me to do, he's going to carry me back to that place where he carried me to, in the sky," Featherston said. "And I will live with him forever."
