The survivor of a traumatic childhood involving physical abuse by an alcoholic father and the suicide death of his revered older brother when he was just a teen, 36-year-old Josiah Dickerson of Nashville, Tennessee, took great comfort in the belief that God had not brought him this far to drop him - until came the day that he was, in fact, dropped by God.
"I'm certain it was an accident, though," said Josiah. "We all have off days. Even God."
According to Josiah, he had just learned that his teenage daughter, Rachel, was pregnant by her high school physics teacher when he sought escape in his favorite adrenaline-rush hobby, skydiving - only for his parachute to fail to open. He plummeted to the ground, unassisted by either mechanical devices or the hand of God.
Severely injured, Josiah is now recuperating following multiple surgeries to mend broken limbs and cobble together irreparably damaged organs.
"I didn't die, though," he said. "Which tells me a guardian angel's been looking out for me all this time."
Knowing that, in addition to God, who's generally pretty good about not dropping him, he's got a watchful guardian angel on his side has only served to deepen Josiah's faith, he says - which maybe was the point all along.
"He works in mysterious ways," said Josiah. "Everything happens for a reason."
