Snake-handling preacher killed by snake, just like his dad
Mark Wolford (Photo for The Washington Post by Lauren Pond)
If you lie down with dogs, you get fleas. Lie down with timber rattlers, and you’ve got a good chance of not getting up again.
That’s what happened to West Virginia pastor Mark Wolford, reports The Washington Post.
Wolford died while hosting an outdoor service Sunday at Panther Wildlife Management Area in West Virginia. During the ceremony, the lively preacher sat a rattler on the ground and sat next to it. The snake did what snakes do — it bit him on the thigh.
Instead of going to a hospital, he went home and tried to recover. His kidneys shut down within three hours. Someone called paramedics when it was too late.
Wolford, who combed the woods for vipers, should have known better. In 1983, when he was 15, he saw his dad die while “taking up serpents.”
But faith, which has never actually moved a mountain, has a way of moving people away from reality.
“Praise the Lord and pass the rattlesnakes, brother,” wrote Wolford on his Facebook page as a way of advertising the Sunday service.
His funeral will be held Saturday, exactly one week after his 44th birthday.
Tell us what you think about the site
Customer Care »
Vacation stops, manage subscriptions and more
AJC Services
Sections
Other Editions
Visitor Agreement | Privacy Statement
© 2013 The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
154 comments Add your comment
gagirl
May 31st, 2012
10:16 am
Who gets bitten by a rattlesnake and then goes home to chill????
john k
May 31st, 2012
10:16 am
The only thing my Holy Book says is that two tablespoons of butter is optional.
itsallgoodnroanoke
May 31st, 2012
10:16 am
FOOL, this is what it is….. A FOOL who used a deadly snake and preached the word and got bit. Forest Gump, repeat the word please, Stupied is What Stupied Does, A-Men Forest…..
Frank Furter
May 31st, 2012
10:27 am
I once bit a snake on the thigh and it died!
http://www.reverbnation.com/notquitedevils
Cammi317
May 31st, 2012
10:27 am
Dumb*ss!!!!
Russ
May 31st, 2012
10:30 am
George, saying faith has never moved mountains is a poor way to phrase a flippant argument and it paints with too broad of a stroke. I don’t believe one bit in snake-handling to test God – it’s foolish. But I also believe as a born-again Christian that miracles, signs, and wonders did happen just as the Bible described. How do you know the walls of Jericho didn’t tumble down because of a people’s faith and obedience?
Helen 'Mama' Boucher
May 31st, 2012
10:32 am
“Uh, basically a snake don’t have parts. But, uh, if I had to call it anything, uh, I would say it’s his knee.”
bwell
May 31st, 2012
10:32 am
God gives us common sense. To bad he didn’t have any or use it. That wasn’t nothing but the devil. First of all any God given child would not have been searching for poison snakes, second what idiot will sit by one which is from the wild and not tamed. Then there’s the generation curse. HIS DAD died from the same thing. Only in Wva i guess.
wreckmaniac
May 31st, 2012
10:33 am
I’ve never really fully understood all of the benefits of venomous snakes until now.
ON THE DOWN LOW
May 31st, 2012
10:33 am
If you lie down with Mike Vick Supporters, you’ll likely get something a lot worse than just fleas.