The son of a snake-handling Kentucky preacher who died from a snake bite says he’s recovering from his own rattlesnake wound.
21 year old Cody Coots told the Lexington Herald-Leader he was bitten on a finger as he removed snakes from a cage he kept at his mother’s house Monday morning.
In accordance with his religious beliefs, Coots declined medical treatment from an ambulance service. Instead, he relied on the healing prayers from fellow members of his Full Gospel Tabernacle in Jesus Name Church in Middlesboro (KY). He says his hand swelled and he vomited repeatedly, but the pain subsided within 24 hours.
Following the snake bite death of his father during a service earlier this year, Coots said that he’s well aware of the inherent danger in handling venomous snakes, but that he feels protected.
“I like to handle snakes. I’ve been bit five times, strictly cottonmouths. But one of those bites, God was moving on me…the thing reached and grabbed me right in the back of the shoulder and never did hurt me. I just kept right on dancing with fire in one hand and a snake in the other,” said Coots.
Coots also spoke about his father’s death and the possibility of his own mortality.
“If I had to die at a young age just like he did, it was my time to go, I’ll still carry on in the signs. If I die from drinking strychnine or I die from handling serpents, it wouldn’t bother me. At least I’d be in the good service before I left this walk of life,” added Coots.
Coots plans to be on the altar for his regular Wednesday night service this evening and back at work in a few days.