Britt Bentley was 28 years old, in the prime of his life, when he found out his heart was failing. Fifteen years after his first heart transplant, he was told he would need another—and a new kidney as well.
He takes us on the roller coaster ride that brought him to the brink of death and rebuilt his faith—a journey he and his wife are still navigating with Jesus Christ as their compass.
You can connect with us through email at gps@billygraham.org or on Billy Graham Radio on Facebook.
And if you’d like someone to pray with you, call the 24-hour Billy Graham Prayer Line at 855-255-PRAY (7729).
Britt Bentley was 28 years old, in the prime of his life, when he found out his heart was failing. Fifteen years after his first heart transplant, he was told he would need another—and a new kidney as well.
He takes us on the roller coaster ride that brought him to the brink of death and rebuilt his faith—a journey he and his wife are still navigating with Jesus Christ as their compass.
You can connect with us through email at gps@billygraham.org or on Billy Graham Radio on Facebook.
And if you’d like someone to pray with you, call the 24-hour Billy Graham Prayer Line at 855-255-PRAY (7729).
MUSIC STARTS
Britt Bentley:
00:00:01 I had this one episode where my heart rate dropped to like 27 beats per minute and I almost died.
Phil Fleischman: Britt Bentley found out at age 28 … that his heart was failing.
Britt:
00:00:12 I’m lying there and I’m thinking, man, if this is it, what am I gonna tell God when I get to Heaven? Am I going to show Him pictures of my nice truck that I have or tell Him about the money I made? You know, He’s not gonna care about any of that.
Phil: Britt has since been through several life-or-death medical situations, and, as you’re going to hear, his trials aren’t over. I’m Phil Fleischman.
Michael Shurbutt: And I’m Michael Shurbutt. You’re listening to the first installment of our new series, “The Great Physician.” It’s a part of GPS: God. People. Stories., an outreach of the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association.
Billy Graham often preached about what the Bible has to say about our hearts …
Billy Graham:
00:00:51 The heart is used throughout the Bible. It’s the seat of a person’s conscience in life and extremely important. And the question I want to ask you tonight is this: Is your heart right? Is it right with God?
Michael: We’ll hear more from Mr. Graham in a few minutes. First, are you a GPS subscriber? If not, you’ll want to subscribe so that the next three episodes automatically pop up for you. Just take a second to tap “Subscribe” or “Follow” on your favorite podcast app.
Phil: We also want to tell you about FindPeaceWithGod.net. It’s a great resource if you have questions about the Christian faith or if you want to explore what following Jesus could mean for your life. That’s FindPeaceWithGod.net.
Intro: GPS: God. People. Stories.
MUSIC TRANSITION
Britt:
00:01:39 Hey, I’m Britt Bentley. I’m a professional videographer and video editor. I live in Durham, North Carolina, with my wife Mindy Bentley, and my mother, and our dog Snoop.
Phil: Britt grew up in Snellville, Georgia, with his parents and older sister. Church and faith were big parts of their life.
Britt:
00:02:01 Pretty much of a typical Christian family, kind of in the ’80s and the ’90s. Any time the church doors were open, we were there: Sunday morning, Sunday night, Tuesday for visitation, Wednesday for Wednesday services. And also we lived right next to our church, so [chuckle], it’s kinda, it’s kinda hard not to—if you don’t show up and they see your car in the driveway [laugh], they know you’re skipping [laugh].
Michael: Despite that added bit of pressure, Britt says his faith was genuine.
Britt:
00:02:33 During that time when I was a kid is when I built my foundation of God. I wasn’t just doing it because my parents said I had to do it. I was doing it cuz I wanted to do it. I was very involved in our youth group and all that and that’s pretty much where most of my friends were.
Phil: But like so many young believers, Britt strayed away from God during his college years.
Britt:
00:02:54 I kind of got into a lifestyle of partying, and you know, not going to church. It’s like I didn’t go to church cuz I didn’t believe, I just didn’t go to church because I was being lazy, you know? And it just became a habit not to go to church at that point. And, once I got out of college, I still kind of continued that lifestyle. I continued that lifestyle of going out and partying with my friends. I was working, so I was more concerned about money and what kind of car I drove and, all those kind of things that, you know, a lot of people in the world covet.
Phil: Britt took a job building homes, following in his dad’s footsteps. He was cruising along, making money, and feeling invincible well into his 20s. Then, at age 28, everything changed.
Britt:
00:03:47 I started having like an irregular heart rhythm. My heart wasn’t beating normally. Everybody’s heart pretty much beats the same beat their whole life and you learn to ignore it, but once that beat changes [chuckle], then all of a sudden you notice it’s there. So I waited a few days and it didn’t go away, and I went and saw a doctor—I hadn’t been to a doctor in 12 years, which, you know, is a life lesson for people to go get checkups.
Michael: After some tests at the hospital, Britt learned his heart was enlarged and wasn’t pumping enough blood to his body.
Phil: He was actually in heart failure and he would need a heart transplant to survive.
Michael: So Britt got on the long waiting list for a heart. Weeks, months, and even years passed by.
Britt:
00:04:37 During that time, God really taught me about patience, because, back then, they used pagers [laugh] to page you to let you know if there was a heart, you had a heart or something like that. So for four years I just sat there and waited on this pager to go off and I’d gotten to where I couldn’t work. I was sick. You know, I was just there. Everybody around me, their life was going forward and mine was on pause.
Michael: God used that time in Britt’s life to grow his faith, but it didn’t happen right away.
Britt:
00:05:14 It wasn’t really until like two years into the process that I had this one episode where my heart rate dropped to like 27 beats per minute and I almost died. I’m lying there and I’m thinking, man, if this is it, what am I gonna tell God when I get to Heaven? Am I going to show Him pictures of my nice truck that I have or tell Him about the money I made? You know, He’s not gonna care about any of that. I was like, I’m not gonna have much to tell Him.
Phil: That was a turning point for Britt.
Britt:
00:05:45 And so that was when I was like, you know what, I need to get back in church and I need to get back living for God. And that’s when I really turned it around. And from then on, my faith just grew. Some people’s faith may waver during that time and I could understand that, but mine seemed to grow.
Phil: Britt got on the waiting list for a new heart in 2002, when he was living in Atlanta. As the years passed by and his health deteriorated, he realized he might need to relocate in order to get a heart before it was too late.
Britt:
00:06:20 So I started doing my research and I found out that the Medical University of South Carolina, their wait time was a lot shorter for a heart transplant. And so I called them, asked them, I was like, Hey, I see it’s shorter, what’s the deal? And they’re like, Well the reason our time is shorter is cuz we don’t have a helmet law for motorcyclists in the state of South Carolina. So we get more brain-injury patients, and to get a heart from somebody, they can’t be dead. They have to be brain-dead. There still has to be blood going through it.
Michael: You heard that right. The wait time for a heart was shorter in South Carolina because of all of the motorcycle accidents involving riders who weren’t wearing a helmet.
Phil: And because of that, Britt decided to move there. He sold most of his stuff and moved in with a friend in Charleston.
Britt:
00:07:11 My best friend since the second grade, he was an Air Force pilot in Charleston and he was single and he had an extra room and he told me just to come down, move in. Let me live there rent-free.
Phil: After just six months in South Carolina, Britt got the call he had been waiting for. A heart was available from a 22-year-old organ donor. Another family’s tragedy had become Britt’s chance for a new life.
Britt:
00:07:35 This was like 4:30 on a Sunday morning that they called me, and they’re like, All right, well, you get up. You got 45 minutes to get here.
Phil: There was just one problem: Britt’s roommate was out of town, and his parents lived hours away.
Britt:
00:07:49 So I just had to get up and drive myself to the hospital. And I showed up by myself and they’re like, OK, where’s your caretaker? I was like, In Georgia [laugh]. They’re like, OK, you got any friends with you? I’m like, No, [laugh]. And they’re like, You got anybody? I was like, No, it’s just me. And, they were like, We have never had anybody show up for a heart transplant by himself [laugh]. Well, I was like, Well, here I am [laugh].
Michael: After 10 hours of surgery, Britt woke up in the ICU and began a long and arduous recovery process.
Britt:
00:08:19 One of the main things you have to deal with is the side effects from all the medications because like, when you get out of the hospital, you’re probably taking I would say around maybe about 60 pills a day.
Michael: That’s 60 … six-zero. And Britt said it felt like he’d been hit by a truck. His mom moved to Charleston for a few months to help him recover. Then, around the six-month mark, Britt moved back to Atlanta. He was eventually able to get a job—not as a homebuilder this time, but as a church youth director.
Phil: It was the church that he’d attended before his move to Charleston—First Redeemer. They needed a youth director for the summer, but it turned into a full-time gig for Britt. From that role, he moved on to the church’s video production staff.
Michael: First Redeemer also led Britt to his wife, Mindy. They met in Sunday school and got married in 2013. Mindy has been there for Britt in sickness and in health—and there’s been a lot of sickness.
Britt:
00:09:14 After having my first heart transplant, there was like three times where my body rejected my heart and I had to go back to the hospital for them to load me up with more medicine to suppress my immune system even more to stop my body from attacking my heart. Because, you know, since it’s not my heart, my body sees it as a tumor basically, as a foreign object, and my immune system is always going to try to attack it.
Michael: During one of those episodes, Britt found out his donated arteries were narrowing, and he needed to have three stents put in.
Britt:
00:09:53 And once that happened, it was kind of, the writing was on the wall that it was gonna keep happening and I needed to get a new heart. And, it wasn’t a surprise because the average transplanted heart lasts about 10 years. And by this time, I was at 15. So, I mean, I knew another one was coming down the road, I just didn’t know when. So, when they told me, it wasn’t a surprise, but what ended up being a surprise was to find out that I was going to have to have a kidney transplant with the second heart transplant [laugh]. I never thought that would’ve happened, but, you know, it did.
Phil: All of those pills Britt had to take were tough on his kidneys. Years after his transplant, doctors told him the difficult news that both of his kidneys had cancer in them. This made him a risky candidate for another heart transplant. Britt’s faith was being tested again.
Britt:
00:10:50 Transplant departments at hospitals, a lot of ’em live and die by their numbers of survival rate and all that. So if there’s a chance you might not survive, then they don’t wanna do it. We spent a year looking and trying and contacting hospitals, trying to find a hospital that would take me as a patient. And finally, Duke here in Durham said that they would take me as a patient. In fact, they’re known for taking riskier patients, you know, and they’re not as worried about their numbers. But the whole deal was, once again, I had to pick up and move again. That was stressful, knowing all that was happening. I was gonna have to move. And then all this was right when the pandemic started. And, here I am with a suppressed immune system and it was not an ideal situation.
Phil: So, Britt and Mindy moved to Durham, North Carolina, in 2020. But it wasn’t until February of this year that he got that long-awaited phone call for the second time in his life. Britt found out there was a heart and a kidney waiting for him.
Michael: This time he wasn’t alone, though. And he and Mindy had hours, not minutes, to get to the hospital. But, it was also a longer and riskier procedure.
Britt:
00:12:07 They did my heart the first day. Then after that, they took me back. They left me under anesthesia, they left my chest open, made sure everything was, you know, going well. And then two days later they took me back in and put a kidney in me. There was like a piece of tape and stuff or like, you know, plastic over, but my wife said she could see my heart beating through it.
Michael: Even though Britt made it through those long days of surgery earlier this year, his trials aren’t over. We can’t tie a bow on Britt’s story and tell you God has healed him completely. The truth is, Britt knows he has to trust God in the midst of more sickness and uncertainty.
Britt:
00:12:47 My transplanted kidney somewhere in the process got damaged. So, it was only giving me a third of the kidney function that I needed. So once they took those two kidneys out, all of a sudden, I didn’t have enough kidney function and I got sick quick, you know. I was only supposed to be in the hospital for two days and I was in the hospital for 12 because toxins and stuff started building up in my body. They had to start me on dialysis and I’m still on dialysis now. And, once they started doing dialysis and started getting toxins out, I started feeling a lot better.
Phil: And thankfully, Britt is now able to do nightly dialysis treatments at home. But he is going to need another kidney.
Britt:
00:13:33 If I’m to survive probably more than seven years, I need to get another kidney transplant. So, right now we’re in the process of getting me re-listed at Duke for that.
Phil: So, what has Britt learned through all of this?
Britt:
00:13:47 It would be easier for me to list off the things I didn’t learn [laugh] but, you know, I learned patience, that’s for sure. And then I learned more patience after that. You know, you think, OK, this is as worse as it can get and the first time I had my transplant, I’m like, This is the worst it can get, can’t get worse than a heart transplant. But no [laugh], I was wrong [laugh] cuz you can need another heart transplant, kidney transplant, and have cancer. So, I learned patience.
Michael: Humility is another virtue Britt has had to learn the hard way.
Britt:
00:14:21 Because during this time we had to ask for financial help from people, which was hard for me cuz I’ve never been one to really ask for things from people, but I had to humble myself and do that. And while doing that, I was like, man, God’s really humbled me. I don’t know if I can get any more humble. And then now all of a sudden I have to ask people to donate one of their organs to me [laugh]. So that’s another level of humbleness, you know, asking-somebody-for-an-organ humble. So I’ve learned that God can always still learn and still add on to the things He’s taught you that make you, you know, more capable and handle more.
Michael: The Bible tells Christ followers to consider it “pure joy” when trials come. The book of James, chapter 1, says, “Blessed is the one who perseveres under trial because, having stood the test, that person will receive the crown of life that the Lord has promised to those who love him.”
Phil: Britt and Mindy are still in the midst of a trial. And we hope you’ll join us in praying for them to keep the faith and to hold onto hope in God, the Great Physician. Because Britt follows Jesus, he knows his healing is coming … either here on Earth, or in Heaven.
Britt:
00:15:39 The main thing I have learned is that I’m blessed. Most people would look at my life and say, That guy’s not blessed [laugh], you know, but I don’t feel that way. I mean, I feel like I’m blessed because God has never let me down. And because of that, I really don’t worry. I don’t worry about stuff anymore. I’m not worried about this next transplant or when it’s gonna happen cuz God’s never let me down. I mean, He’s always been there for me, whether I needed an organ, whether I needed money, you know, all this stuff—and that’s a blessed feeling or you’re blessed to be able to have that feeling of knowing that, you know, Jesus is there. He’s got this. I’m just gonna go on with life and let Him handle it.
MUSIC TRANSITION
Phil: You’ve been hearing from Britt Bentley, who has had two heart transplants, a kidney transplant, and is currently in need of another kidney. He’s been walking this long and difficult medical path for more than 20 years now—and he still puts his trust in God.
Michael: If you want to have that kind of trust and hope in the midst of life’s hardest trials, give your life to Jesus Christ. If you don’t know what that means, you can check out our website, FindPeaceWithGod.net. It’s a safe place to ask spiritual questions and even chat live with one of our trained volunteers. Again, that’s FindPeaceWithGod.net.
Phil: You’re about to hear a quick word from Billy Graham, and then, a sneak peek at next week’s new episode in our series, “The Great Physician.”
Voice-over: You’re listening to GPS: God. People. Stories., a podcast production of the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association.
MUSIC STARTS
Billy Graham:
00:17:32 Now, what does the Bible teach about the heart?
Voice-over: Billy Graham …
Billy Graham:
00:17:36 The heart is used throughout the Bible, considered far more than a bodily organ. It’s the seat of our emotions. It’s the seat of a person’s conscience in life and extremely important. And the question I want to ask you tonight is this: Is your heart right? Is it right with God? The Bible teaches that our hearts are sinful. But there’s something else: All the way through the Scriptures we read about the blood of Jesus Christ. If Jesus Christ had not died on that cross and shed His blood for you, there’s no way you could be forgiven of your sins. It means that His heart bled and it is only through the cleansing of that blood that we can be forgiven. And the Bible says that He gives a new heart. God says an old heart will not do. A new heart is what you need. What about you? Have you received this new heart from God?
Phil: You can learn more about that. Our website: FindPeaceWithGod.net. Or, if you’d rather talk with someone on the phone, you can call our 24-hour prayer line. The number is 855-255-7729. That’s 855-255-PRAY. And, the web address, again, is FindPeaceWithGod.net.
Michael: Today you heard from Britt Bentley, who kicked off our four-part series called, “The Great Physician.” Next week you going to hear from Steve Cochlan, a married father of three who was diagnosed with ALS in 2019.
Steve Cochlan:
00:19:07 And on April 23rd, they said, Steve, you’ve got ALS, you’ve got two to three years to live, so go home and get your house in order. And that was the extent of it. I mean, literally, the doctor spent less than three minutes with me. And so, you know, now I’m going, oh my goodness, what now?
Michael: God has given Steve a powerful story to share. You don’t want to miss it, so be sure to subscribe to GPS. Thanks for listening. I’m Michael Shurbutt.
Phil: And I’m Phil Fleischman. This is GPS: God. People. Stories. It’s an outreach of the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association—Always Good News.
CLOSING MUSIC
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