Crossing the finish line

Army Captain Joel Maxwell, whose leg was shattered when he was run over while on duty as an Evangel University security officer in 2000, has rebounded from his injury and completed a marathon

Capt. Joel Maxwell, pictured with his wife, Amy, and children Sarah and Jeremiah, finished the Bass Pro Shops Conservation Marathon on November 1, 2009. It was a significant accomplishment, considering doctors once told him he might not ever walk again.

SPRINGFIELD, Mo. — When Joel Maxwell, 36, crossed the finish line at the Bass Pro Shops Conservation Marathon on November 1, 2009, he was almost knocked over by a wave of emotion. It was more than the accomplishment of finishing his first 26.2-mile race that Maxwell was feeling in that moment.

It was so much more.

It was coming back from a catastrophic leg injury nine years ago that doctors feared would leave him unable to walk, let alone run a marathon. It was finishing his degree at Evangel University while healing from the accident. It was completing a tour of duty in Afghanistan. It was accomplishing his goal to become a military police officer. It was clawing his way back from the brink of bankruptcy to pay off more than $300,000 in debt. It was his faithful wife, Amy, who stood by his side through it all — and their two beautiful children, Jeremiah (8) and Sarah (7).

“It didn’t really hit me until I crossed the finish line,” he says. “It was a very emotionally satisfying moment.”

The accident

In August 2000, Maxwell was taking classes at Evangel, working toward a degree in criminal justice and public administration. He was also working full time as the night shift supervisor for Evangel’s Security Department and was a reserve deputy for the Greene County Sheriff’s Department.

On the morning of August 16, he was just finishing his shift when an employee reported a suspicious vehicle parked on Glenstone Parkway (this is the road that runs parallel to Glenstone Avenue on university property). Maxwell told Security Chief Gene Thomlinson he would check it out on his way home.

Maxwell asked the driver a few questions and quickly determined that the man was lying about his reasons for being parked on Evangel’s property. He also noticed the driver had a gun. When he asked the driver to step out of the vehicle, the driver put the car in reverse and hit the gas.

Maxwell was thrust under the car, and his left leg was crushed. He had a compound fracture of the left tibia and a compound fracture of the tibial plateau. “The doctor described that injury as kind of like a package of crackers that had been crushed with a hammer,” says Maxwell.

“I remember the doctor saying, ‘I think you’ll be able to walk, but I can’t promise it. I don’t know if you’ll be able to walk normally ever again. I don’t know if you’ll be able to run,’” Maxwell recalls.

His doctor did a bone graft and inserted a rod in his leg. He was not allowed to walk for four and a half months. That was followed by seven months of physical therapy. Eleven and half months after the incident Maxwell was back in a patrol car doing full law-enforcement duties. At 18 months there was another surgery to remove the hardware from his leg.

After a re-break in November of 2002, doctors decided Maxwell would need a permanent rod in his left leg. It runs the full length of his tibia.

The man who ran over Maxwell, John W. James, was convicted of assault in 2004. He had been on Evangel’s campus because he was stalking his ex-wife, who he believed to be working in a business across the street. He was arrested several months later and is now in prison.

Law enforcement career

Capt. Joel ('02) and Amy (Bell '99) Maxwell at the Assemblies of God Theological Seminary Christmas banquet in December 2009. Joel is a military police officer, and Amy is a chaplain candidate.

Maxwell, who is originally from Dalhart, Texas, first came to Evangel in 1993 with the encouragement of his youth pastor, Brent Leas. Always interested in pursuing a career in law enforcement and criminal justice, he found more than he could have hoped in the program at Evangel.

Early in Maxwell’s college career, he started working for the Security Department. His relationship with Chief Thomlinson proved to be one of the most influential of his life.

“Chief has just mentored me in every way possible,” says Maxwell. “He developed me as a security officer. He is the one who introduced me to the reserve program at Greene County, which led to me getting on full time.”

Maxwell was able to work those jobs while finishing his degree. “I highly recommend the criminal justice program at Evangel,” he says.

Both Joel and his wife, Amy, decided to make the Army their career. Captain Joel Maxwell is now a military police officer stationed at Fort Leonard Wood in Missouri.

Amy (Bell ’99) Maxwell is a chaplain candidate in the Army Reserve and is now completing her last year of seminary at Assemblies of God Theological Seminary in Springfield, Missouri.

Joel has just been given his next assignment and will be the Brigade Provost Marshall for the 3rd Brigade Combat Team, 1st Infantry Division at Ft. Knox, Kentucky. He will start this assignment in May of 2010.

The brink of bankruptcy

As if the stress of the accident recovery wasn't enough, the Maxwells found themselves considering bankruptcy four years ago.

Joel had invested the workers' compensation money that he received after the accident into a new restaurant. A series of bad spending decisions and bad luck led to the closure of the restaurant just months after it opened. That left the Maxwells almost $556,000 in debt.

They had just contacted an attorney to file for bankruptcy when Joel was introduced to Christian financial expert Dave Ramsey’s book and program, “Total Money Makeover.”

“It didn’t come in time to save the restaurant,” Maxwell says of Ramsey’s get-out-of-debt program. “But it did come in time to save us from bankruptcy.”

The Maxwells have followed Ramsey’s program and paid off more than $300,000 in just over four years. They started by selling their house and other possessions, and Maxwell says that proceeds from the sales accounted for about $140,000 of the debt elimination. Joel says that in addition to Ramsey's plan, the Maxwells live by four absolutes, "One, we always pay our tithe first. Two, we don't borrow money for anything. Three, we don't spend over $100 unless Amy and I agree on it. And four, We have a written budget every month before we spend any money. Those are absolutes in our life, which means that no matter what, we do this."

National television exposure

The Dave Ramsey Show, which airs on the Fox Business Network, heard about Joel's accident, recovery and marathon, and invited him to appear on the show on November 17, 2009, for a segment about overcoming physical disabilities. "It was great to talk to Dave Ramsey, the man who saved us from bankruptcy and probably saved our marriage," says Joel. "He does so much to help so many people, and I was honored to tell my story of overcoming physical pain to run again."

View Joel Maxwell's interview on The Dave Ramsey Show.

View Past Alumni Spotlights

ako