Joe Petit’s story on this Easter Sunday is not so much one of resurrection as it is “revitalization.”
That’s the word the Christian musician and small business owner from Aurora uses when describing the new heart he received on his birthday back in November of 2011.
Still, Petit considers himself a “walking parable.” And the Rev. Randy Schoof, pastor of Warehouse Church who has been his friend for over 30 years, agrees that “the analogies to Scripture and to Jesus remain pretty clear.”
“Someone had to die in order for him to have life.”
The fact that Petit, as he puts it, went into the hospital “with an old heart at age 41 and woke up at age 42 with a new heart” only makes this narrative more compelling.
Indeed, just two weeks earlier on his youngest son’s first birthday, Petit didn’t have the strength to blow out the one candle celebrating a young life. Joe’s mother Jolene Petit recalls her son “kneeling on the floor, then lying in a recliner” trying to catch his breath.
But problems had surfaced in January of 2010 when, after leading worship at Warehouse on wife Amy’s birthday, he suddenly became overheated, clammy, sweaty, his face so ashen he was taken to Mercy Medical Center.
There, tests determined his heart was struggling, and in fact his heart stopped while his mother, “shaking like a leaf,” she recalls, “was rushed from the room” as doctors revived her son.
For the next 23 months, Petit’s life was a series of ups and downs, revolving around defibrillators, pacemakers and University of Chicago doctors who attempted to fix what was clearly broken.
“We’re trying to repair the airplane’s engine but not forgetting to pack the parachutes,” Petit remembers a doctor saying in reference to a transplant possibility.
On Nov. 14, 2011, Petit went on that life-saving donor list and two days later a heart became available.
“Congratulations, Mrs. Petit,” Jolene recalls the nurse telling her after the transplant was completed that morning of his birthday. “You have a 155-pound bouncing baby boy.”
Petit, requiring nearly a dozen types of drugs, was hardly out of the woods, however. In March of 2016, his body began rebelling against the alien organ because he had stopped taking the expensive but critical anti-rejection medications.
Petit blames a mixture of “overconfidence” and an insurance snafu for that near-fatal decision. Feeling his heart “hiccuping” as he drove himself to the hospital, he remembers being “rushed into a room and throwing up … then waking up a week later.”
For three excruciating days as their son was on life support, Jolene admits “we were mad at him” for not taking the drugs to save his family money. But mostly Petit’s loved ones prayed for another miracle.
Petit, now 55, has certainly learned some important lessons on this journey of “revitalization.” And as a strong believer, he also sees the “many Christian metaphors” of his narrative, including the one tied closely to this holy season.
“While they were not there to witness me getting a new heart,” Petit points out, “people believe I got one because they have seen me before and after.”
Petit has referred to his story as the “parable of a broken heart,” a message of faith and hope he continues to share with others, not just those going through similar issues of the heart but to all Christians, no matter where they are in their personal journeys.
“People are struggling every day of the year,” says Petit. “That is my mission – to help them be more contagious with the Gospel, to feed on it rather than just refer to it.”
“Without a doubt he has touched a lot of people,” insists Schoof. “Joe is gifted in so many ways. He is an extrovert and creative thinker” as well as an accomplished musician.
Skilled on the keyboard, guitar and as a vocalist, for 30 years Petit toured internationally and recorded with Sacred Warrior, one of the first Christian heavy metal bands. In fact, there is speculation that his coronary problem is related to a 2009 trip to Puerto Rico, where he and the band’s drummer, who also eventually had a heart transplant, came down with strep-like symptoms.
“There is a reason I’m still alive,” Petit tells me. “I have a purpose, not a job description.”
Speaking of which, when he’s not doing gigs with current band Sonic Sanctuary or leading music and/or worship at Warehouse and other Aurora churches, Petit operates his home-based T-shirt business. At one time, he had the idea of “making parables and connecting the dots” via his mission by taking wife Amy and their three also musically-inclined children – now ages 28, 25 and 14 – on the road.
These days, however, he’s leaning toward a podcast, no doubt one that would contain plenty of humor because that’s how Petit, who also “likes to study comedy,” sees life.
“Some say I’ve become more serious after the transplant. Others say I’m even cornier … I’m always ready with a modern-day parable and a dad joke,” he quips.
One thing Petit does not make light of, however, are the challenges, including suffering, that even the most faithful will encounter on their own road to new life.
“What was a horrible day for my donor’s family was a great day for my family,” he points out. “Now I live my life looking for and pointing out the sharable good news in everybody’s story.”
dcrosby@tribpub.com
