WORTHINGTON — A prayer breakfast is planned for Saturday, April 1 at the American Reformed Church at 8 a.m. The keynote speaker is Trenton Bass, who was paralyzed in his senior year of high school at Hills-Beaver Creek during a football game on September 8, 2017 .
“It really took another step after it happened,” said Bass on his faith. “It just really opened my eyes, this God is an awesome god, and he just takes care of you (through) anything that you ask him to.”
Bass works at Raven Industries in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, as a design II engineer, and continues to live in Hills. In 2019, Trenton’s parents Jeff and Missy started the non-profit Game Plan 4 Hope with the mission to assist families whose lives are in despair because of a life-changing event.
“When an accident like this happens a lot of people think it's the end of your life,” said Bass. “That is absolutely not the case. With faith you can find a whole new life and happiness. Life still goes on and you have to make the most of it.”
After Trenton Bass was in his accident, his story spread far across the area through both word of mouth and through social media. Missy Bass said that the nonprofit came about to share with others going through upheaval their story, send care packages and spread their message of hope.
ADVERTISEMENT
“We just try to spread hope that life is not over and that it will all be okay one way or another,” said Missy Bass. “We had gotten a lot of equipment donated to him (Trenton) to use, that he wasn’t able to use. Not all families get that through insurance, so we kept that in storage and are trying to find homes for it.”
Bass lives a fulfilling life. His two older brothers Colton and Dalton live in Hills. He is also an uncle with a 2-year-old niece named Maddie and a four-month-old nephew named Myles. He is able to drive and recently purchased a new vehicle with modifications installed to facilitate his needs. There is a ramp in his car, a driver’s seat that spins around, and gas and brake pedals operated by his left hand. Bass drives to work in downtown Sioux Falls, where his company specializes in agricultural machinery. Trenton also volunteers as a peer mentor for spinal cord injury patients.
“He always has a positive outlook,” said Missy. “Because we don’t know the next person he goes and visits might walk someday and he’s very good about that.”
Bass will give a presentation at the prayer breakfast with good friends Easton Harnack and Luke LaRock on their faith and friendship in adversity, which has been the key to persevering through the life-changing event. Harnack and LaRock were on the Patriots football team with Bass.
“His friends were a key part in just mentally getting through it,” said Missy. “They never changed how they treated him. They included him in everything they did, even if he couldn’t do it. He loved to golf with them and he can’t golf anymore but he can sit in the golf cart, so they’ll lift him and strap him in and he will ride around with them. … That is huge.”
Bass said that through his accident his faith was amplified.
“When my accident happened and when a lot of these accidents happen, you really don’t know what to do,” said Bass. “I had nothing to do, nowhere to turn, and I just began to rely on God. He really just opened my eyes to live as a whole and what it means to be happy and accept the circumstances that we are given.”
“He doesn’t choose to be in the situation,” said Missy Bass. “But he does have a choice every day when he wakes up and he just chooses to be happy. And someday he will walk again whether it's on this earth or after he dies. That is just profound and he has been saying that since he was 17.”
ADVERTISEMENT
Bass does not believe that his accident was a coincidence, or spare a thought to believe that it was avoidable. Bass is firm in his belief that the accident was God’s will for him and if it didn’t happen on the football field, it would have happened another way.
“This has not ruined anything for me, if I could go back I would play football again,” said Bass. “At this point I know that my injury was God’s plan for me and if I wouldn’t have played football I think this accident would have happened another way. It was the plan that God had for me.”
Bass said that the support he received from his community has been unmatched and a great source of strength for him. When he was at the Craig Rehabilitation Hospital in Colorado, with others from big cities who were going through their own time of upheaval, lacked the community support small towns bring.
“We have been very blessed in our communities supporting us,” said Missy Bass. “We just feel like that's God’s work.”
“It was huge for me, there was never a time that I was in the hospital that there weren't like five people in my room,” said Bass. “That encouragement to know that you are never alone, that there are always people encouraging you – that continues to this day.”
The Trust Project
