After an accident on a radio tower, Federico Magbanua went on to inspire a generation of pastors in the Philippines.
When the late Federico “Fred” Mission Magbanua Jr. preached a radio sermon on offering one’s body as a living sacrifice, he probably didn’t imagine he’d one day hear these words again as a 10,000-watt radio frequency current surged through him in a near-death accident.
It happened one night in early 1961, while Magbanua was working at the Far East Broadcasting Company (FEBC) gospel radio ministry. He was mulling over a job offer in the United States with a salary far greater than what he currently made as an FEBC engineer and as a pastor of a small Baptist church.
Suddenly, the warning lights on the 308-foot radio tower went out. Magbanua loaded some new bulbs into a bag and began climbing the structure. From his home nearby, his daughters and his wife, Aliw, watched him scale the tower.
What Magbanua didn’t realize was that the grounding system—which diverts energy to the ground to prevent surges—wasn’t working. A radio frequency current “hit his head using his body as a lightning rod,” his friend Harold Sala later told God Reports. “Literally, he was being executed by the tremendous surge of electrical power.”
The program that was airing at that moment was one that Magbanua himself had hosted on Romans 12:1–2. “Through the sparking, he heard his own voice in his head saying, ‘Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice,’” recounted former FEBC head Dan Andrew Cura.
Miraculously, Magbanua was released by the current and fell to a step that was several feet from the top of the tower instead of falling 300 feet to the ground. He managed to climb down the ladder …
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