Program History

The decision to launch the Healthy Vessels began in the fall of 2008.  Jim Williamson was a former high school distance runner.  He was the school record holder in the mile run, district champion in the half-mile run and unofficial national high school record holder in the 50 mile run.  In college he ran cross country and placed in an AAU marathon run (26.2 miles).   He coached one of his daughters to an age-group national record performance in the half-marathon and coached another daughter to an individual national title in a decathlon type competition.    He had worked as an athletic coach in basketball, track & field, wrestling, cross country and golf.  As an adult he was the player coach of a men’s softball team that was state champions in Ohio and placed 6^th in the national tournament.  He was the city homerun derby champion.  Other than a near death experience at birth, Jim had been healthy most of his life.

For many years he was free of any apparent health problems.  However, like many adults in the United States, he allowed himself to drift into the unhealthy eating and drinking habits that are so prominent in our culture.  He went from a 6’3” 147 pound high school distance runner to a 232 pound couch potato.  Then in the year 2000, Jim experienced a number of symptoms which caused him to make 66 separate appointments to a doctor, hospital or health care facility.  This experience forced him to take a closer look at his personal habits.  He wondered whether it was just the result of getting older or did it have more to do with his personal habits.  This reflection drove him to spend extensive time researching a variety of health issues and healthy practices.  This research led him to believe that his personal health habits may be responsible for the decline of his health.  Jim decided to make some radical changes in both his eating and exercise habits.  His plan was to implement new habits for a 12-week period of time and then assess whether it made an impact on his health.  His 12-week experiment ended on April 15, 2001.  The results were remarkable.  In just 12-weeks he had lost 46 pounds and he had other health improvements.  His experiment did not stop after 12-weeks.  The practices that he began in 2001 have allowed him to be free of illness and disease for more than 9 years—no colds, flu or sickness.

In November of 2008, Jim met with the pastor Walt Sheppard at Cornerstone Baptist Church in Findlay, Ohio to discuss potential areas for personal church service.  During this meeting Jim showed the pastor the before and after pictures from his initial 12-week transformation.  The pastor was impressed with the visual change and asked Jim if he could help him with a health program.  Jim put the pastor on a program similar to what he had followed for 12 weeks and monitored his progress.  Pastor Walt lost 37 pounds and went from 224 pounds at 6’2” to a fit 187 pounds.  During the 12-weeks Jim and the pastor began to discuss the value of developing a 12-week class at Cornerstone Baptist church to help others with physical health issues.  Jim told the pastor that he believed that he could develop such a program.  Our first class began in February, 2009.  We followed up that class with two more 12-week sessions at Cornerstone Baptist Church and then held a 12-week class at Tri-City Baptist Church in Port Charlotte, Florida in 2010.  The results have been very good.  Members of the Healthy Vessels classes lost more than 1,000 pounds of unhealthy body weight and lost the need for many prescription drugs.  We have documented many health improvements by enrollees and we have a very extensive list of health improvements.

We have just started to develop a more extensive outreach program.  As the word spreads regarding the health benefits that can occur we are making plans to expand this ministry to other churches, organizations and individuals.