Employing the Power of Prayer!

As I have said many times in the past, prayers requests are always welcome on my radio show. I also plan to use this blog spot to address needs for prayer in our community. I would like to request your prayers for several folks in our community who are facing health issues.

I was shocked and saddened to learn on my radio show this morning that one of Patrick County's finest public servants, Buddy Dollarhite, has been diagnosed with leukemia and is undergoing treatment at Wake Forest University Baptist Medical Center in Winston-Salem. His tearful mother, Ola Dollarhite, told my radio audience this morning that Buddy learned of his disease Tuesday and was hospitalized immediately.

Buddy is one of the most humble, kind, and community-involved persons in our community through his job as manager of Lowe's Foods, his position as chief of the Stuart Volunteer Fire Department, and as a supporter of many worthwhile community causes, including Patrick County United Fund and others. Buddy has never sought any personal glory for what he does for our community. He simply works tirelessly outside the glow of the limelight to make our community a better place in which to live and a safer one too. Buddy is a community treasure indeed.

I am so sorry to hear this distressing news of Buddy's illness. However, I am encouraged that God responds to our prayers and that "all things work together for good" to those who place their faith and trust in him.

Please lift Buddy up to our Heavenly Father asking that God bless him, his mother Ola, and his family, and that the Lord will give his physicians the knowledge and skill to care for him and nurse him back to good health.

If you would like to send him a card, you may bring them to Donna Rogers, secretary at Stuart United Methodist Church from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. daily. You may also send them directly to the hospital: WFUBMC, Medical Center Blvd., Winston-Salem, NC 27157, Attn: 9 Reynolds, Buddy Dollarhite. Thank your for your prayers for Buddy and his family, your cards, and other kindnesses that you feel led to offer him during this time of uncertainty in his life.

I would also like to convey to you a request for prayer from my friend Sandra Health. She made this prayer request known to me in a nice letter that accompanied a very thoughtful Christmas card from her family to me.

At age 38, a wife and young mother of boys, ages 4 and 1, Sandra was diagnosed with "DCIS Stage 0 breast cancer" in October. She had surgery last month to remove cancer cells, tissue and 3 sentinel nodes. The pathology report, Sandra said in her letter, "showed that it had moved out of the milk duct and a small cell was found in tissue and in 1 of the sentinel nodes, therefore it is Stage II now."

Sandra has surgery scheduled for Thursday, Dec. 6 at 11 a.m. to remove lymph nodes and more tissue to be sure that it hasn't moved thus far. Sandra noted that she will still have to have chemotherapy (probably beginning in January) no matter what the results are. "I am trying to maintain a positive attitude and have a great support system around me. Let's all pray that Sandra will have a "Praise Report" next week following her surgery and pathology report.

Sandra asked me to let everyone know that she would like special prayer sent up for her, the surgeon, and that the pathology report comes back "clear." "I would like to thank everyone for their thoughts, prayers, cards, calls and visits," said Sandra.

Both Sandra and Buddy relatively young community leaders who are in the prime of their lives and their careers. I am sure that God is working through them and others like them to accomplish His will and to bring overall good to our community. We can all draw inspiration from their courage and determination to defeat their diseases and resume their normal lives. Please keep both Sandra and Buddy in your prayers. God bless you both!

If you too would like to enlist the priceless resource of a caring community to put up a "wall of prayer" around others like Sandra and Buddy, please contact me. You may call me at the station at (276) 694-3114 or at home at 694-7856. My email address is rrogers@sitestar.net This blog and my radio show are both avenues that I invite everyone in our community to use in "employing the power of prayer"!

Proud of Patrick,
Richard

PS: Again I would like to ask you to pray for Winnie Smith who will also undergo surgery Thursday, Dec. 6, in connection with the broken ankle she sustained recently while stepping off her porch.

PSS: Keep me in your prayers too, asking that God will guide and direct me and strengthen my faith.