Testimony of Sharon & Raymond Bland (12/05/2021)

So like I told you guys a couple of minutes ago, we are doing something a little bit different today. Dad had asked previously for basically just to give the opportunity for anyone who would like to come up and share a testimony, if they feel led to do so, to come and share with everybody, not only our church family here.

Of course, we have some church family online as well. And some newer members that don't yet know, you know, a lot of us that have been here for a while.

Now, for starters, I'm going to invite the Blands to come up first. Of course, the Blands have been with us my entire life and even beyond, you know, 30 years.

That's incredible. They used to babysit not only me, but also my older siblings before me. And so they are absolutely family in every sense of the word.

So y 'all come on up and I'm looking forward to sharing. Good morning, everybody.

I'm just going to tell you up around here what I learned in 2010 about prayer.

You never pray to God for what you want. He's not going to give you what you want business.

You pray for being blessed and he'll bless you for the blessing that you ask for. And at the end of this story,

I'll show you what I mean. In 2010, I got out of bed that morning and my shoulder here was sore.

My arm had a little ache in it. For me, that's not unusual because I do so much work in the yard and whatever.

So I go in and rub it good with icy hot. That's what you're supposed to do. Well, it just rocked on.

And each day it got just a little worse. We went on a cruise vacation. It was right after Thanksgiving for Christmas cruise.

And it hurt the whole cruise, but not enough that I didn't enjoy myself. So we got back from the cruise and went on through Christmas.

And right after Christmas, it was really hurting. So I decided I need to go have it checked. I went to my family doctor and he said, let me take some x -rays of your shoulder.

So he did and he came back and told me, he said, I can't see anything wrong with your shoulder because all

I can see is bone. And he matched on the top and asked me, did that hurt?

And I told him it sure did. And he said, I believe you got a torn rotator cuff.

So he gave me a shot of cortisone and told me, he said, you'll hurt tonight, but you'll feel all right tomorrow.

Well, was he ever wrong? Because next day it was really hurting.

But I didn't pay that much attention to it because I said, maybe it takes a little longer to work on some people than it does others.

So I went on Saturday and it was worse. Sunday was real bad. And Monday, I could not stand to touch my own arm.

So I called up and told him I need to see the doctor. And I went back to my family doctor and he looked at it.

And he said, there's more wrong than I can see. He said, you need to see a surgeon. So I said,

OK. He said, my secretary nurse will get you an appointment with the surgeon,

Dr. Malone. So I went to see Dr. Malone. Finally got the appointment for Thursday of that week and I suffered it out

Thursday. And went and he did the same thing. He took x -rays and he said,

I can't see anything wrong, but I need to have an MRI done.

So I said, all right. And he said, my nurse will have you and set up.

So I went out and she called over to the hospital. This is where it starts getting interesting.

They could not give me an MRI for at least 10 days.

They were so busy. So I said, well, I'll just have to tough it out. So me and my wife, we went and got in the car.

This was on. She told me whenever I did get the MRI to call her and she'd set my appointment back up.

This was on Thursday. We got in the car and I caught her hand and we prayed.

Told the Lord that I need to be blessed with something to done to have this MRI. So we lived about 10 minutes from the hospital to my house.

So we got home and opened the door and the phone was ringing. And she answered it and it was the hospital.

Said, we have an appointment in the morning for 9 o 'clock. Cancellation if you want it. So we went and got it.

And we took call to the office and told them. She said, well, they won't read it till Monday. And we'll get it over here

Tuesday and I'll make you an appointment. Which she did. And we went and Dr.

Malone looked at it. He said, what I see is you've got a bone spur and tore muscle in your shoulder.

Now he said, I can do this next surgery on it next Tuesday. But I'm not a shoulder doctor.

He said, I'm a hip and knee doctor. And he said, most of my shoulders, I send to an expert in Tyler, Dr.

Deviney. He does all the shoulder work for the major base football and baseball teams and schools.

So we thought about it and since he put it that way, I told him we would go see the surgeon in Tyler.

So they made an appointment seven days. So I get over there in seven days and Dr.

Deviney, I went in. And at this time, my shoulder was really hurting. They took me into a room and he had a machine in there that they got, finally got me in that took pictures.

And out, when we got through, it took me down to his room. And he finally came in and looked at it.

And he said, well, he said, my MRI is a lot different than theirs. He said, you,

I had a knot right here. He said, that knot is your shoulder. He said, it's out of socket.

He said, we'd had, I'm going to go in there, it's pushed out by scar tissue, scrape it out, put your shoulder back up there, screw it together.

And I don't know how to replace the muscle until we get in there. I said, okay.

And he looked and he said, I'm going to give you some powerful drugs. He said,

I can't do this. It was 14 days. So these are,

I figured this out, this is God's day, 7 and 14. And anyway, we came back home and Richard said the same prayer.

If he didn't want to put anybody out, but they could work me in earlier, I would appreciate it, you know.

And we said that night and the next day, the phone rang. It was East Texas Medical call.

And she said, the surgery that you're going to have to have is so bad that you're going to have to be pre -opted.

And so they had a Dr. Wee and Tyler. I had to go be pre -opted. So called her up, went to her for 7 days.

It was going to take 2 days to do it. So why don't we go over and we do the stress test and all of this.

And she gets it done and she said, well, it looks good. But since you had artery surgery on this, carotid artery,

I'm going to have to have you have it checked by the hospital to see if you got it anywhere else before you can have this surgery.

Well, I went and had it checked. And when he got through the next day, the hospital, he said,

Dr. Wee needs to talk to you on the phone. So I go in his office and she says that 72 % blockage is when we say you need surgery.

So we're seeing 78 in your neck on this side. Since you had it here, we decided until you have this fixed, we're not going to let you have your shoulder surgery.

Okay. So she said, there's a surgeon here that does that and he's the best.

She said, you can have it done here or you can have it done in Coors County. I said, well, let us have it done here and that way all doctors will be right here.

So I go to his office and he, the surgeon, talked to us real nice.

He said, I can do it, but it'd be about seven days. We want to get you. So, okay.

So we go over there seven days and go into surgery. And he said, most of this

I can do in just a little while. But they kept me two and a half, three hours in surgery.

And when I come out, I could tell they was trying to wake me up, but I wasn't coming out of it just right.

So finally got me awake. And then they admitted me into the hospital for observation.

And I spent the night me and Sharon. And that was a night to remember. They had a sign above my bed, do not touch my left arm.

And it was tied down and this one was tied down with any needle stuck in and I can't sleep on my back. Anyway, the next morning, doctor came in and he asked me how

I felt. I said, I got one of the darndest headaches that I've ever had. He said, that's great.

So glad to hear that. Said, that tells me I did my job right. Well, I figured if I get out of this bed, maybe you'll have a good run around here.

But he said, let me explain what I'm talking about. He said, when I got in your neck, you was 99 % barred.

Your brain was getting 1 % of the blood it needed. He said, when I opened it up. Said, it's like opening up a powerful hose in there.

And it made a headache. It just said, it'll go away. And he said, this bone is sticking out here from death.

He said, right under there, you got an aneurysm about the size of a hen egg. He said,

I cleaned it out and got rid of it too. He said, if that had burst, and I don't know why it hadn't already burst, shutting off that 1%, said it would be innocent death to you.

So that situation saved my life. And I said, well, can

I have my surgery? He said, I'm not going to let you have your surgery until you go to a heart doctor and have your heart checked and check for any other blockage in the rest of your stomach.

Since you had it in these both of these, I would have it elsewhere. So I go to the heart doctor, and he checks me out.

And he said, you look good. But said, I won't know anything unless I do a heart cath. I said,

OK. So we go over, and he does a heart cath on me and tells me that everything looks good.

And can I have my surgery? He said, yes. So in 14 days,

I went back and had my surgery. And it took him about two and a half hours.

And he told me, he said, normally, most shoulder damage he can fix in 25 minutes after you go under.

But said, mine was bad. I was paralyzed, and he got it back up there and put it back in there.

He said, the headache didn't go away. And so it did.

And it just on. And finally, he got my surgery done.

And he told me, that was, it took till June, with all the time that they'd give me, before I could have my surgery, six months to get my heart fixed.

And he told me, he said, you're probably going to need about eight months of exercise to get it back to where you can use it.

Well, I went out to the hospital here. And first thing he wanted me to do was pick up a one ounce weight, which that one ounce weight must have weighed a ton, because I couldn't pick it up.

Well, went on, and he gave me them pain pills.

And he told my wife, she'll tell you. He went on and told her son when he got through with the surgery. He said, he's not being in pain now.

But said, when he comes around tomorrow, you make sure he takes his pill, because he'll be cussing me, because he's going to be in so much pain.

And but anyway, I came to. And next morning, I took one pill, just in case.

And then I went to take him to therapy. I didn't take another pill. And I took two and a half months of therapy.

And they released me. Everything was fine. I never took another pill.

And I told my wife, I said, you know, God answered the simplest prayer that we prayed.

Give me blessing with no pain in my shoulder so I could sleep. That's what we was praying for in church every

Sunday, that he would bless me with no pain so I'd go to sleep. I wasn't sleeping any, and I was just walking around in a zombie.

And I've had no pain since then. I can raise my arms high as the air.

And it went back. I can tell you this story. I went back the second checkup with him.

And he couldn't do it, so his nurse did it, the practitioner. And she came in, and she looked at my chart and said, how's your arm?

I said, well, I can put it back here and picked it up here. She said, oh, wait just a minute.

I got the wrong chart. And she came back to me and said, this is the right chart?

She said, with what you went through, you shouldn't be able to do this. And we came out of the office, and he was coming down the hall and asked me, how could

I lift my arm? I said, about this high. And he said, I won't need to see you for a year.

But anyway, during all this, the heart doctor found I had a weak heartbeat.

My heart would skip a beat. And he said, I need to keep an eye on that.

He said, I want to check you every six months. Well, I went back six months, and he said, it's a little worse.

And I went back another six months. He said, it's a little worse. Then all of a sudden,

I went to losing weight, and I lost 68 pounds in six weeks.

Wasn't trying, and I was still eating my Blue Bell. I don't know.

And I went to my family doctor, and he said, that's too much weight, even if you was trying.

So he sent me to some doctors, and they checked me out and ran all these tests, and they couldn't find anything wrong.

So it come up a few days. I had my doctor appointment with my heart doctor in Tyler.

And I went back. And he called me and Sharon in the office.

He said, now, I'm going to tell you this. He said, the valve in your heart is gone.

He said, that AR valve is done and gone. He said, you don't have to have this surgery if you don't want it.

He said, you might live a year. I said, if we do the surgery, you could live 15.

I said, well, let's do it. I said, I ain't no good at that, you know. So we go over there.

And he had two surgeons in there, and he said, now, if you're still no blockage in your lower abdomen, we can go through the lower part of your stomach up through the valve and drop the heart in, and it be simple surgery.

He said, if you got any blockage, he'll have to cut you open. Well, I didn't have any blockage.

So they went in and put this valve in there. I got the valve out of a cow.

It's either a hog or a cow, but I'm glad I got the cow, you know. And he put me in the hospital.

He said, you have to stay in the hospital for five to seven days. You can't drive for six weeks.

So, OK. They did a surgery and went in and put me in a room.

And they checked my vitals about every 45 minutes to an hour. They never went up.

They were always perfect. And they was that way every day. And come

Friday, the doctor wanted to get another machine to check it, and it checked out perfect, too.

So he said, I'm going to do something tomorrow. If your vitals are still this good,

I'm going to let you go home in two and a half days. He said, that's something

I've never done before. I said, you really have to stay seven. They said, with vitals like you're checking, it's perfect.

And I said, what about driving the car? He said, you can drive home. So I didn't, but he said that.

That is when I learned, whenever we finally got through,

I didn't have anything to appeal. He answered that first prayer, that I had a simple prayer of,

Lord, bless me with some sleep so I can rest. And that was it.

And today, I have no problems with it, and it's doing great. And I just thank the Lord for everything.

So if you want blessing, ask him to bless you, and he'll do it. Thank you. God has blessed me in so many ways that it almost sounds unreal.

Through many prayers and faith, he's healed me and taken care of me, and I give him all the glory for everything.

Whenever there is a storm brewing in my life, I go to him in prayer, and I ask others to pray with me.

Throughout the years, God has answered many prayers on my behalf, and he continues to do so now.

He says when there are two or more gathered, he will hear our prayers and answer them.

And I have learned that he does answer them, but in his own time. In January of 2004,

I was diagnosed with stage 1 lobular breast cancer. I met with Dr.

Kingman, the surgeon, and he told me the best option was for me to have a lumpectomy.

And after I was healed, he would refer me to one of the two oncologists who came here from Dallas.

He said, and I quote, I hope you don't have to have chemo, but I know you will have to have radiation, and I don't know how much he will recommend, but I think it would probably be six weeks.

In February, I met with Dr. Agarwal, the oncologist, and he recommended six months of chemo and 36 radiation treatments.

I would then have to be on an expensive pill called a Remedix for five years.

I had to have labs weekly until I finished both treatments. The morning after each chemo treatment,

I had to have a powerful shot to help with the sickness that occurs after the chemo and to help keep an infection from occurring.

I started radiation immediately as soon as I had the last chemo.

I had to go to Waco every day for that, and since Raymond was on the road all week and at times away for 10 days or longer,

I had to have someone drive me there, back and forth, because of the side effects of radiation.

The Lord has always given me the best of best friends, always.

I've always had the best, and praise the Lord for the wonderful friends I had that chauffeured me there and back every day.

Charlotte, Joy, Jenny, Diane and Clarence, Ann, Gail, Linda, Jada, Adam, and Raymond when he was home off the road.

I had chemo on Thursdays, and just like clockwork, around 2 a .m. the sickness would begin, nausea, headache, weakness, and vomiting.

He wanted me to take my temperature daily to make sure I didn't have fever because that indicated an infection had set in, and then there is always a side effect of some sort.

But I would drag myself out of bed and go to the clinic for that shot, but even with it,

I would still be sick all of Friday, Saturday, and Saturday night. But by the grace of God, on Sunday morning,

I felt just fine and felt normal. I never missed a Sunday of church, and I felt well enough to get up and prepare usually two meals to take to the church for the noon meal.

Now, let's fast forward to 2020. I had been in remission for 16 years.

My yearly mammogram showed a suspicious -looking tumor, and they recommended a biopsy.

I had that done, and the next day the tech called me and said it was benign, but it could and it would usually turn to cancer.

I scheduled another surgery with them and chose Dr. Kristen Birdwell to do surgery.

I went back in three months for a follow -up after the surgery, and there was an area with about 30 clusters of tumors.

I was in shock almost. The first person I called was David Mitchell, and I asked him to pray for me.

I knew he would, and for some reason I always felt better after I talked with him.

Not only was he my pastor, but a close friend too, and it just seemed like his words of wisdom was what

I needed to hear. He has been with Raymond and me through many of our major surgeries and was with us when

I went in for that surgery. I was diagnosed with stage 0 carcinoma in SOTSU, and after six weeks saw

Dr. Agarwal. He had all my tests, the surgeon's letters and notes, the copies of the mammograms, and he had studied all of them.

After my examination with him, he said, I am going to order six weeks of radiation and chemo.

My heart sank as we had prayed so hard since surgery that there would be no chemo.

Before I left, I timidly asked him how much chemo I would have to have, and he said none.

I said, well, I understood you to say six weeks of radiation and chemo, and he said no.

I said six weeks of radiation and no chemo because you did not have cancer.

It was pre -cancerous, and it's gone now. I couldn't believe it.

When we walked out of the doctor's office, Raymond said, I told you it would be a good diagnosis because I gave it to the

Lord and asked him to heal you. I had finally just about quit worrying about anything, but I do tell

God my concerns and let him take care of any situation that arises. I had always had a fear of dying, and truthfully,

I still fear it a little bit. After each little setback or surgery or cancer diagnosis,

I always thought God may be ready for me to be with him. But here I am today.

I'm still here. Evidently, someone up there loves me or someone up there doesn't want me.

I don't know which, one of the two. But don't ever ask me if I'm ready for heaven.

Instead, ask if heaven is ready for me, and all the jokes I'll be telling when

I get there. Thank you. Well, there's a couple of crazy things about that.

The first one, over the last 26 years, this isn't the first time

I've heard the Blands give a testimony. The crazy thing is that they could literally probably come up here for several weeks in a row and give a totally different testimony, just as incredible as that.

I mean, Brother Raymond has shared some things. And Ms. Sharon mentioned a second ago that in 2004, there were times where Brother Raymond would be on the road for 10 days at a time.

He was a truck driver. And so, you know, he had a very demanding job for many, many years.

And sometimes on the road would experience incredible things that only would have been of the

Lord. And so it's amazing how many testimonies they could share on any given Sunday, and they would be just as uplifting and crazy.

But the other thing I wanted to mention is, so like you told the story about 2004, you told the story about your shoulder 2010.

I can remember those, like I can remember them happening. I can remember hearing about them and, you know, mom and dad saying we needed to pray for the

Blands, for Brother Raymond and for Ms. Sharon. What's really crazy, though, and I mean, 2004,

I would have been nine years old, 2010, 15. Like when we would see you guys as kids, we'd never, like we knew if we needed to be praying for you guys, we never understood, at least

I never understood the severity of what you guys were going through. And the reason was because at no point did you guys lose your joy, your faith, you know, y 'all's testimony, y 'all would, like Ms.

Sharon said, she came to Sunday every, to church every Sunday, even during that incredibly tough time in 2004.

And once again, I can remember the prayer request. I remember us talking about it, but you were always Ms. Sharon. And so, you know,

Sunday school this morning, Brother Bill was talking about, you know, Jesus giving us the example and he gave a specific, it was in First Peter.

He was he was talking about a specific example that Jesus set for us. But to preface it,

Brother Bill mentioned how many examples he set for us. And through those examples, you guys have lived your lives by those examples and then in turn set the example for us.

So, I mean, it is just so crazy. Again, you guys practically raised me. And so these kind of stories,

I mean, they really they're really, really special. So I appreciate you guys sharing and so glad everyone else got to hear them.