Rick: I'm a father of eight children. I've been married for 46 years. I married my high school sweetheart. We met on the beach, Pensacola Beach.
My wife and I have been in ministry now for 35 years. Our children have grown up in the midst of a soup kitchen and a homeless shelter. And it started out of a restaurant that I owned back in 1983. We started serving soup and sandwiches to anybody that came in after we closed the business in the afternoon. And it grew into a ministry now that comprises five different segments. We still have our soup kitchen and we also have an emergency family shelter. We have a transitional housing program, and a parenting center, and a thrift store that helps support all of that.
I decided to look for an alternative to healthcare because my premiums went up and heard about Christian Care/Medi-Share and investigated and decided it was the right choice for us. What was appealing to me about Christian Care/Medi-Share was the concept, the biblical concept of sharing one another's needs. But I have to confess also there was a substantial reduction in the amount of money I was having to pay compared to what I had paid when I had a health policy through one of the major health providers at that time.
Judah: I went to the doctors to get a checkup and I was telling them I have some problem with my knees and they took some different scans, CAT scans and X-rays and all that, and found out that the muscles around my knee were really weak and they didn't know why. So they decided to take some blood tests and they found out that there's a couple of things missing, took a X-ray of my brain and found out that there's tumor there.
Pam: We weren't prepared for that. I mentally had not even given it a consideration.
Judah: It was a little crazy. I didn't really know how to handle it at first. And then you deal with it and give it to God and let what happen happens.
Rick: It was very frightening to... You don't know. I trust the Lord, but we do die, and didn't know whether this was the time that the Lord was going to take our son from us or not.
Pam: And I said, Judah, you've been in boot camp for this all of your life. You know the Word. You know what God can do. And so the only thing we're going to entertain is God's Word and his promises. And he's going to get us through this one day at a time.
Rick: When your children have a serious diagnosis like that, you kind of forget about the monetary aspect of things, and you want to find whoever the best is it at taking care of it.
Judah: It was only about two months from the time that we found out to the time that we went to Boston and had the surgery done.
Out of surgery I was feeling pretty weak. Couldn't even lift my head for the first couple of days after I was awake and didn't eat too much. And then just slowly started getting my strength back.
Rick: We grew a lot spiritually during that time and learned to turn it over to the Lord.
Judah: One of the nicest things I got was a knit blanket from a couple of ladies who are a part of Christian Care /Medi-Share. They sent it to me just to let me know that they were thinking about me.
Pam: Just atypical of any other kind of medical insurance company that would be that caring. And I feel their compassion when I talk to them on the phone and not only have they met our financial needs, but they've also helped her emotional needs.
Rick: Judah, his costs were in the neighborhood, I guess, of over $200,000. And again, the members shared all of those costs.
Judah: When I found out that the tumor was all gone, I was very excited. No more surgeries. No more worrying about what was going to happen.
Pam: Medi-Share is amazing, and I tell everyone that will listen that I have an opportunity to, about Medi-Share. I think it's the best decision that anyone can make for their family in terms of healthcare options.
Rick: We've been members of Christian Care/Medi-Share now for 19 years, a wonderful experience too.
