I started listening to some of the Focus on the Family broadcasts when I was in high school, and Dr. Dobson was advocating homeschooling and a book by Raymond and Dorothy Moore called Better Late Than Early. It made an impression on me. As a result of this, my children were homeschooled and did very well academically, thanks to that influence. I met Dr. Dobson when I was 27 years old and had challenged him to a basketball game. When I arrived, I was the only African-American there. He sought me out to come down to his court and play the next game. (I remember thinking that I don’t think I would have had the character to interrupt my game to reach out to someone else who had walked into my church gymnasium and was a stranger.) He didn’t know that I was the physician who had challenged him. It told me that he was not prejudiced. Later, he invited me to interview/participate in his Physician’s Advisory Council. We shared stories about personal heart attacks. When he called me after his heart attack, somehow he found me even though I was working in the ICU, at the naval hospital in Guam. Some years later, when I had a heart attack, I had a chance to speak to him, even though he was on a writing trip and didn’t normally take phone calls during that time. I shared with him a book called Reversing Your Heart Disease by Dr. Dean Ornish. I think it may have been a factor in the fact that he became vegetarian. I believe that it extended his life. Long before some people had accused him of only being concerned about unborn babies, and not children who were already here, Jim and Shirley demonstrated love and caring by adopting Ryan. And this was also before starting a program that recommended that churches should adopt kids out of the foster care system. Once when I was meeting with him in his office about a serious personal issue, he received a phone call from Ryan and told his secretary that, unless it was an emergency, he would have to call him back. That he would give me the priority of the moment, despite a phone call from his son, told me a lot about his character. When we had a physician’s conference, and a group that I sang with gave a concert of hymns and African-American spirituals, he asked us privately to sing one of the songs again, and he sang with us. We shared these and other memories. May God bless Shirley, Ryan, and Danae as they deal with this tremendous loss. We can all thank God that we can look forward to heaven where we will not suffer these losses.
PreviousNo one influenced my parenting more than Dr James Dobson. He spoke of the beauty of parenting so highly that we believed it truly was our highest calling. The joy in raising my three beautiful daughters to know and love the Lord was a heartfelt result of all the time Dr. Dobson poured into us sometimes-tired moms through his wonderful books and radio shows when we had little ones. He always reminded us that the years fly by and to enjoy the childhood years. He helped me realize I had the rest of my life to work outside the home, but my children only had one childhood, and I could not get the years back. I left my job in corporate America, working in management for a high tech company, and I never looked back. Every sacrifice we made God more than made up for over the years. Today, my daughters love the Lord, and they are not afraid to stand for God’s priceless truth in this darkened world. Praise be to God for men like Dr. James Dobson! I prayed for his safety and the safety of his family over the years as he was willing to stand for truth no matter the personal cost. He was an enormous hero of the faith, a man I have greatly admired, and who is already missed more than words can say. But because of his commitment to writing down what God led him to, future generations will be able to benefit, as my family did. I am praying for you, Shirley, and your entire family as you mourn so great a loss. You are a beautiful and loved family!
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