If you are a praying person ...

• O-Trap

  

  I'd ask you to say a prayer tonight for Dr. David Plaster.
  
  Dr. Plaster is the senior pastor of the Worthington GBC, but to thousands of people, he's been more.
  
  You see, Dave was a long-time professor and dean at Grace College & Theological Seminary, from which I personally received my Bachelors degree. He also took numerous trips to Africa, where he spent months at a time teaching locals how to speak English (and where he contracted malaria three separate times).
  
  Dr. Plaster (or "the Oppressor Professor" as we called him on account of his brutal multiple choice exams) was my mentor while in college.
  
  When I got back to Grace after a year at Akron, I was an atheist with a chip on his shoulder. I'd regularly get into discussions with people in hopes of proving what lunacy Christianity was, because I'd never heard ANYONE be able to handle themselves logically while professing any sort of Christian view.
  
  Enter Dave, a short, stocky Welshman with an amazing heart and an amazing mind. Dave and I started meeting once a week on Wednesday nights in my dorm room. I would bounce questions and honest reservations I had with Christianity off of him, a professor in the Religious Studies department. He handled them with an amazing balance of wit, honesty, and understanding. I didn't get any of the "caca del toro" answers from him that I used to get from many pastors and Sunday school teachers. I got answers from a man who had not learned what to think, but a man who had truly learned HOW to think.
  
  And over the years, that was what he instilled in me. As we would meet, he would never force my thinking in any direction, but if there was ever a weakness in my thought process, he'd bring it up, and force me to either defend it or rethink it.
  
  Dr. Plaster was probably as big an influence as anybody in my development as a thinker and as a person.
  
  Over the last month, however, he has been hospitalized for numbness and loss of function in his legs, face, and brain. The doctors are saying it is an infection that may have been the result of some damage that his malaria medicine has caused.
  
  This morning, the doctors labeled him terminal. He is at the Cleveland Clinic, and I am hoping to visit him on Saturday if he makes it that long.
  
  This man has meant more to me than any other man in my life, save my father and grandfather. I am a mess right now, and I hate this.
  
  So, if you pray, please do for his family at least. They've all gathered from all over the world (as far as France, where his son is a missionary), and it's really not looking good.
  
  My biggest reservation to going is that I'm going to have to see what this infection has done to his brain, which once housed such an inspiring and insightful mind. I don't know that I can bear seeing him reduced to such a state.
  
  I know he would be content with being called home to be with his Creator and greatest passion, but I'm not so sure the world is ready to lose such a great man yet.
  
  
• coyotes22

  

  He is in my prayers right now!!
• THE4RINGZ

  

  I will certainly remember him my prayers over the next days. I hope all ends well.
  
  BTW my uncle got his undergrad degree at Grace College in Winona Lake, IN. Is that the same one you attended?
• O-Trap

  

  Yes, the very same. Depending on how old your uncle is, he might have had Dr. Plaster.
• THE4RINGZ

  

  He is probably pushing 70. His degree is in education.
• O-Trap

  

  Nevermind. He might have known Dave as a classmate.
• THE4RINGZ

  

  I am old dude, thus making the generation before me really old.
• coyotes22

  

  THE4RINGZ wrote: I am old dude, thus making the generation before me really old.

  Thats putting it, lightly.
  
  I believe the word ANCIENT comes to mind, when refering to your age?
  
  
• THE4RINGZ

  

  Yeah well everyday I wake up I somehow beat the odds.
• O-Trap

  

  Don't you dare take that for granted, either!
• THE4RINGZ

  

  Oh I don't. Trust me.
• O-Trap

  

  UPDATE: He hasn't said anything for several days, but just a bit ago he told his wife:
  
  "Trust God ... Pray for him to heal me ... we just pray."
• coyotes22

  

  The power of prayer
• O-Trap

  

  coyotes22 wrote: The power of prayer

  Sometimes, I don't know how much good prayer really does.
  
  That's exactly the kind of topic that I used to talk about with him. He was never preachy, and he didn't act like he knew it all, even though sometimes, YOU thought he knew it all when talking to him.
  
  Still, I pray, in hopes that prayer can change or enhance things.
• september63

  

  Ill add him to my prayers. A man like him will have the strength and conviction to pull through.
• Apple

  

  If this man, Dr. Plaster... Dave, helped to bring O-Trap to where he is today as a man, then all huddlers are better because of him.
  
  O-Trap... Consider my thoughts and prayers with you and your wife, Dave and his family.
• O-Trap

  

  If anyone is interested in hearing his last sermon (as he's been the senior pastor at the Columbus GBC for the last couple years):
  
  http://www.gracebrethren.org/mp3s/sermons/01_24_10.mp3
• BigAppleBuckeye

  

  O-Trap wrote: I'd ask you to say a prayer tonight for Dr. David Plaster.
  
  Dr. Plaster is the senior pastor of the Worthington GBC, but to thousands of people, he's been more.
  
  You see, Dave was a long-time professor and dean at Grace College & Theological Seminary, from which I personally received my Bachelors degree. He also took numerous trips to Africa, where he spent months at a time teaching locals how to speak English (and where he contracted malaria three separate times).
  
  Dr. Plaster (or "the Oppressor Professor" as we called him on account of his brutal multiple choice exams) was my mentor while in college.
  
  When I got back to Grace after a year at Akron, I was an atheist with a chip on his shoulder. I'd regularly get into discussions with people in hopes of proving what lunacy Christianity was, because I'd never heard ANYONE be able to handle themselves logically while professing any sort of Christian view.
  
  Enter Dave, a short, stocky Welshman with an amazing heart and an amazing mind. Dave and I started meeting once a week on Wednesday nights in my dorm room. I would bounce questions and honest reservations I had with Christianity off of him, a professor in the Religious Studies department. He handled them with an amazing balance of wit, honesty, and understanding. I didn't get any of the "caca del toro" answers from him that I used to get from many pastors and Sunday school teachers. I got answers from a man who had not learned what to think, but a man who had truly learned HOW to think.
  
  And over the years, that was what he instilled in me. As we would meet, he would never force my thinking in any direction, but if there was ever a weakness in my thought process, he'd bring it up, and force me to either defend it or rethink it.
  
  Dr. Plaster was probably as big an influence as anybody in my development as a thinker and as a person.
  
  Over the last month, however, he has been hospitalized for numbness and loss of function in his legs, face, and brain. The doctors are saying it is an infection that may have been the result of some damage that his malaria medicine has caused.
  
  This morning, the doctors labeled him terminal. He is at the Cleveland Clinic, and I am hoping to visit him on Saturday if he makes it that long.
  
  This man has meant more to me than any other man in my life, save my father and grandfather. I am a mess right now, and I hate this.
  
  So, if you pray, please do for his family at least. They've all gathered from all over the world (as far as France, where his son is a missionary), and it's really not looking good.
  
  My biggest reservation to going is that I'm going to have to see what this infection has done to his brain, which once housed such an inspiring and insightful mind. I don't know that I can bear seeing him reduced to such a state.
  
  I know he would be content with being called home to be with his Creator and greatest passion, but I'm not so sure the world is ready to lose such a great man yet.
  
  

  Nice post O-Trap ... this man obviously touched a lot of lives, including yours. While I am not a Christian, this sounds like a classy man that stood by his faith, but was open to intelligent discussion -- a powerful and admirable trait. My thoughts and prayers go out to him and his family tonight.
• BCBulldog

  

  Prayers that God's will be done and his people be strengthened and encouraged in this ordeal. May he bring Dave, the Plaster family, Otrap and his other friends peace in this time of sadness.
• buckeyefalls

  O-Trap,
  
  Are you currently serving a Grace Brethren church? If so, may I ask where?
  
  I attended communion service at Wooster GBC this past summer and had the opportunity to visit with my ole buddy Dr. Plaster. I wished I lived closer but I make due listening to his messages on CD/internet/etc.
  
  My prayers are with him and the family.
• O-Trap

  

  No, I am not a pastor. I serve in a non-denominational church plant in Akron.
  
  However, I used to attend Wooster GBC, and I've attended a couple of Dr. Plaster's sermons at the Columbus GBC (where he is the senior pastor).
• Scarlet_Buckeye

  

  O-Trap, I will keep Dr. Plaster in my heartfelt prayers. He sounds like a wonderful individual.
  
  O-Trap, from a lot of your posts recently it appears as though you are depressed. If Dr. Plaster should pass, although it will be a sorrowful thing, I want you to remember the lessons you have learned from him to give you strength. You should also remember that he would not want his death to discourage you but rather give you motivation to carry on his memory and his insights in teaching others. Make him proud.
• Salmom

  prayers said O!
• Swamp Fox

  I am so sorry about your friend and mentor. My prayers are on their way.
• O-Trap

  

  Thanks, Salmom. I appreciate it.