Don Wildmon

AFA/AFR founder

November-December 1994 – Some time ago I included in one of my mailings the story of how Thomas Carlyle ignored his wife and spent little time with her while she was alive. After she died, he suffered greatly because of his inattention to her.

In response to that article, I recently received the following letter. I want to share it with you.

Dear Dr. Wildmon,

I’ve just finished reading an article you wrote which was published in Bro. Royce Thomason’s paper “The Voice in the Wilderness.”

The article was horribly sad. It was about poor Thomas Carlyle and his shortsightedness about his dying wife.

How heart-wrenching and tormenting the remainder of his life must have been. But Dr., I’m glad it doesn’t have to be that way.

As I was reading this article, tears of sadness and yet of joy burned in my eyes for, you see, I was at my dying wife’s side when I read this sad account. Yes, she has cancer, and without a miracle from God she will soon pass into the next world.

Last week I did not work at all. This week I’m working half days just so that I may be at her side. I told my pastor today that even the loss of my job will not keep me from her.

Life is short, as the saying goes, but misery and regret can seem as an eternity.

I’m so thankful for these precious moments we have together right now. So sweet and comforting are her words of “I love you” and “You’ve been so good to me.” Together we comfort each other.

Dr. Wildmon, I am only 35 years old. We’ve been married 13 years. How true is the scripture that says the husband and the wife become one flesh.

Also Dr., seven years ago we lost a precious six-year-old daughter to cancer. I was able to spend the last seven weeks of her life right at her side without having to work but two days. How sweet, how priceless were those days. We pushed two beds together each night for seven weeks. On her last night, she did not want to sleep in the beds but rather on the sofa. I slept beside the sofa on the floor and at about 2:00 a.m. her feeble voice woke me as she slipped into a coma. The end followed shortly.

Somewhere along my life’s path, God allowed me to learn the lesson that Thomas Carlyle waited too long to learn.

I’m so glad I can look back on my daughter’s and, yes, possibly upon my wife’s most trying times and know that at least in the area of “quality time” I will have no regrets. Maybe it was a similar article that helped to establish my pathway. I hope the sobering truths of this article may direct some unwary lives before it’s too late.

God bless you, Dr. Wildmon.

Rick Welch

Thank you, Rick, for helping us keep our perspective and better understand what our fight is all about.