All Saints, 2011 Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ, The number of hands and hearts involved in Health Ministries is amazing. I share below some excerpts of correspondence among dental clinic volunteers. One dentist wrote to his colleagues:  "… I began working the second Saturday of every month for a half day. I just did my sixth month and am slated to do up to six this coming year.  It is a great feeling to be able to serve those in need.  We owe it to them and to our profession. Last weekend I was there and saw 8 patients.  I did 3 fillings and took out 6 or so teeth. ..With the clinics that are running every other Friday already at the Church, you have the ability to prescribe an antibiotic to relieve swelling until the next clinic session, should you not be comfortable in doing what is needing done. …There is nothing more gratifying than walking in at 8:45 to a full waiting room of smiling faces anxious for your services. And the feeling you have walking out is even better than that! Please help. These Saturday hours need to continue. They must continue.  It is all the underserved of Harrisburg have. They are relying on us for their care.  Step up and volunteer.  … I guarantee once you do it one time you will want to go back. You will hear the calling to return." And a co-worker of that dentist wrote to him:  "…What I get the full benefit of, that you might not, are the various stories shared by the patients as they arrive or wait, like tales of desperation that drove a person to come very early in the morning to assure themselves of a chance to be seen. One man said when he'd come for an emergency dental problem 2 years ago, he'd arrived at 4:30AM and sat on the church steps. His fear of the neighborhood at that hour warred with his dental pain. This Saturday, with it being so bitterly cold and him being 2 years further into middle age, he waited until 6 before he showed up. The young mother with the terrible infection was so grateful. When she asked for paper and pencil, I thought it was to write down the post-op directions you'd given her. Instead, it was to scrawl you a heartfelt blessing and note of thanks. The way she labored over it showed that she was at the edge of her literacy skills. "Please make sure you give this to him," she urged. The large man with a clear intellectual disability had a broken tooth, which you addressed. Did you know that he is the grandson, also companion and caretaker, of that very old man with the cowboy hat you also treated? What a combination they were: the old man's brains and judgment, the young man's brawn. I wonder how one will do without the other, but how they grace each other right now. And how about that crippled man who dragged himself over 5 blocks in the icy wind, struggling to avoid the cold touching his broken front tooth? I'm so glad we had the chair lift for him, but he was determined to crawl up those stairs, if he had to. Those are just 4 poor souls off the top of my head that were in trouble and had no place else to turn. Your skill and your time made a difference. I love seeing how relaxed people look when they come back down stairs. Cheeks stuffed with gauze, spitting -and pulling their coats and gloves back on, relieved and with a happy heart. By the way, in the course of holding dental clinic Saturday, we were able to identify and remedy one child and one adult who did not own a hat or gloves. Imagine that, in the cold of that day." Can there be any better use for the Lord's house? Love, Pastor Jody