Do you feel like manna from heaven?

Are you ready to fall from the sky inside your heart into the hands of real need?

Unless the Heart of Virginia Free Clinic receives sufficient funding right here and right now, it faces closure in December. A miracle of giving is needed to continue this crucial ministry of providing primary medical care in our community, one that in a very short time has proven its value to those it serves.

In the organization's recent newsletter, Reverend Sylvia S. Meadows, president of the free clinic's board of directors, writes, “For this ministry to continue, your support needs to continue. Without prayer, volunteers, and contributions, our patients will no longer receive these vital services. Please join me in keeping the clinic in your prayers. Please volunteer your gifts of time and talents that are appropriate for the functioning of the clinic. Please help us by sharing your financial gifts and helping to spread the word to others who might be able to contribute.

“We have been blessed again and again,” Rev. Meadows writes, “with what we have come to refer to as 'manna' from heaven. So often our needs have been provided at just the right time. The blessing of this has been visible and celebrated.”

Just the right time is now, and it has never been more just the right time than it is now.

The free clinic's “biggest need at this time is to establish regular means of financial support,” Rev. Meadows explains, “for the fruitful operation of the clinic into a sustainable future.”

And all of this is for whom?

People just like you and me who are either not offered medical insurance where they work or cannot afford it.

The clinic's patients have included folks with these jobs:

Farmer.

Nurse's aide.

Secretary.

Landfill attendant.

Waitress.

Cook.

Minister.

Handyman.

Truck driver.

Store clerk.

Van driver.

Day care provider.

Laid off factory worker.

Teacher's aide.

Logger.

Those occupations were listed one to a line intentionally, rather than one after another, to ensure they stand out, stand on their own. Each one of those occupations is more than a word, more than a sentence, more than a paragraph.

Each one of those occupations is a human being.

Each one of those occupations is a lifetime.

And there so many other people sharing our streets and sidewalks. People who say their prayers each night beneath the same stars shining over our own prayers. To gain greater insight into the clinic's human impact, please read Marge Swayne's front page story in today's issue.

The Heart of Virginia Free Clinic at the intersection of Third and Main Streets in Farmville serves people who have a job or those who've been unemployed less than six months, are between the ages of 18 and 64, with eligibility determined by the Federal Poverty Level Guidelines.

There but for the grace of God go us.

So let us be the arms of God's grace to them, reaching God's love for us all into the world that is at our fingertips.

There through the grace of God, and our own willing hearts, go us toward them. There we go to become manna from heaven for the Heart of Virginia Free Clinic.

We can do this.

And without difficulty.

Miracles like saving the free clinic, when we act together for goodness, are really quite easy.

$4 buys a 30-day prescription for one medicine for one patient.

$10 buys a 90-day prescription for one medicine for one patient.

$500 covers the cost of the free clinic's utilities for one month.

$1,000 pays for a one-year membership to Rx Partnerships, which will provide access to many free medicines for its pharmacy.

$5,000 provides the match for a $5,000 challenge gift offered to fund creation of a new dental clinic.

Manna is manna, no matter what size. Whatever each of us can do, let us do now.

(Donations can be mailed to the Heart of Virginia Free Clinic, P.O. Box 142, Farmville, VA, 23901. Make checks payable to the Heart of Virginia Free Clinic)

-JKW-