Chris Bright, my husband of nearly 24 years, is a small church pastor in Lancaster, PA. He planted a church, Lancaster City Assembly, in the spring of 2012 to minister to the needs of the inner-city neighborhoods of southern Lancaster city. He has never taken a salary from the church and, to be available to his people, he only worked part-time at outside jobs for a couple of years before becoming a pastor full-time in 2014.
He was in his 2nd year of seminary working on his Masters of Divinity degree when we found out that he had Stage 4 End Stage Renal Disease. This quickly became Stage 5 in the Fall of 2017, and he was accepted on the kidney transplant list at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia in December 2017. Since then, it has been almost a year and a half of doctor’s appointments, lab tests, trips to and from Philly to meet with the transplant team, local ER visits and hospital stays, in-home dialysis, and now in-center dialysis–all with the goal of getting a kidney transplant.
When the transplant comes through, he will need to be in the hospital in Philadelphia 1 – 2 weeks, then he will need to see the transplant team doctors 3 times a week in Philadelphia for another 4 weeks minimum. Since neither our 22-year-old or our 14-year-old car are highway-friendly at this point, we will need to stay in Philadelphia for his post-surgery visits after he is released from the hospital as opposed to traveling back and forth every other day. There is reduced price housing for transplant families, but it adds up after a while, especially since he has no salary and I will be on non-paid family medical leave from my job. We are saving to continue paying our mortgage, insurances, and utilities during this period, and will appreciate any donations to help pay for lodging & meals in Philadelphia for his transplant surgery and gas, parking, and tolls to get to his doctor appointments during the weeks following.
We are so grateful for your prayers and for any financial support you can give. Thank you!
UPDATE: We are honored and overwhelmed by all donations from friends and anonymous friends. We enjoyed the fundraiser at Taj Mahal Indian Restaurant in Lancaster last week which raised $200.00 and an additional $55.00 in personal donations. Along with the donations through givetaxfree.org, we have now raised a total of $3555!!!! We praise God for your generosity. Thank you so much!!