39236 N. Green Bay Rd. Beach Park IL 60087
Pastor Brian Petrick
CHURCH
Service Times
Sunday:
Sunday School - 9:30 am
Church Service - 10:30 am
Evening Service 5:30 pm
Wednesday:
Prayer and Bible Study
7:00 pm
Saturday:
Soul-winning/outreach/bus visitation - 10:00 am
Sign language available for all services.
Separate services for Spanish speaking in the morning services.
Sunday and Wednesday evening services interpreted for Spanish speaking.
Nursery provided for all services.
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***** UPDATES ON THE HEALTH STATUS OF PASTOR EMERITUS DR. RONALD T PETRICK******
90 years young
(Updates may not happen daily, but we'll do our best)
Sunday 8-17-25 "Papa preacher" fell coming back from the restroom.
No one witnessed his fall and we were concerned his back or hip may have been broken
He was taken by ambulance to Vista East in Waukegan.
Initial CT scans did not reveal anything to be broken
Heavy pain meds were given and he never left the bed for 7 days.
we were promised more scans,... or MRI,... or total body bone scans every day but nothing happened and communication from this hospital was not good.
(The nurses there were fine and some even exceptional. One nurse even got saved!)
Bowel blockage caused EXTREME pain on saturday 8-23.
This cleared up by the end of the day on Saturday.
He did move to the edge of the bed and stood up briefly, got dizzy and sat back down.
8-24 Sunday afternoon, evening and night into monday morning he had extreme abdominal pain due to UTI or bladder infection (in hindsight,... but was never diagnosed or treated for that at VISTA)
Monday 8-25-25 he was discharged from VISTA and moved by personal car (very risky but proved to be the BEST decision), to Lake Forest Hospital (Northwestern Medical). Lake Forest, IL
Upon arrival he was still in extreme abdominal pain and was given antibiotics ASAP for possible UTI or bladder infection and was comfortable for the first time that day, sometime in the late afternoon or evening. His sodium levels were also extremely low.
He was also given new scans at Lake Forest since VISTA was unable to send over any of thier findings to the new hospital in a timely manner.
Tuesday 8-26 We were given new CT scan results:
No broken bones showed up.
ALSO:
Unreated incidental findings:
Nodules in left lung and in pancreas.
(unsure if cancerous or not)
Enlarged lymph nodes.
Tues. 8-26 he had a reasonably good day. Still way too much lower back pain. But nothing in comparison to his last 3 days from the bowels and bladder pains he had! Sodium levels up,... still too low, but climbing. Was able to stand up twice that day and sit back down.
Side note: His lower back had been in extreme pain also for these 7-8 days, but the bowel pain and the abdominal pain far EXCEEDED his back pain!
8-27 Weds morning started out good, but after physical therapy,... (standing up and sitting down twice) he was weak, very exhausted and dizzy and the abdominal pain stated up again while I was there (Brian). He was thrashing uncontrollably and gritting his teeth in agony. The nurses were scared because they hadn't seen him like that since he had been at Lake Forest. (I had seen him like this at VISTA). The nurses were trying to see if they could give him stronger pain meds. I was asking if he could be sedated. It was awful. This went on for maybe 30 minutes. (At vista it was one hour one day, and an hour the next). On weds it was 30-40 minutes of total agony.
******************* BUT GOD!
I was praying. Dad was praying
It was then I started as fast as possible,...texting everyone in my phone to pray for dad's pain and for him to settle down.
As I "copied and pasted" I texted 10, 20 , 30 ,40 people. Godly people who knew how to pray and loved and cared for my dad. The more I texted, the more he calmed down, little by little. So I kept texting and posting and texting some more. I must have texted over 100 people. Friends, preachers, evangelists, missionaries. Even after he settled dowm I just kept texting until he finally dozed off a little.
I saw the POWER OF PRAYER IN REAL TIME!
The nurse came back in the room after trying her hardest to get approval for more pain meds, and found him completely still and dozing off.
I said "Do you believe in GOD?"
"You see him?"
I told her, "I just texted over 100 people to pray for his pain,... and look at him now!"
She said "of course I believe in God". She said "wow, that just gave me chills,... I haven't even given him any more pain meds"
Thank you everyone for bombarding heaven with those prayers, As far as I know, he hasn't had any more of those extreme episodes of pain since weds afternoon when that happened. AND,...It's now thurs. 8-28-25 at 5:10PM as of this update!
Thursday 8-28-25. He is supposed to have an MRI done today to rule out (or to find) if his back is truly fractured. This is because the fall was over a week ago but the pain is still very bad.
If the MRI comes back OK, he could possibly be moved to a care facility as early as tomorrow, where he will stay as long as needed before returning back home.
The short-term care facility will most likely be: ALIYA of Highwood, IL
Follow up appts will have to be made,... outpatient for biopsys of his lung and pancreas, to determine possible future treatment/procedures for those incidental findings. Also the Urologist is monitoring and doing the best to keep infections under control / elimninated.
Please pray for wisdom and direction for us going forward. I will try to update each day if possible. Thank you so much for all the concerns, prayers, calls, texts and visits.
Please limit your calls/texts as it's getting a bit overwhelming. Please refer to this site. - Pastor Brian
*** Newest Update Sat. 8-30-25 ***
Yesterday morning (friday) was VERY rough again for Dad. He had bladder spasms which caused him to writhe in pain for some time. They gave him a medication to relax his bladder and that worked. He was as comfortable (as could be expected) then for the rest of friday, friday night,.. and into this morning saturday he talked on the phone with Lisa and I and we laughed and joked. Such a blessing to hear his sense of humor again.
The MRI did actually take place yesterday (friday) and revealed no fractures or anything out of the ordinary for a 90 year old back. No invasive procedures suggested or planned on his back.
He has not been able to stand for more than a few minutes, and has not even been able to sit in a chair (yet). So pray for his strength to regain . Pray for the transition to go well and for to be well taken care of, and to be happy in this new place. The hospital was so full in Lake Forest (no one trusts waukegan hospital anymore, nor should they) and his UCC room had no windows. So he will be happy to be in a place with windows and I'm sure much better scenery. Please pray the staff here that they will be super and treat him as if he was thier father.
Of course I and my family will our my best to be with him as much as possible in his new location and I will be his advocate, along with my sister, but we do have a big conference coming up too, so please pray for him, and us and BBC.
The place his going today is :ALIYA of Highwood 50 Pleasant Av. Highwood, IL 60040.
Feel free to visit him and call or text him. He does get lonely at times. His sense of time isnt the same or his memory. So sometimes he forgets he's had some visitors and believes no one's coming to see him.
**For Health Updates on Pastor Emeritus Dr. Ronald Petrick, please scroll to the bottom of this page**
