No one can watch Dave Roever speak in a video about his tragic experience as an injured Vietnam veteran without being impressed with his wife, Brenda. We never get to see her, but we definitely hear about her. He honors her throughout his account of the debilitating experience he had on the river in Vietnam. There part of his face and head were blown away. She waited for him to undergo several surgeries that equipped him with a plastic ear, hairpieces, and a repaired eye and face. Then, they resumed their young marriage that was interrupted by a dreaded draft notice.
Dave and Brenda made the decision to give away the pieces of their lives that were left. He has spoken in dozens of high schools and veteran events. He always lovingly mentions his wife who helped him endure the ordeal that was theirs after a grenade exploded near his head.
When I was a public-school teacher, I used his video to satisfy the system’s requirement for anti-drug education. It also addressed peer pressure and promiscuity. But I’ll never forget the comment of a female student about Dave’s wife. She was struck by the way he honored Brenda as he spoke. Brenda called him “Davey” and accepted him wounded or not.
I have experienced some of the respect that Dave enjoyed. I have had two brain surgeries and had my hair shaved down to the scalp twice. Each time I had the love that God gave me there beside me. It was Allan, the one who kissed me “goodnight” if I was shaved bald or wore a wig. It didn’t matter to him. I received the same tenderness either way.
One thing that made his sacrifice costlier was knowing that care-giving for me kept him from getting to what he hoped to accomplish personally. He is a writer with his burden to print and publish brewing inside him.
Allan has published multiple books (all on Amazon). As a former English teacher, I have appraised him as a “wordsmith” with an ability to put his message into “lingo” that the average person would not think of.
His books have undergone revision at a publisher’s suggestion. One chapter of his original book (Filled with the Spirit vs. Illumined by the Word) was extracted to make a smaller book, A Dialogue between Praise and Exposition, with Cup. Then, the remaining book was renamed Strange Fire, a take-off of John McArthur’s 2013 anti-charismatic conference, “Strange Fire.” Recently (2018), Strange Fire has been thoroughly edited and revised and renamed The Work of the Holy Spirit in the Believer: What Does It Mean to Be Filled with the Spirit? The book supports the Spirit-filled experience of the believer from a wide array of sources, from Lewis Sperry Chafer of Dallas Seminary to F.F. Bosworth, Christian Missionary Alliance, to Jack Hayford, Four Square Pentecostal.
Allan designed the book jacket himself to defray publishing costs.
In addition to the recent books, Allan and Dottie worked on his award-winning 1982 Master’s thesis, Roger Williams and the Search for New Apostles amidst the “Ruins” of the Reformation Churches: The Continental and English Seekers, 1530 to 1660, which had sat on our bookshelf since grad school days. The book outlines the tremendous hunger the Seekers had to know God in a first century manner. Dottie was able to type every word on Microsoft Word after her first brain hemorrhage and surgery of 2015. God has been good.
Dave Roever’s Brenda (I am sure) is probably prettier, but her love and devotion can’t be better than the one I’ve been privileged to know.
I still get a lump in my throat when I hear the Gaither group sing “Thank You, Lord, for Your Blessing on Me.”
There’s a roof up above me.
I’ve a good place to sleep.
There’s food on my table,
Shoes on my feet.
Oh, you’ve given me a love, Lord.
I’ve a great family.
Thank you, Lord, for your blessing on me.