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Roger Dillard traveled the world as a mountain man. He treated audiences to his own brand of country charm and thrilled them with his death defying stunts. When he wasn’t on the road, you could find him entertaining visitors at Dollywood in Pigeon Forge, Tenn. There he also worked as a craftsman showcasing the trade of blacksmithing and the art of knife making.
"I would go in and light my forge up of a morning, and we would hand-crank in the way that it was done in the 1800s. When you first started it up, you got so much smoke," he says.
The constant exposure to the smoke was taking a toll on Roger’s health.
"I
would do a hammering show and the smoke would get in my lungs,"
he recalls. "I would cough and hack for a period of two weeks.
I came to the point where I was coughing up blood. There were
doctors that would come through, and I just remember one lady
that pulled me aside and said, 'You need to quit what you are
doing.' She said, 'You are actually killing yourself.' "
Roger ignored the warnings and instead turned to alcohol to kill the pain.
"My family didn’t know the pain and what was happening within my life," Roger reveals, getting emotional, "so as my battles started at home, I lost all of it."
Back home in Ohio, Roger reluctantly attended a church service where his life changed.
"I walked into the church, and when I walked in, it wasn’t about the preaching. The man was a wonderful preacher. It was about nothing other than God had called me to there and all heaven opened up for me," he says. "That night I made my commitment to walk with God."
Roger met and married Juanita. She begged him to get examined by another doctor, so he did.
"I went to one more doctor, and they did tests and tests," Roger says. "Finally, he said, 'Roger, there is nothing I can do for you.' "
Then one day, while watching The 700 Club at around 11 p.m., Roger heard Pat Robertson give a word of knowledge.
"Pat said, 'There is somebody that has something wrong with their lungs. God is going to touch that and take it out.' As Pat said that, God reached in and took out whatever was wrong in my lungs. He took it out. God simply told me, 'Roger, now then, you can go on. I touched you."
Now
Roger isn’t throwing tomahawks for the cheers of the crowd
but for the pleasure of his Lord and Savior. He knows that true
peace is in his relationship with Jesus Christ.
"Today my life is as good as it was bad," he says. "And you know, as deep as I went, God has taken me and is going to take me much higher because I am going to walk forward for Him."
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