Plain Values Magazine | April 2023

P U BL ISHE R

WHO WE ARE...

From 2007 to 2012 we, the Millers, adopted our first three children, a preschooler on the autism spectrum and two babies with Down syndrome. We published our first issue of Plain Values in 2012 to highlight biblical ministries, share the beauty of adoption, and to cultivate anchored community. In 2018 we welcomed our fourth child in a surprise adoption, this time a baby with Mosaic Down syndrome. We homeschool our family and enjoy working together to grow and raise food on our twelve acre homestead.

Marlin Miller SA L E S A DV ISO R

Matt Yoder SA L E S A DV ISO R

Aaron Stutzman SA L E S A DV ISO R

Chris Conant Q UA L IT Y A SSU RA N C E / BO O K K EEP I NG

WHAT WE BELIEVE...

Sabrina Schlabach

Our values are plain values, steeped in the rich traditions of yesterday. We enjoy the simple things in life. Gathering eggs from the coop, getting our hands in the dirt to grow food, and cooking meals from scratch. Sometimes we sit around a fire and share life. We strive to walk humbly to strengthen authentic relationships with our families and neighbors. And, yes, we have taken a fresh pie to a front porch and surprised a friend… we didn’t even text them before! We just stopped by, walked up the steps, and knocked on the door! Just the way our grandparents used to do on a Sunday evening. They called it living in community.

We seek to serve our neighbors. Plain Values began with a prayer, hoping to play a small role in connecting a child with Down syndrome to his or her forever family. We have checked that box more than twenty times—and counting—and we will not stop until the orphanages are empty!

We will rest in Heaven!

P RO DU C T IO N M A N AG E R

Isaac Hershberger M U LT I- M E DIA P RO DU C T IO N

Seth Yoder O F F IC E M A N AG E R /C U STO M ER S ERVI C E

Jan Schlabach M AY A D C LO SE

April 6, 2023 WR IT E R – CO N F E SSIO N S O F A ST EWAR D

Joel Salatin WR IT E R – RO OTS + WIN GS

HOW YOU CAN HELP...

Join us as we pursue a more authentic life. By subscribing to Plain Values, a portion of each subscription goes directly to Room to Bloom, our non-profit that supports children with special needs.

Rory Feek WR IT E R – T HE G RA N DFAT HE R EFFEC T

Brian Dahlen WR IT E RS – T HE RO U N DTA BL E

Emily Hershberger & Daniel Miller

JOIN US FOR PORCH TIME! Every third Friday from 1:00pm – 4:00pm

Stop by, enjoy a cup of coffee or tea, sit on the porch, and visit for a while. We'd love to get to know you! We're located in the heart of Winesburg, Ohio—just down the street from the church.

WR IT E R – HO M E ST E A D L IV IN G

Melissa K. Norris WR IT E RS – T HE HE A L IN G L A N D

Shawn & Beth Dougherty WR IT E R – T HE WIDOWS PAT H

Ferree Hardy WR IT E R – HO N E ST CO N V E RSAT I O NS

Wendy Cunningham WR IT E R – BOT H HA N DS

Nic Stoltzfus WR IT E R – SE RV IN G O U R N E IG H B O R

Rebecca Greenfield CO N T R IBU T IN G P HOTO G RA PH ERS Millpond Photography Landon Troyer Photography Ashley Rivers Photography

Plain Values is published monthly by Plain Target Marketing, LLC. Please contact us with any questions.

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P.O. Box 201, 2106 Main Street Winesburg, OH 44690 P HO N E

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E M A IL This publication and its contents are © 2023, Plain Target Marketing, LLC. Individual copyrighted items, trademarks, etc. contained within are the property of their respective copyright holders. No part of this publication may be reproduced or redistributed by any means without authorization from the publisher. Publisher is not responsible for advertisers’ offers, products, or services, and publication neither expresses nor implies an endorsement.

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April 2023 // Issue 118

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CONFESSIONS OF A STEWARD High Pathogen Avian Influenza

ROOTS + WINGS Build It and They Will Come

COLUMN BY: JOEL SALATIN

COLUMN BY: RORY FEEK

Perhaps no agricultural topic right now creates a sharper contrast between the “life is biology” versus “life is mechanics” philosophy than High Pathogen Avian Influenza (HPAI).

Rory's hope is that his farm will continue leaning into the mission of teaching homesteading skills to folks who are interested in learning them all throughout the year.

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HOMESTEAD LIVING Spring Foraging

THE HEALING LAND Planting Potatoes

COLUMN BY: MELISSA K. NORRIS

COLUMN BY: SHAWN & BETH DOUGHERTY

Foraging was a term Melissa learned long after she learned the art of it. Every spring, she would anxiously wait for the tell-tale signs that morel hunting was ready to begin.

It's the Friday before Easter, potato-planting day. The whole family is in the garden patch where we grow Pontiac, Kennebec, and Yukon Gold potatoes.

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ON THE COVER Melissa K. Norris, lover of traditional, old-fashioned skills, preparing for Spring. photo © Cheryl Constable

Room to Bloom Report One Minute with Marlin Both Hands Exile International

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THE GRANDFATHER EFFECT Part Two – Vietnam

THE ROUNDTABLE Amish Insights on: Big Families

WORDS BY: BRIAN DAHLEN

COLUMN BY: EMILY HERSHBERGER & DANIEL MILLER

This month, we continue our multi-part series with Brian Dahlen as he recounts what it was like for his father to be drafted into the Vietnam War and the effects it had on his family.

Emily and Daniel answer the question: "Springtime is such a busy time of the year for homesteaders. How do you keep such large families seemingly so organized during busy seasons?"

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THE WIDOWS PATH An "EKG" for Grieving Hearts

HONEST CONVERSATIONS WITH WENDY A Reluctant Homeschool Mom

COLUMN BY: FERREE HARDY

COLUMN BY: WENDY CUNNINGHAM

Just as an electrocardiogram (EKG) records the electrical signal from the physical heart, Ferree uses the letters E-K-G to measure conditions in a grieving heart.

"I wasn’t a teacher. Although I had my bachelor’s degree, it was in theater performance, for goodness’ sake. And besides, I worked!

There was just no way."

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One Minute with Marlin

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A FEW MONTHS BACK, I shared how our 10-year-old

questions afterward. So, this is an open invitation for

son, Bennett, has been gaining in his communication skills. He is signing more and slowly adding to his small but wonderful bank of spoken words, not to mention the tremendous growth in his reading and writing skills.

Recently, he added the best yet—in fact, the words that all parents long to hear. Bennett began saying “I love you!” It has been a massive blessing to watch him grow and learn how to communicate at a deeper level, and Lisa and I are hopeful and optimistic that he can and will learn how to share much more.

Darcy Day is mom to Brady, a young man who has Down syndrome. For the first 18 years of his life, he was completely locked inside, not having a method of communication that worked for him to share what he was thinking about. That is until Darcy found Spelling to Communicate and dared to wonder if things could be different for her son. Today, Brady shares his thoughts and feelings rather openly, even writing beautiful poetry.

Spelling to Communicate is a gross motor skillset that was developed and geared to individuals on the autism spectrum. After learning about the program, Darcy simply applied and tweaked it to her son and has seen truly incredible results. There is a new documentary premiering in April called Spellers that takes a close look at the stories coming out of this work.

After coming home from the Down syndrome conference, where we met Darcy, Lisa did her own research and found a practitioner an hour from our home. After connecting with Samantha Fox, we decided to host an evening of learning. We will share the movie at our office, and Samantha will join us in the discussion and answer

any and all to join us on May 5th in Winesburg at 6 pm.

If you are curious and have questions about how Spelling to Communicate might help someone you love, or if you are interested in becoming a trained practitioner, please come. You can learn more about the documentary at spellersthemovie.com.

Below is a quote from Samantha with a brief description of the S2C method: “Spelling to Communicate (S2C) is an alternative method of communication that is used for individuals who show difficulty expressing themselves through speech. These individuals may be non-speaking, minimally speaking, or unreliably speaking. There is often a disconnect between their brain and their body. With this, they do not have a consistent or reliable way of demonstrating their understanding or expressing their thoughts. These individuals are often labeled as “low functioning” or as having a “severe” cognitive/language disorder. S2C addresses the disconnect between the brain and the body by teaching the purposeful motor skills to point to letters on a letter board. Once the foundational motor skills are built, individuals work towards expressing their wants, needs, and ideas through spelling.”

-Samantha Fox M.A., CCC-SLP

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Speech-Language Pathologist Owner, Beyond Speech Therapy Center | S2C Practitioner

We hope to see you May 5th and as always, may you find joy in the simple things. // MARLIN MILLER publisher, always looking for more friends

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Confessions of a Steward JOEL SALATIN

COLUMN BY:

High Pathogen avian Influenza PERHAPS NO AGRICULTURAL TOPIC right now creates a sharper contrast between the “life is biology” versus “life is mechanics” philosophy than High Pathogen Avian Influenza (HPAI). In less than a year, the United States has exterminated more than 58 million chickens, turkeys, and ducks by government mandate.

For the uninitiated, realize that if one bird in a million on a farm tests positive for HPAI, every bird on that property must be exterminated. The industry uses the term euthanized, but that is not the right word. Euthanizing is what you do to a suffering pet that has no hope of recovery. It’s an end-of-suffering kind of thing. Most of the birds being killed due to HPAI are neither sick nor showing symptoms of being sick; they just happen to be in proximity to sick birds and get caught up in the melee.

To be sure, HPAI is a real thing and does kill birds. But just like covid, which is also a real thing, proper responses

photos by Millpond Photography

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vary. The orthodoxy right now is to annihilate every proximate bird, healthy or not. Complete extermination. It’s being done to such an extent these days that our nation now has a Foaming Association that poultry growers can join to be first in line when the extermination order comes.

How do you kill 15,000 turkeys in a confinement house? Or 50 million chickens in a layer house? You can’t electrocute. Starvation is too slow. Ah, soap suds. You close all the windows and doors and pump in soap suds that suffocate everything and then dissipate into nothing. All you have after the foam leaves is carcasses to pick up. Efficient and cheap. How many of you want to join the Foaming Association?

The official narrative regarding this disease is that it’s spread by wild waterfowl. Isn’t it interesting

"The complete extermination policy makes no sense. If you have a rampant disease, why would you also kill the survivors?" that these supposed carriers don’t themselves succumb to the disease? This brings up an interesting question about how you respond to disease. That question prompts an even deeper question: Why did something get a disease? Or we could even ask what the purpose of disease is?

Bible believers understand that we live in a fallen world, where corruption and disease are all a part of losing the Edenic paradise. But clearly, the Pentateuch’s instructions about land, hygiene, religious protocols, and finances indicate that the Israelites would enjoy fewer diseases than other people. Leprosy occurred, but it was rare.

Usually, disease or complete functional breakdown occurs because protocols surrounding health aren’t—or weren’t—followed. This includes stress, of course. Envy rots the bones, according to Proverbs. My point is that things don’t break down without a reason.

Right now, nobody knows why low-path avian influenza turns into high-path. Nobody actually knows the vectors. In domestic poultry flocks, HPAI devastates, but it never kills all the birds. Somehow in the midst of the catastrophe, some birds never succumb and continue to thrive. All genetic understanding, adaptation, and immunological development indicate that the most reasonable response to HPAI is to protect and propagate the survivors.

The complete extermination policy makes no sense. If you have a rampant disease, why would you also kill the survivors? Wouldn’t you want to hang onto them at all costs, breed them, and reward whatever created a more robust immune system? It’s such a simple question, but apparently,

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nobody in the industry is asking it. The official policy is the complete extermination of every bird on the property.

Even Darwinian evolutionists promoting survival of the fittest should reject such a nonsensical policy.

How do we know which ones are fittest if we kill them all? In order to find the fittest, something must survive. A blanket extermination insures no survivors and therefore no discovery or development regarding fitness. The complete extermination policy flies in the face of reason and our current scientific understanding.

Could it be that the reason we don’t see major die-offs in the alleged wild fowl vectors is that over time the susceptible ones did die, and the survivors developed such a robust immune system that even high pathogenic strains aren’t deadly? That thinking certainly dovetails with a reasonable understanding of adaptation and immunological function.

HPAI is relatively weak. Temperatures as low as 85 degrees Fahrenheit kill it, which is why it spikes in the winter. For something that weak to decimate the poultry industry indicates profound fragility.

I recently attended the American Pastured Poultry Producers Association (APPPA) annual convention in Dallas and had the privilege of spending time with three growers whose flocks contracted HPAI in 2022. Their stories were grisly and horrifying. Two were hatcheries whose flocks are housed in barns. The other had flocks of 3,000 on pasture. The outdoor bird producer had been dealing with cholera for several years.

All three were required to exterminate all their birds, even though all three said their HPAI symptoms were only in a tiny number of their birds. After extermination and disinfection, they were allowed to get back in business quickly. The outdoor grower received a clean bill of health in 45 days.

Now folks, I want you to just think about this for a minute. Here’s a farm with 45,000 chickens. They find HPAI in a few and have to kill all 45,000. In less than two months, they can repopulate completely as if nothing had ever happened. If something is lethal enough to demand exterminating more than 42,000 non-symptomatic birds, would you think everything is perfectly fine in 45 days? In the world of biology, 45 PLAIN VALUES

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"Many times, interventions create more problems than solutions. Especially if we can’t really identify the problem. HPAI rears its ugly head cyclically, and nobody knows why." days is the blink of an eye. You can scarcely recover from a bad cold in 45 days. None of this makes sense.

Back in 2015, HPAI flared up in the U.S., resulting in a 55 million bird extermination. Nobody knows why it stopped. And nobody knows why it came back in 2022. With all these unknowns, you would think people in the industry would step back in humility and see what nature has in mind. Airplane pilots learn early that engineers design the plane to fly straight. Novice pilots encountering rough air tend to panic, fighting

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the controls to compensate for ups and downs. The universal answer is, “Take your hands off the controls, and the plane will level on its own.”

Many times, interventions create more problems than solutions. Especially if we can’t really identify the problem. HPAI rears its ugly head cyclically, and nobody knows why. But the industry responds with mandatory extermination and investment in vaccine technology. The industry hopes it’ll come up with a vaccine to eliminate the problem. All of this is a narrow solution option.

One of the HPAI outbreaks that decimated Virginia flocks a couple of decades ago sent a swarm of Federal veterinarians into our area. A team of them visited our farm, and I wouldn’t let them out of their car. They didn’t wash off their tires before driving in. And they certainly didn’t wash them off going out. They didn’t follow their own rudimentary biosecurity procedures.

Two of the federal veterinarians did come and visit me over that time because they’d heard of this weird farm and wanted to check it out. They weren’t here to take blood samples or spy. Both said, without

provocation, that all the federal vets knew the problem was too many birds crammed in too tight density in too many houses located too closely together. But they said if any of them publicly made such a comment, he’d be fired within a day.

Is HPAI a conspiracy? Who knows? Is it real?

Yes. Is the best response mandatory extermination of every bird and a future vaccine? No. Chickens are highly susceptible to respiratory problems. They scratch and dust and fluff, living in dusty conditions.

If those dusty conditions are unhygienic, they will breathe in pathogenic particles. In an industrial confinement house, of course, fecal particulate coats all the tender respiratory membranes. Flocks of more than 1,000 birds in size create emotional stress on the birds.

Unhygienic conditions can happen in a backyard flock if it’s in a dirt yard or unsanitary bedding. Nature sanitizes in two ways: rest and sunshine or vibrant decomposition (like a compost pile). Nature never creates sterility; living systems thrive in a veritable biological soup of microbes.

The whole idea is to have enough good microbes that overwhelm the bad ones; about 95 percent of microbes are good, and only a few are pathogenic.

The correct response to HPAI is first to leverage the survivors. Be grateful that the strong identified themselves and then do everything possible to

What Would You Like Joel to Write About?

Joel is always looking for reader suggestions on which topics to cover. Please email all suggestions to: reachout@plainvalues.com

duplicate their genetics. Second, don’t spray down things with anti-microbials; rather, cultivate habitats that encourage a broad range of microbes.

Third, get the chickens into an environment that is hygienic and sanitary—that’s not sterility; it’s sanitary, meaning it’s not toxic or pathogenic.

Rest and sunshine if they’re outside or vibrant decomposition if they’re inside or in a coop are the two best ways to stay ahead of disease. Dirt is the worst condition you can have for your chickens.

A deeply bedded run is fine because the dirt has a layer of vibrantly decomposing carbon on top of it. Chickens on a compost pile tend to have robust immunity. Don’t be paranoid about HPAI. It’s out there, but a good habitat with young, healthy chickens can go a long way to reducing risk. //

Joel's Upcoming Speaking Events April 15

Asheville, NC (Farm Where You Live Fair)

April 21

Fredericksburg, TX (Force of Nature Meats)

May 6

North Augusta, SC (Farm Where You Live Fair)

June 2–3

Columbia, TN (The Homestead Festival)

June 9

Richmond, VA (Home Educators Association of Virginia)

June 21–22

Walnut Creek, OH (Food Independence Summit)

June 30–July 1

Kootenai County, ID (Pacific Northwest Homesteaders Conference)

July 17–18

Swoope, VA (Polyface Intensive Discovery Seminar)

July 21–22

Swoope, VA (Polyface Intensive Discovery Seminar)

July 28–29

Lancaster, PA (Family Farm Day)

August 4–5

Swoope, VA (Polyface Intensive Discovery Seminar)

August 17–19

Swoope, VA (Bio-Fert Seminar with Jairo)

August 25–26

Marshfield, MO (Ozarks Homesteading Expo)

September 7

Columbia, South America (Expo Agrofuturo Medellin)

Sept. 30–Oct. 1

Wheeling, WV (The Vineyard Church)

October 13–14

Front Royal, VA (Homesteaders of America)

October 21–22

Indianapolis, IN (Indiana Homestead Conference)

Joel co-owns, with his family, Polyface Farm in Swoope, Virginia. When he’s not on the road speaking, he’s at home on the farm, keeping the callouses on his hands and dirt under his fingernails, mentoring young people, inspiring visitors, and promoting local, regenerative food and farming systems.

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column by:

build it and they will come April 2023

"There was a time when music was enough to sustain me… now, it must be combined with meaning and purpose."

– rory feek

rory feek

MY WIFE JOEY AND I used to put on a yearly music festival here at our farm called the Bib & Buckle Fest. Held the first weekend in June from 2009 ’til 2013, they were single-day affairs where singers and songwriter friends would join us to play music, and we’d have games and serve burgers from about 2 pm until after dark. It was open to everyone, with only a small entrance fee.

Some of the festivals were held in our front yard, using our front porch as a make-shift stage. The front lawn of our farmhouse would be filled with a thousand people in lawn chairs. Put on each year by Joey and me, along with friends and family, The Bib & Buckle gradually moved to the backfield and grew to a couple of thousand people by the last year. At that last one, in 2013, the performers took turns doing sets on a hay wagon until a torrential downpour came and scattered everyone into the wind. In the end, as the evening turned beautiful again, the remaining 500 or so people joined us inside a big tent, and we sang and told stories ’til well after sunset.

We decided to put them on hold for a while as our little girl Indiana arrived the next year, and then a few years after that, Joey passed away. Although I was often asked through the ensuing years if I’d ever start the Bib & Buckle Festival back up, I usually answered, “We’ll have to wait and see,” although I knew well the answer was no.

I knew in my heart that inviting folks from all over to come here to the farm to spend a day listening to music wasn’t enough for me anymore.

After all we’d been through, if it was ever going to happen again, it was going to have to be for something more meaningful than that.

Rory Feek is a world-class storyteller, songwriter, filmmaker, and New York Times best-selling author. As a musical artist, Rory is one-half of the Grammy-award-winning duo, Joey+Rory. He and his wife Joey toured the world and sold nearly a million records before her untimely passing in March 2016.

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The 2011 Bib & Buckle Fest on Joey & Rory's front porch

Although I had no idea what that might be until a couple of years ago.

After being invited to take part in the Homesteaders of America annual event in Virginia in 2019, and then hosting some smaller Homesteading events here in our concert hall the following year or two, I was inspired to create a weekend that would combine the fun of having music and entertainment in the evenings with the opportunity for people to spend the days learning helpful skills and knowledge that could make their lives better.

So, the idea for The Homestead Festival was born.

Since our farm had grown in size since the last Bib & Buckle event we held in 2013 (we only had six acres then, now we have 100), the size and scope of the new festival grew too. It would again be put on as a family affair, along with a lot of good friends and folks who work with us on a daily basis, but the new festival would have multiple tents, a huge main stage, a vendor village, and a demonstration area. The schoolhouse and grounds would be turned into a “Lil' Homesteader” area, where little ones could also learn about growing food and raising animals.

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Although none of us on our little team had ever done anything on this scale before, we began dreaming and planning and meeting and, by last March, put the first tickets on sale. We made a fun promotional video called “Build It & He Will Come” that parodied Kevin Costner’s Field of Dreams vision of “doing something crazy in the field behind the farmhouse,” since we had no idea what we were doing either—or even if anyone would come. And in the end, like in the movie, people came from all over by the carloads, and as a special treat, Kevin Costner himself even came to kick off the first of what I hope will be many, many to come.

On June 3 last year, the gates swung open wide, and folks started streaming in. To say our first Homestead Festival was a success is an understatement, at least for me. We had dozens of wonderful speakers come and teach on four stages­— Joel Salatin, Temple Grandin, Justin Rhodes, and many others. In the evenings, as the sun set, we had wonderful music on the big stage with The Isaacs, Jimmy Fortune, and myself. On the last night, Kevin and his band shared songs and stories about his time playing John Dutton on the hit TV series Yellowstone. Along with all this, we had hundreds of

vendors, a demonstration area, food trucks, and a small stage with music throughout the day.

I was so proud of what we’d created and how perfect our place was to host it. Our whole team was. We had combined Music and Meaning all in one weekend. Something good, with something good-forus. Plus, the 40-acre hayfield that we had never been sure what to do with until then was the perfect spot to create a separate entrance for the festival and parking for 3,000 to 4,000 cars. Honestly, it felt like this is what the farm has always wanted to be. What God created it to be… a place where you can come to not only learn how to grow your own food but learn to grow a life filled with meaning and purpose.

And so now, all year long, our farm is a place where

Our 2nd Annual Homestead Festival is rapidly approaching, and I hope you’ll consider joining us. It’s on June 2 & 3 this year and again we have lots of wonderful teachers, speakers, and entertainers coming to our farm in Tennessee to be part of another incredible weekend.

Go to our festival website www.thehomesteadfestival. com to learn more and get your tickets.

Hope to see you at our farm this June! //

we personally learn daily how to grow more of our own food. Pigs and cows and chickens. Where we have our gardens and our families all live and do life together, my two sisters, Marcy and Candy, their families, and mine.

But for that one special weekend, it’s a place where we share the gifts we’ve been given with others.

My hope is that our farm will continue leaning into the mission of teaching homesteading skills to folks who are interested in learning them all throughout the year, and, in time, hosting lectures in the concert hall and classes in and around the barns. And we learn right alongside everyone else.

www.TheHomesteadFestival.com

rory

2nd Annual Homestead Festival Friday & Saturday • June 2-3, 2023

Visit the Plain Values website to watch a video from Rory's first Homestead Festival held last year.

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PART TWO

VIETNAM

Special thanks to Brian Dahlen and Moody Radio for allowing us to share this series with our readers.

WORDS BY: BRIAN DAHLEN

How do you forgive a dead man? Particularly when he’s your grandfather?

In this limited series, Moody Radio host Brian Dahlen takes a five-year journey surrounding family mystery, forgiveness, and faith in the face of generational sin.

PICTURE THIS: It’s December 1, 1969. You’re twelve years old, and it’s a cold Monday night. Mom’s in the kitchen making some Shake ’N Bake, and Dad has his nose in the sports section of the newspaper, as usual.

A seventh straight loss for the Giants? This time to the Packers. He looks at the clock and puts the paper down. It’s time for your favorite show.

Every Monday night your whole family, along with millions of other Americans, gather around the TV to watch the hit show “Mayberry RFD,” a spin-off of the Andy Griffith Show. So you can imagine your disappointment when a CBS news special report interrupts your favorite Monday night activity.

To make matters worse, your routine was interrupted by what felt like a mash-up of bingo, a Powerball drawing, and the Hunger Games.

Seriously.

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Here’s how it worked: there were over 350 game pieces in the form of small, blue plastic capsules.

Hidden inside of each was a neatly folded slip of paper with some writing on it. And instead of a slick gameshow host reaching into the container to pull them out, it was officiated by Washington bureaucrats.

As boring as that sounds, you kept watching.

And nobody wanted to win.

What was going on?

It was the first draft lottery since 1942. But instead of being sent to Europe or the Pacific, American young men across the country would be shipped to the jungles of Vietnam.

Those blue plastic capsules each contained a birthday. The order in which they were randomly

1. If you were 1, you were drafted… I remember one guy in class saying he got 360 or 364, and he said, ‘I was thinking of enlisting.’ And I said, ‘can we trade?’”

My dad explained his options: If you were enrolled in college, you could get a deferment. That would allow you to postpone being drafted, as long as you’re carrying at least twelve credits per quarter and passing all your college courses. Since my dad was already a freshman at the University of Minnesota, he could keep working on his degree and avoid the draft temporarily.

But the government only gave you four years to defer the draft for college.

A few months after my dad got his college degree, something came in the mail.

“I got a notice from Richard Nixon, President of

drawn would determine which men of draft-eligible age would have to report for induction into the military in 1970. The earlier your birthdate was called, the more likely you would be going to war.

General Lewis Hershey, Director of the Selective Service System, opened the ominous event by nervously referring to himself in the third person.

New York Congressman Alexander Pirnie, the ranking Republican on the House Armed Services Committee, reached in to grab the first capsule, opened it up, and read the first date.

No young man in America with a birth year between 1944 and 1950 could avoid being assigned one of those numbers.

Pat Sajak from Wheel of Fortune? His number was 7.

Bruce Springsteen? 119.

Jay Leno: 223.

Meanwhile, Sylvester Stallone and George W. Bush both breathed a sigh of relief when their shared birthday was the 327th called.

Then there was my soft-spoken, introverted dad, Bill. His number? 82.

But what did these numbers mean? The closer your number was to 1, the higher chance you had of getting drafted into the military. I asked my dad about his experience during the 1969 draft.

“I was [number] 82, and that was sort of this sinking feeling, as I recall. There was a pretty good chance that I’m going to get drafted… [I had a] better chance of getting drafted than not because it’s close to

the United States, [and the letter said] ‘Greetings, you are hereby ordered to report to the Armed Forces Entrance and Examination Station in Minneapolis.' I ended up—after I got that—I enlisted for two years, and I could defer my enlistment. So that meant that I could

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"...my mom and dad came up with a 1970’s trendy way to communicate with their family back home: they communicated with audio tapes and sent them through the mail."

delay the entry into the Army, and I could delay it 180 days, and the recruiter and I counted out 180 days, and that’s what I did.”

Once his deferments were up, my dad still did not really want to go to Southeast Asia. So he took one more shot at delaying the inevitable in a pretty hilarious way. The way he saw it, there were two strategic ways that he could fail his physical. First, he had what’s called a pilonidal cyst. What’s that, you ask? Well, it’s an infected pocket of skin right near the tailbone, specifically—as I saw on the Mayo Clinic’s website—it indicates that it typically is “at the top of the cleft of the buttocks.” Anywho, once infected, it’s swollen and painful and needs to be drained. My dad figured if he could enflame and rupture this pilonidal cyst, the Army physician would not only be grossed out but would reject him from the draft. Of course, the problem is how do you get a pilonidal cyst to rupture?

Well, Dad tried to figure that one out— “So I bounced up and down on the cement floor in the basement for a while to see if I could get it going, and it didn’t work. But this was before my regular physical.”

His second strategy had a sort of music connection. You see, my dad was playing drums in the band at the time, and the wife of one of his bandmates had an idea— “At the advice of [a] bandmember’s wife who was diabetic, I drank two bottles of Reactose, which is something diabetics use to get their blood sugar up.

But they don’t drink two bottles. And then I chased it down with a Coke before the physical. Went in and had the urinalysis and came back, [and the doctor said] ‘Hey, you made it!’ I think they ignored the [blood sugar] test…”

Then it was eight weeks of basic training starting in March of 1973. But due to his college degree and manly typing skills, he managed to become what’s called, in our family, a “Chairborn Ranger.” The real title was “Clerk Typist,” and that eventually meant he would be stationed in Udorn, Thailand, which is in northern Thailand, not too far from Hanoi, Vietnam, on the other side of the border. He worked in the Personnel Office at the military base as a Records Clerk.

As you might imagine, contacting Minneapolis, Minnesota, from Udorn, Thailand, in 1973 wasn’t so simple. There’s no Skype, there’s no FaceTime. There’s no texting. So, of course you could hand write a letter.

Or you could go through a short wave radio operator to contact home. But my mom and dad came up with a 1970’s trendy way to communicate with their family back home: they communicated with audio tapes and sent them through the mail. It was a way to hear your loved ones’ voices. Now this wasn’t instantaneous, like it is today. It took time to send and receive those tapes.

After two years of mandatory service filled with cassette tapes shipped across the world, my parents were finally back home in Minnesota by March of 1975.

Where did they live? With the man who would later disown us over a birthday card. My Grandpa Tom and Grandma Betty welcomed them into their home for a few months as my dad looked for work and they readjusted to life out of the army. By June of 1975, they moved into their own apartment.

Then just six months later, tragedy struck. And it was likely the beginning of the end of my dad’s relationship with his father. // TO BE CONTINUED...

Brian Dahlen became a Cleveland morning show host after working at Moody Radio in Chicago as a radio host, producer, and co-host of a weekly podcast. Brian caught the radio bug while teaching history at a public high school near Minneapolis, where he was co-host and producer of a weekly radio program. After teaching six years and graduating with a master’s degree in education, Brian lives with his wife and five children in Broadview Heights, Ohio. For more information on Brian and The Grandfather Effect, visit www.moodyradio.org/grandfather.

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AMISH INSIGHTS ON: BIG FAMILIES

This Month's Question: Springtime is a busy time of the year for homesteaders.

How do you keep such large families seemingly so organized during busy seasons?

Answered by:

Emily Hershberger & Daniel Miller

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Emily: "Out with the cold and in with the spring" is what comes to mind as the sun shines these days.

Pretty soon, we’ll notice the first Coltsfoot bloom in the ditches and the Spring Beauties pop up in the otherwise bare lawn, and we are assured once again that the next season is almost here. It would be lovely if we could spend long hours in the neighboring woods, observing the reawakening that is happening, but in all reality, it is also the beginning of a busy time for most of us. Fruit trees and grapes need to be pruned, gardens planned, early crops planted, lawns raked, spring cleaning finished up, and much more. For us farmers, it’s getting the fields prepared for the spring seedings, the fences fixed so the cows can go on pasture (oh happy day!!), and thinking about first cutting hay. So how do such large families seemingly stay so organized during this busy time? Let me put in a disclaimer: first, we do not have a large family, and second, I do not consider myself the model of efficiency, but there are many, many women I greatly admire and who have taught me much over the years. And I could add “homesteaders” doesn’t quite fit our mold; our farm is our livelihood.

It seems much of our culture is rather structured, with everything having a rhyme and a reason. There is stability in knowing that each season brings things that need to be done in order for us to be able to enjoy the beauties of the season coming in. Summer

"March promises the hope of spring, In swampy places peepers sing.

April sees the birds return, Scatters showers on leaf and fern."

Around the Year ~ Tasha Tudor

is planting and harvesting, Autumn is preserving and preparing for the cold months, and winter is spent preparing for spring. Closets and drawers get sorted, organized, and cleaned; March might begin with the walls, ceilings, woodwork, window whites, windows, furniture, and floors all getting a thorough cleaning.

There is something so gratifying about washing curtains and hanging them back up in a sparkling, clean room.

The same goes for sheets that have line-dried in early spring—I’m convinced that luxury makes your brain release endorphins and creates a happy feeling! Some weeks will come when the farm work is most important, and the floor barely gets swept, but we know that everything was clean at one time. A lot of women have workdays once a month where their sisters and sisters-

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in-law get together, and they do whatever is on the list.

Very enjoyable and helpful, especially if you’re preparing for church services. In the winter months, lots of sewing gets done so that once the outside work begins, there are not many clothes that need to be made. Weddings start happening in April, so if your family needs certain attire for that, most women will have everything made, ironed, and hanging in the closets. Just the other day, my friend was telling me that she wanted to get fabric and sew her dress for a family wedding coming up in the fall. To me, that is impressive! But she is preparing for the busy times, and this enables her to help on their farm and ENJOY it.

A friend of ours became gravely ill, and the future looked uncertain. Her sister had the difficult task of checking the children’s closets to see if the appropriate clothes would be ready should she pass on. It touched me when she related how everything was there, pressed and ready to go. This friend was granted life, but I’ll never forget how she had her things in order. We are not promised tomorrow, and I like to think that most will make similar preparations for their families during the not-so-busy months.

Being stewards of the land and homemakers are worthy virtues and highly important, yet being so busy that we don’t have time for others is just sad. Sometimes we can get so wrapped up in good things that we really miss what life is all about. In communion church, we hear that alms are not just monetary but also the giving of our time. I remind myself of that when I think I have such a busy day and I get asked to make a gallon of potato salad for a funeral in a neighboring church. It’s a little thing I can do for the ones who are grieving. So perhaps doing what we can before the busy times keeps us from feeling overwhelmed when the unexpected happens and allows us to graciously give where needed. Plus, as my husband keeps reminding me, you’re just as busy as you make yourself to be. Annoying but true.

So, perhaps the secret to being organized is to take the example of the industrious ant and the slothful grasshopper in a favorite childhood story—plan carefully and work ahead so there is time to live a life of worship.

For me, a springtime walk through the woods after the evening chores renews my spirit.

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"On any work project, Dad, Mom, and older siblings provide leadership—actively promoting the spirit of teamwork. Children generally respond favorably to situations where Dad or an older brother rolls up his sleeves and leads by example..."

Daniel: Here are some homespun observations regarding this interesting question. I suppose it’s mostly wrapped up in family structure, a work schedule that’s doable, and camaraderie in heaping doses. The long and short of it is that it’s not that difficult to figure out. A large family doesn’t happen overnight. As year follows year, the children, by succession, grow into the tasks they’re capable of doing; a natural progression that creates its own order of work, from oldest to youngest.

Large family or not so large, the overall approach to cooperation remains much the same. Anyone who grew up on a farm knows firsthand about the busy season. It happens every spring on every farm and is apt to stretch into summer, and fall for that matter. The earth wakes up, farmers begin their fieldwork, the oats get sowed, the sun warms the soil to a certain temp, and then... boom!— everything happens at once. A fair amount of corn seed is in the ground by now, and a fair amount is still in the bags it was bought in, meaning planting season isn’t over yet. The hay crop is ready, and the weather is favorable for cutting it. At this point, the lady of the house drops not-so-subtle hints that she couldn’t think of a better time than right now to get the garden plowed and prepped.

The bottom line is there are only so many minutes in a day. No matter how fast the farmer picks up his feet and puts ‘em down, it’s not fast enough. Here’s where a large-size family shines, their superior numbers making short shrift of a big workload—the more, the merrier. On any work project, Dad, Mom, and older siblings provide leadership—actively promoting the spirit of teamwork.

Children generally respond favorably to situations where Dad or an older brother rolls up his sleeves and leads by example—“Watch me, here’s how you do it.”

From day one, these children grow up in an environment of working with a cheerful heart. Dads

try their hardest to set a pleasing tenor to the day, whistling, singing, telling stories. All the folks in the neighborhood operate in like manner. The children see it and sense it, day in, day out. They mimic it, and it becomes an integral part of how they go about it themselves. Another thing: parents put a high value on seeing their children happily finding their places in the family setting and discovering contentment in their world of work, play, and school days.

If you’re beginning to think all this sounds too fanciful and cookie-cutter perfect, let me show you another side to it. In a family made up of a dozen or more siblings, any one of ‘em is liable to get up on the wrong side of the bed on any given morning. More than likely, there’s a Curious George in the mix, too.

Trouble always seeks him out, no matter where he is or what he’s doing. Disagreements arise at any time for any reason. An older brother may take it upon himself to motivate an uninspired little brother who, in

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turn, gets seriously annoyed at Big Brother’s bossiness and purposely disrupts the workflow by acting the slowpoke. It’s all in a day’s work, the good and the notso-good. Camaraderie goes hand-in-hand with any sibling crew. In that regard, parents make allowances for a certain amount of monkey business. Wherever a dozen or so brothers and sisters work side by side, occasions for pranks arise on every hand, and few opportunities are altogether ignored. Many families possess a bumper crop of prankster lore, impressive in both scope and ingenuity.

Aside from that, the age-old tradition of dangling a carrot on a stick is just as effective today as in centuries past. Incentives such as the promise of an end-of-thesummer trip to the zoo do wonders in helping schoolage children bear the heat of the day while hoeing sweet corn rows. I know that for a fact; once I was the hoe-er, then I was the dad. Sometimes no particular incentive is offered or needed.

On the farm next to ours lives 11-year-old David Lee, the youngest of nine children, presently a 6th grader in Hickory Hollow School. For a number of years now, he’s been the official caregiver of the occupants in the calf pens—bottle feeding and so on. Each evening, year-round, David Lee helps milk their 40 cows. Every Thursday morning since he’s been nine and a half, the little feller rolls out at four o’clock and takes his turn as morning chore boy. Little stepping stones such as this may seem insignificant, but they aren’t. When his number comes, he’s up and doing.

The nice thing about it? David Lee gets to take a snooze after chores till it’s time to get ready for school.

In my experience, all work and no play was a nonfactor.

Children on every farm roundabout got time off to pursue hobbies—and still do. Pastimes in my own boyhood had to do with ponies, playing ball, the creek,

and anything outdoors. Horse-farming figures into family structure, too. A horse in harness requires water, oats, rest, and care—morning, noon, and evening— which brings the family together and sets an order to the day. In many larger families, the older siblings may have day jobs, but when suppertime rolls around, everyone’s home, everyone’s there to stick their feet under the table, and everyone’s talking. It’s the highlight of the day.

On occasions when there are grain sheaves to be set in shocks or hay to be put up, these older siblings lend their muscle and might, giving the family at home a welcome boost with the harvest. Exactly how produce farmers go about handling the workforce and the handpicking required in their operations is beyond me. I don’t know diddly about it... other than it all looks formidable.

To me, the best real-life paragon of large family cooperation revolves around a typical hay day on an Amish farm—or the way it used to be done. Once the hay is windrowed and ready to bale, Dad calls all hands on deck, top to bottom, boys and girls. Oftentimes the lineup spills into neighboring families. Dad oversees each part of the haymaking, helping out where needed, sometimes raking more windrows once the baling is underway. Grandpa handles the team pulling the baler.

The oldest children stack bales in the haymow because that’s where the hardest, warmest, sweatiest work takes place. Middle-bracket children ride the wagon hooked to the back of the baler, lifting the bales from the chute and stacking them in their proper place on the wagon.

Unloading the bales from the wagon to the elevator demands at least one sibling old enough to handle the job, reinforced by a couple of smaller children who roll the bales within reach. More little ones are scattered throughout, doing this, doing that, or doing nothing, delighted to be part of the goings-on.

On hay day, everyone is on their best behavior.

Even Curious George needs no intervention from the Man in the Yellow Hat. The littles, as yet exempt from

About Emily and Daniel Emily Hershberger with her husband and two children have an organic dairy near Mt Hope, Ohio. She enjoys farming, gardening, garage sales, and a good book.

Daniel and Mae live on a 93-acre farm between Walnut Creek and Trail, Ohio. Five children, hay-making, and Black Angus cattle take up any spare time after work at Carlisle Printing. Questions and comments welcome: 330-893-6043.

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"To me, the

best real-life paragon

of large family cooperation revolves around a typical hay day on an Amish farm—or the way it used to be done."

– Daniel Miller

work, caper about and get chaperoned rides to the field on empty wagons and return rides to the barn on the loaded wagons. Sisters work shoulder to shoulder with brothers, enjoying the outdoor work to the hilt.

At chore time, Mom ramrods a ragtag crew to get the milking done. On a just-unloaded flatbed wagon, Grandma serves up stacks of omelet sandwiches seasoned with a light dusting of alfalfa chaff and slathered with mayo. Everyone leans against the sides of the wagon, sunburned and ravenously hungry. Icecold chocolate milk in glass quart jars caps it all off.

Grandma smiles when she’s told that was the best meal ever, and everyone who says it means it from the bottom of their hearts.

Those were, and will always remain, the best of times. //

Submit Your Questions!

If there's a question you'd like The Roundtable to answer, email it to: reachout@plainvalues.com or mail it to: The Roundtable, P.O. Box 201 Winesburg, OH 44690

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COLUMN BY:

Melissa K. Norris

Homestead Living SPRING FORAGING

SOME KIDS HAVE MEMORIES of family vacations, going to theme parks, or road trips to the beach.

Not me.

Growing up, we didn’t take family vacations because my father worked all year long. However, we did go morel mushroom hunting.

Foraging was a term I learned long after I learned the art of it. Every spring, we would anxiously wait for the tell-tale signs that morel hunting was ready to begin. They usually pre-date the pasture, so on our way to feed the cows, we’d take advantage of the ever-lengthening days this side of the winter solstice and set off into the woods.

While unofficial, it was a contest to see who would spot the first morel. I’ve always been a tad competitive, but it was many a year until I was the first to best my dad.

We’d set off under the cottonwoods, my hand in Dad’s as we climbed over downed logs and brush to reach them. “Now sis, watch where you’re stepping, you’re as likely to step on one before you see it. Look under the side of the cottonwood with the longest branches, there’s always one side with longer ones than the other. The morels favor that side.”

Here in the Pacific Northwest, morel season is from the first of April to mid-May, depending on the weather. If we dry out too soon, the season is cut short; but oh, for those few weeks, we hunt and dine on morels like kings in a castle. And if you’ve ever seen the prices in stores, you’ll know I’m not exaggerating the kings in a castle part.

Little kids enjoy Easter egg hunts, but, to me, mushroom hunting is better than an Easter egg hunt, and it’s one I never tire of. Though I’ve often wondered if I would enjoy them so much if we could have them all the time. Is it really the flavor, or is it because it’s so rare?

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A few rules of morel hunting and foraging in general.

Never go foraging on private land. If you’re unsure, don’t go. It’s a sad state of affairs, but I’ve more than once had to ask people to leave my father’s property who were on it without permission, despite the no trespassing signs.

Morels are a mushroom and fungi. They prefer moist and cool temps, especially leaf-littered forest floors.

Here in our neck of the woods, they prefer cottonwood stands, old burn areas, or the edge of pastures.

One of the first things I do is look for leaves that are poking up. Not always, but often I’m rewarded when I lift the leaf with a morel’s wrinkly cap greeting me.

The best method I have found is to scan the ground in a grid-like pattern. Inspect the area as you would a map. Look at it from every angle, scanning the area a few feet in front of you, and then move out with your eyes while walking slowly.

PRO TIP: If you find one, look closely. They usually have a mate!

Harvest—Carefully cut or pinch off the morel leaving the stem intact. This leaves the root in the ground and allows it to produce morels again. If you pull up the stem and roots, you cut into future harvests.

Carry—I like to carry a mesh bag with me so the spores repopulate the area while I continue searching.

Be sure not to overfill whatever container you choose to place the morel mushrooms into. The weight of too many can smash the mushrooms and ruin them.

Clean— When you get the morels home, you will need to soak them overnight. Since they grow in the forest, they might have small bugs or worms on them.

If you can see lots of worms or bites, it’s best to discard them. Place the mushrooms in a bowl of cold water and sprinkle them with salt. Cover them completely and store them in the fridge overnight.

Morel mushrooms have a very distinct look and come in all sorts of colors. I have never found black morels, but I have found white and yellow.

Look for mushrooms that have a cone-shaped top with lots of deep crevices resembling a sponge. They will be hollow inside if they are true morel mushrooms.

(There are false morels—make sure you’re certain they’re correctly identified before consuming, and always cook them.)

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Our favorite way to cook morels is after an overnight saltwater soak, cut them in half and rinse them in cold running water. Lay on an absorbent towel to dry.

Beat a couple of eggs together in a medium bowl.

In another bowl, measure out a cup of flour or so, lightly sprinkle with seasoning salt, and combine.

In a large cast iron skillet, melt some butter on medium heat. Once the butter is hot, take your prepared mushroom and dip it in the beaten egg and then dredge it through the flour. Fry for a few minutes on each side. Lightly salt with garlic salt when you remove them.

This is a simple dish, but you will be surprised by the delicious flavor profile that hits your taste buds.

There is something about the arrival of spring that signals a craving for new and fresh. New emerging blades of grass, buds swelling, and the break of crocuses offer a feast for the eyes from the long bleak grays and browns of winter.

Though I am grateful for a pantry stocked full of dehydrated, canned, freeze-dried, and the very last of the root cellar items, come spring, my taste buds are also craving new and fresh items on the menu.

While I’m a gardener through and through, even with my best planning—carefully watching those overnight lows and clear skies that bring last-minute surprise freezes—I can never best nature. Thankfully, I can read the signs provided and enjoy the fruits of harvest I didn’t have to cultivate in any way. The first of these is the morel mushroom, and the second is stinging nettles.

Almost all my life, I’ve viewed stinging nettles as, well, a stinging nettle. I mean, those suckers can pack a zinger. Building forts as kids, we always managed to

get zapped by one of those pesky plants. They like to invade the yard and are a nuisance. Or so I thought.

Nettle leaf is truly amazing. It is packed—I mean packed—with vitamins and minerals, specifically: • Vitamins: A, C, K, and several of the B’s.

• Antioxidants (hello boosting the immune system and fighting off free radicals) • Minerals: calcium, iron, magnesium, phosphorus, and potassium • Amino Acids • Polyphenols That’s a whole lot of goodness; but wait, there’s more!

Some of the most common medicinal uses for nettle leaf are to help aid: • Seasonal Allergies • Prostate Issues (helps increase urination) • Decreasing Inflammation Harvest nettle leaves in the spring. It’s preferable to harvest the leaves before the nettles go to seed.

Wear gloves and protective clothing, long sleeves, pants, etc. Always harvest leaves where there’s no worry of chemicals or weed spray, aka, not next to a busy roadway or any roadway that’s maintained by the county or government; it’s most likely been sprayed or has pollution from motor vehicles.

Stinging Nettle Leaf Tea 1.

2.

3.

Place about 2 teaspoons of dried leaves in a tea strainer.

Pour boiling water over it and let it steep for 10 to 15 minutes.

Sip and enjoy! I like a cup in the morning and a cup in the evening.

Stinging Nettle Eggs 1.

2.

3.

In a large skillet, melt a pat of butter (or fat of choice, lard is also great) over medium heat.

Once hot, place a large handful of stinging nettles with a minced clove of garlic. Sauté until stinging nettles have shrunk down and are fully cooked.

Place on a plate and sprinkle with salt.

Fry an egg, cooked over easy, in a hot buttered pan. Place on top of cooked stinging nettles and enjoy.

Okay, you can cook the egg as runny or as done as you like, I prefer over easy because the yoke makes the nettles creamy, but I realize some have an aversion to that creamy goodness.

There is something about those first harvests of morels and stinging nettles that make me incredibly grateful for the food the Lord provides us. And there have been a few hunts when we jumped the gun and were a bit early, or the rains didn’t come, and it’s been shortened, where we don’t find any morels, or only a few.

It is at those times I’m reminded how fortunate we are not to have our meals fully dependent on what we can forage for a day.

I’m also thankful my father taught me how to find food in our woods because the skill he gave me is one I treasure beyond anything I may have learned in an amusement park.

Every time I take my own children, I know it is these simple moments, these simple tasks of finding our food from the forest floor, that will mean the most. //

Blessings and Mason jars,

Melissa Melissa K. Norris is a 5th generation homesteader who married a city boy… but that city boy quickly became a country boy and turned into a bonafide farmer when they moved to Melissa's family property. With their two children, they believe in keeping the old ways alive. She is an author, blogger, and podcaster. Learn more by visiting: www.melissaknorris.com.

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COLUMN BY:

Shawn & Beth Dougherty

Planting Potatoes IT'S THE FRIDAY BEFORE EASTER, potato-planting day. The whole family is in the garden patch where we grow Pontiac, Kennebec, and Yukon Gold potatoes. Putting in the potatoes is a big job—we grow a lot, as much as two tons, because they are a really significant part of our diet.

The soil was tilled yesterday in furrows three feet apart, dark streaks showing where last year’s mulch has decayed. We haul buckets of cut potatoes to the garden and divide into teams: one person to drop a piece of potato (sprouts up)every twelve inches or so; the second person, with a hoe, to cover it with a few inches of soil.

Teamwork We are often aware of how much farming has made us a family, a team, through our work together. Some folks go to Disney Land for a Together vacation; we stay home and work on a project. It’s easy to see how this has formed us over the years; the young people are good planners and problem solvers and know how to collaborate. Luke and Jess’s new deck includes nails put there by everyone in the family, down to their five-year-old son; the bricks in William and Ashley’s house were repointed by all the Dougherty women. The boys built us a barn in April of 2020, while most of America was trapped indoors by mandates. This isn’t just work for us; when we do it together, it’s fun.

So gardening is a family task. Beginning in January, when the first seed catalogs arrive, we make lists and charts of what to plant, where to plant it, and how much to grow. The children are as likely to take the lead as we are. They’ve known this routine all their lives; they have the experience and judgment, and they, too, will be eating the results.

Put in the ground on Good Friday, potatoes just seem to grow better. Planting times are one of the things our work is teaching us, one

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homestead planning, dairy management, and sheep care; workshops on canning, butchering, grazing, fermenting. It was wonderful how many people turned out to learn about growing their own food. We met folks new to the area and old-timers who had been here for generations. Ties were forged, and everyone went away with new information, fresh resolve.

It turns out our community is a real mix! A local family doctor milks a cow before breakfast; so does the brickmason down the road. Matt is a computer operator who works remotely, Gwen is the mother of eleven; both milk cows, grow gardens to feed their families. Young couples with small children raise dairy goats, keep laying hens; one family just starting out has planted a you-pick flower garden. In the nearby town are many folks who keep a few chickens and fill their yards with vegetables, fruits, and flowers.

The Healing Land

Just up the road, neighbors and family have been planting potatoes as well. As much as the food, the sharing of knowledge and community are fruits of homesteading. New people move in, not knowing this place and its soil, its climate; folks just starting out in gardening or animal husbandry have questions, need assistance with difficulties. Neighbors can be there to help.

So, last spring our community took the initiative to meet this need and offer help on a larger scale.

The Healing Land homestead group held a whole

Lunch over, the family disperses to its own tasks, some to farm work, some to work of other kinds.

Pulling together the resources to make another Homesteading Skills Festival happen takes a lot of time— and people. Johanna, mother of six, spends hours, squeezed in between all the duties of a homeschool mom, on the computer coordinating our event.

Terry builds spreadsheets of presenters, workshops, and finances—although we operate on a shoestring, accounting is still necessary! Luke, as a farrier, sheep shearer, and itinerant butcher, gets around a lot, finds skilled people and asks for their help with workshops and advice. Brian—the family doctor with the milk cow— often advises patients who need access to better food; many are anxious to get involved in a neighborhood food initiative. We Doughertys are the old-timers of the homesteading community, sharing our experience, making connections.

In May, the potatoes planted this morning will have sprouted, poking their first tiny, dark green leaves, deeply creased like tiny mouse ears, above the soil.

Given warm weather, they will grow quickly, and just as quickly we must be there to hoe the sprouting weeds and hill around the plants. When the spring rains are over we’ll spread a deep mulch to keep the soil moist.

Then, in July, we’ll get the whole family out again to dig

day of workshops, and over three hundred folks from five states attended. There were talks on

under the dying vines for the generous harvest of red, brown, and gold potatoes we pray will be there.

of the helps we are passing on to one another. Timing the potatoes right can mean the difference between great potatoes and an only so-so crop. By the end of the morning we have almost 2,000 planted, two-tenths of an acre. We head to the house for lunch; Beowulf, the farm dog, who has been bored by our steady work, races ahead, barking at sparrows to show that he’s on the job.

Growing the Community

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The Healing Land Homestead Skills Festival will take place on Memorial Day weekend this year.

Important as that harvest is to us—a staple for a whole year—the human harvest is more important still.

Farming is partly about food, yes, but it’s also about community, about place. And place is a function of the people who live there. No matter how much food we grow or how delicious or nutritious it is, it is our relationships that will really determine the quality of our lives. If we are to be fed, if we are to be healthy, if we are to be happy, it will be because we—all of us— make this a good place to live, and help one another live well in it.

You're Invited!

The Healing Land Homestead Skills Festival will take place on Memorial Day weekend this year. We’ve moved to a new site, a bigger one, better suited to the many families who plan to come, with space for

demonstrations, for children to run and play, for music and dancing, tents and campfires. Elkhorn Christian Service Camp in Carroll County is hosting us, and we anticipate bringing together many folks from all over the region and the nation, with whom we can build community, share knowledge, make friends.

Next winter, God allowing, we will be eating the potatoes we put in the ground just before Easter, drowning them in butter and sour cream from our dairy cows. Good food is a celebration all by itself.

Equally, we hope to rest at night in the knowledge of our fellowship with a community that is continuing to grow, in friendship, in skills, and in strength, with people all over the country who are finding their way toward an ever-deepening connection to their families, their neighborhoods, and their land—their Healing Land. //

Shawn and Beth Dougherty live in eastern Ohio, where their home farm is 17-acres designated by the state as "not suitable for agriculture." Using grass as the primary source of energy, they raise dairy and beef cows, sheep, farm-fed hogs, and a variety of poultry, producing most of their food, and feed, on the farm. They are also the authors of The Independent Farmstead, published by Chelsea Green Pub.

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COLUMN BY:

Ferree Hardy

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HOW LONG DOES GRIEF LAST? That’s a question for which we all want the answer.

But people and circumstances are so varied that no one can say how long it goes. It lasts as long as it lasts, and it always lasts too long. In our drive-through society, we want things done quickly, but grief is a process that’s not bound to a schedule. It’s hard to measure.

But, just as an electrocardiogram (EKG) records the electrical signal from the physical heart, we can use the letters E—K—G to measure conditions in our grieving heart. It gives us some clues about where we could use some help. The more help we get, the better equipped we are to do this process, and the less likelihood of getting stuck in it. Let’s take a look at an “EKG” for a grieving heart and see where we stand. This is not a substitute for, nor is it intended to be, medical advice.

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"What does my “EKG” indicate for your grieving heart? Test yourself again in six months and see how things have changed."

• • •

E—Express yourself and Exercise K—Know God and Know what you need to know about grief G—Gather with people and practice Gratitude

E—Express Yourself and Exercise *Are you expressing yourself enough? Talk it out.

We all need to talk about our losses. Losing a loved one is often overwhelming and hard to put into words, but talking about it is very therapeutic.

Talk to a friend who is able to listen without trying to fix things or correct you. They should respect your honesty and be strong enough themselves to carry some of your burden. It’s good to have more than one person to talk to, so also talk to God. Try praying out loud; it does us good to hear our own voice. God cares, and He has the power to truly help us in times of need.

Talk to your doctor soon after losing your loved one. Get a baseline on your health so that in the months to come, you’ll be able to see if stress is taking a toll on your sleep patterns or eating habits.

There are creative ways of expression too. Write in a journal as often as you like. Some people write several times throughout the day, while others write only once every couple of weeks. Writing poetry helps. If you’ve been itching to write a book, get started! If you don’t care for writing, express yourself with art or hobbies. *Do you get enough exercise? It's an amazing help.

Exercise aids grief recovery in so many ways. The body feels better and looks better, the emotions get a lift, and it gives you something to accomplish. A twentyminute walk works wonders, and it doesn’t require a gym membership. I set a timer and circle through my kitchen and living room when I can’t go outside. If you can’t fit in twenty minutes, take five or ten a couple of times a day. Start with what you can do and gradually work up. Be sure to ask your doctor in case you need to avoid particular exercises.

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pleased with your answer? If not, why not? What has to change in order to improve?

K—Know God and Know What You Need to Know About Grief *Know God, and cling to Him on this journey.

The death of a spouse is one of the most stressful events of a lifetime. Values, routines, finances, plans, and dreams are all upended. The presence of God is the only solid footing for the soul. There are times when even faith, as we are accustomed to it, can give out.

But it’s during those dark times that faith proves true.

Eventually we realize how massive God Himself truly is, and how very small we are in comparison. That He would send His Son, Jesus Christ, to take the blame and punishment we deserve becomes a true solace in grief.

We learn that in His perfect time and wisdom, He cares; He provides. For “He that spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also freely give us all things?” (Romans 8:32). *Know what you need to know about grief.

You don’t need to know everything, but you should know a few things. Here are some basics: Grief: it’s when we feel sad about a loss, particularly the death of a person. It’s also possible to grieve about the loss of a possession like a home, a body part or function, a pet, or anything stolen away. Loss of a daily routine or job, loss of a hoped-for future, loss of identity, etc., can all cause grief to one degree or another.

Compounded grief: when your loss is a combination of any of the losses just mentioned. Many a widow experiences compounded grief: she not only lost her husband, she has also lost daily routine, identity as a wife, and dreams for her future.

Complicated grief: has the addition of trauma, PTSD, multiple deaths, unresolved grief, abuse, suicide, clinical depression, and more. I’m an advocate for good counseling at any time, but if you think you might be dealing with complicated grief, do not hesitate to talk to a wise and experienced counselor.

There’s also unresolved grief from prior losses and pre-grieving, which can happen when facing a known and undesirable outcome.

What type of grief are you experiencing? Identifying the type can help you determine the next step to take. Next steps might involve knowing God better, committing to exercise more, choosing a way to express your thoughts and feelings, and finding a counselor.

G—Gather with People and Practice Gratitude * Gather with people.

Do you feel the walls of your house or apartment closing in on you? When “the silence is deafening,” it’s time to be with people! A trip to the grocery store, mall, or local diner is a good start. Just get around people even though you might not talk to them. Or, invite someone to lunch or coffee. Get back to church.

Try a new Bible study group. Find a GriefShare group in your area at www.griefshare.org. Visit your local library—spend the afternoon there with a good book or a free class. Volunteer in your community. Why not go to Winesburg, Ohio? Visit Plain Values magazine for the “Porch Time” gathering on the third Friday of each month from 1:00 pm to 4:00 pm. Say “hello” to Marlin Miller and his great team for me, and that you and I connect through this column.

Choose to gather with people—it’s like good medicine. It’s true that solitude is also a healing part of grief but be careful not to isolate yourself. Extended isolation makes grief worse. Find a balance that works for you. *Practice Gratitude.

We hear new benefits of practicing gratitude every day. It’s right up there with exercise. In my book,

"We will always miss the loved one who died, but eventually, the weight of the sorrow will lighten."

Postcards from the Widows’ Path, when the widow Naomi expressed gratitude, everything began to change for the better. (Chapter 14). What are you thankful for today? List at least three different things every day for three weeks, and people will start to see a difference.

What sort of goals for gathering and gratitude will you work on?

What does my “EKG” indicate for your grieving heart? Test yourself again in six months and see how things have changed. We will always miss the loved one who died, but eventually, the weight of the sorrow will lighten. It becomes bearable, and the memory of them becomes precious and priceless. We can become so grateful they were a part of our life that we wouldn’t trade this path for anything less. // Until next month,

ferree l

To learn more about widowhood, order a copy of Postcards from the Widows’ Path—Gleaning Hope and Purpose from the Book of Ruth. It’s a gentle, biblical guide for widows that has many saying, “This is the best I’ve ever read!” Mail a check for $14.99/copy (paperback, 248 pgs.), along with your address to: Ferree Hardy, 76 Grace Ave., Ticonderoga, NY 12883. Please allow 2-3 weeks for delivery. Free shipping for all Plain Values readers!

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COLUMN BY:

Wendy Cunningham

Honest Conversations with Wendy

A RELU C TAN T HO ME SC HO OL MOM “ABSOLUTELY NOT. NOT MY THING.” That was my response when my husband hinted at his desire for me to homeschool our kids. At the time, we had a three-year-old, a one-year-old, a baby on the way, and I ran a successful business from home. To say I didn’t have the time wouldn’t paint the full picture—I wanted nothing to do with it. Besides, I was a product of public school, as was my husband, and we were doing just fine (thank you very much).

When I lived in the West, homeschooling was both foreign and frightening for a number of reasons. Namely, no one I’d ever met was homeschooled or homeschooled their children. Even if I wanted to, I wouldn’t have known the first thing about where to begin such an endeavor.

Once we moved to rural Tennessee—where homeschooling is not only normal, it’s celebrated, and resources and support are in abundance—I briefly considered the idea again. But how could I ever pull it off? I wasn’t a teacher. Although I had my bachelor’s degree, it was in theater performance, for goodness’ sake. And besides, I worked! There was just no way. So, I did what so many parents do by default.

I sent my daughter off to kindergarten at the local public school.

Conviction from Holy Spirit came almost immediately. If you’ve been reading along with me over these past months, you know I receive my biggest breakthroughs in the shower. This was no exception. One evening, only a few short weeks into my daughter’s education, I felt Holy Spirit impress upon me something I’d skipped in my decision-making on this topic.

I hadn’t prayed about it.

"I felt Holy Spirit impress upon me something I’d skipped in my decision-making on this topic.

I hadn’t prayed about it."

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In the five years I’ve been homeschooling, I’ve had many conversations with moms about whether or not educating at home is right for their families. The chat always ends with, “I’ll pray about it.” To which I respond, “Did you pray about public school?” The surprised smile always gives them away. Like me, they hadn’t. It was just the expected course of action.

As I showered, a little embarrassed about my rash decision to surrender an enormous amount of influence over my child without even praying about it, Holy Spirit pushed me a little further, and I began to wonder…

Does God have an opinion about education?

Turns out, He does!

Scripture is clear in some areas, and it’s gray in others. I certainly subscribe to the idea that we needn’t yell where God is whispering and vice versa. Although one could argue that the role of “government” can be debated in Biblical terms, you’ll be hard-pressed to find anywhere that suggests education should be the government’s responsibility. Scripture tells us plainly where the role of educator lies. It certainly isn’t in the hands of governing authorities, and perhaps surprisingly for Christians, it also isn’t in the hands of the Church.

God suggests it’s the family’s responsibility.

Ephesians 6:4 says, “Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord.” The word used here in the Greek is paideia. The definitions of paideia according to word study are as follows: rearing of a child; training and education of children; instruction. The Greek lexicon goes so far as to say, “The whole training and education of children (which relates to the cultivation of mind and morals…).” Paideia speaks to the culture of a child’s upbringing as well as instruction—the foundation. I’m not confident public school provides an appropriate culture or foundation for any child’s upbringing, let alone a Christian child. And furthermore, God didn’t give my children to public schools. He gave them to my husband and me.

Now dads, as the above Scripture suggests, you’re not off the hook. God doesn’t explicitly relegate this job to moms, despite our nurturing nature. It was my husband who suggested I should homeschool our kids, but he’s the one making sure my son can read

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"In my searching, I found twice as many commands for fathers to instruct their kids when compared to mothers."

a tape measure and the one teaching the kids how to operate a tractor. In my searching, I found twice as many commands for fathers to instruct their kids when compared to mothers. In practice, yes, I think most households find that mamas are at the center of homeschooling, but at the very least, this brings fathers more exposure to their children for discipline, correction, and training—which God assigns as their duty. As a matter of fact, the role of discipline falls entirely to dads in the Scripture, and yet so frequently, Mom plays the role of disciplinarian. The father’s influence and his Biblical roles have been all but removed in so many Christian homes due largely to a lack of opportunity.

It’s a scheduling conflict.

And let’s not forget the abundant chance for learning and discipline that authentically takes place in the home on an average day. Most parents feel disqualified from teaching because of the lack of certification. I would argue there is no one more qualified than the parent who will deal with the consequences of an adult who never learns to thrive, but I digress. For those of you who homestead, you can’t imagine how many opportunities for real-life learning lie at your fingertips. During my daughter’s one (long) year in public school, she missed the first chickens hatching, the first blooms in the garden, the baby pigs being born, and the two dozen loaves of zucchini bread we baked after our first harvest. These daily miracles allow for ample topics of conversation, research, reading, and even a chance to dive into the Bible. At a recent Rogue Food Conference, I heard Congressman Thomas Massie say he didn’t homeschool his kids; he homesteaded them.

So, should we step into reluctant obedience and homeschool, forcing down our inclinations and commitments to align with God’s will for our family? Yes and no. Yes, because we always want to be in alignment with God’s will, right? And no, because one could argue we don’t have to do anything reluctantly when we trust it’s for our very best. Was I the most prepared and optimistic homeschool mom when I decided to take the plunge? Absolutely not. I was terrified, unprepared, overwhelmed, and ill-equipped.

But lucky me. God doesn’t call the equipped. He equips the called.

Proverbs 22:6 tell us, “Train up a child in the way he should go; even when he is old he will not depart from it.” This is my hope. This is my anchor on the hard days.

This is where I draw strength when I’m certain God has picked the wrong gal for the job. I don’t mind if my child isn’t a wiz at math, but if they fear the Lord, they have wisdom. If they learn to discern the voice of God, I know I have prepared them for every trial and temptation this world will surely throw at them. Traditional school doesn’t teach them to fear or hear the Lord. As a matter of fact, most education systems and unbelieving peers will encourage them to question their faith.

Y’all, God has given us an assignment: The stewarding of souls. It’s not a responsibility I take lightly, and it’s certainly not a job I feel prepared to pass off to someone else. When it comes down to it, I have to remind myself of one important truth: As a mom, my job is to ensure my child is healthy, happy, safe, and loved.

But what good is any of that if my child never enters the Kingdom of Heaven?

Discipleship is my most important role as a parent. As a former atheist, I know how vital this is and how eternal the implications are. Seventy percent of our youth are leaving the Church in or by college, according to Barna Research. Only six percent of those claiming a Christian faith hold a Biblical worldview. We’re hemorrhaging, Church. We’re failing in our most important endeavor. How can we rely on

a few hours on Sunday and Wednesday to override more than 18,000 hours of public education (and that’s excluding college)?

Now for some encouragement. Although I didn’t want to homeschool, and I still work from home—now more than before I began—and I still feel like I have no idea what I’m doing a lot of the time, homeschooling has been the biggest blessing of my life as a parent. My obedience has assured my success.

"Instead of asking what obstacles you’ll have to overcome to step into such a challenge, I’d invite you to dream about the memories you’re going to make."

Isn’t that the funniest thing about trusting God? When we don’t get all the English done and haven’t picked up Spanish in two months, God is faithful to show me the miracles unfolding in my living room. In the middle of science, my seven-year-old gives me a glimpse into his tiny mind as he proclaims, “Mom, did you know God can’t lie?” Or, in the midst of World War 1 history, my nine-year-old decides he’s ready to give his heart to Jesus. Who would be on the receiving end of those blessings if I were not the one present? Would such moments even be happening at all?

Instead of asking what obstacles you’ll have to overcome to step into such a challenge, I’d invite you to dream about the memories you’re going to make. I hope you’ll be inspired by the relationships you will build with your kids—and them with each other. But more than anything else, I pray you recognize that during the struggle, God’s very best for both you and your children is waiting. // ~ until next month, Wendy

Wendy Cunningham is wife to Tom and homeschool mom to three amazing gifts from God. In addition to that calling, she is an entrepreneur and author. Her book What If You’re Wrong?, blog, and devotionals can be found at gainingmyperspective.com. She is also host of the podcast Gaining My Perspective. Wendy loves Jesus and inspiring people to step into their calling—whatever that might look like in this season. When she’s not working, writing, traveling, or podcasting, she can be found homesteading and chasing kids and cows on her farm in Middle Tennessee.

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WORDS BY: Nic Stoltzfus

BOTH HANDS is a Tennessee-based non-profit with a mission of fulfilling James 1:27 by serving orphans, widows, and Christian adoptive families. Since Both Hands began, they have raised $16.5 million for adoptions and orphan causes through 1,209 projects serving 1,346 widows and 1,451 orphans.

But it all started twenty years ago with just one little note.

Back in 2003, JT Olson was heading up a charity golf tournament to raise funds for Bethany Christian Services. When he sent a letter to his friend asking for money, his friend sent the letter back, no money included, but instead with a sticky note scribbled with this message: “JT, if you told me you were working on a widow’s house, I might sponsor you, but you’re just golfing. Nice cause, but not my money.”

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"One thing that sets Both Hands apart from other adoption fundraisers and websites like GoFundMe is that Both Hands doesn’t take anything out for their operating costs. That’s right, 100% of the funds a family raises goes towards their adoption..."

The note was pointed, but the idea stuck in JT’s head—what if he did a fundraiser to help widows?

Would it be more effective than a golf tournament or a 5K run?

JT would have the chance to test out the idea a few years later. After church one Sunday, one of his friends, Don, approached him. Don told JT that he was adopting four children from Moldova. This came as a shock to JT—Don already had three biological children, and now he was going to add four more?! JT asked Don what led him to want to adopt these four children. Don told him that he had gone to Moldova on a mission trip delivering beds to orphanages, and a little boy named George captured his heart, and they were inseparable the whole week. After Don got home, he talked with his wife, and they decided to adopt George. In the process, they discovered that George had three other siblings,

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and Don and his wife didn’t want to separate the children. Don said that the total cost for the adoption of the kids was estimated to be seventy to eighty thousand dollars, and he had no idea how he was going to raise the money.

Without hesitation, JT told his friend that he would do whatever he could to help raise the money to keep the children together. It was time to put his friend’s sticky note idea to work. He was going to do a project that would help both orphans and widows. JT decided to call the project “Both Hands,” taking their inspiration from James 1:27—one hand for the widow, one hand for the orphan.

Don and JT recruited fifteen friends of theirs. They all sent out letters saying that they would be serving a local widow, Miss Lucille, with help around her home (landscaping, decluttering, skilled labor, and painting).

In the letters, they asked people to sponsor them, with all of the funds going towards the adoption costs for George and his siblings.

Around thirty-five people showed up on the volunteer day to help Miss Lucille. Their supporters sent in donations. The total amount? About seventy thousand dollars raised! Finally, Don and his wife had enough funds to adopt, and George and his siblings found their forever home in Nashville, Tennessee.

This first project set the foundation for Both Hands’ purpose: to help Christian adoptive families fund their adoptions by coordinating a service project fixing up a widow’s home.

Adoption is expensive. In fact, studies continue to show it’s the #1 reason families who want to adopt aren’t able to move forward, with costs ranging from $30,000-$70,000. This is where Both Hands comes in.

Their average project raised a total of $22,000 from 2021-2022, making them the highest yielding adoption fundraiser out there.

One thing that sets their ministry apart from other adoption fundraisers and websites like GoFundMe is that Both Hands doesn’t take anything out for their operating costs. That’s right, 100% of the funds a family raises goes towards their adoption, and Both Hands has a "No Funds Guarantee" pledge for adoptions.

To cover its operating costs, Both Hands does a yearly Vision Project. This is the only fundraiser that the organization does, so the more funds that are raised in the Vision Project, the more families they can help. This year’s Vision Project takes place on May 6 in Franklin, Tennessee. The goal is to raise $350,000.

If you want to support the 2023 Both Hands Vision Project, you can make a donation by visiting www. bothhands.org/vision or by writing a check payable to “Both Hands” and mailing it to this address:

Both Hands Attn: Vision Project 2023 P.O. Box 2713, Brentwood, TN 37024 write "Vision Project 2023" in the memo line www.bothhands.org/vision Nic Stoltzfus is the editorial manager at Plain Values magazine.

He and his wife Jen live in Reading, Pennsylvania, with their three crazy cats and rescue dog, Paul. They hope to have children soon!

Nic loves volunteering in his community—he is teaching Sunday school next spring, is involved with the Schuylkill River Passenger Rail Authority’s plan to bring back passenger rail to Berks County, and he serves as secretary of the Nicholas Stoltzfus Homestead Preservation Committee. He is currently working on a novel about the immigrant Stoltzfus family.

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WORDS BY:

Rebecca Greenfield

HE WAS ONLY 10. Jimms was a good boy, still carrying with him the innocence of a child and wonder of youth. He was loved by his family and playful like children are. It was just another Ugandan day. The Bush War continued, but civilians went about their lives, always aware of the threats that existed but choosing hope in order to sustain some form of normalcy. The morning had come. It was time for school. As Mama helped Jimms get on his way, she had full intentions of seeing him return after his day of classes. But unbeknownst to her, this day would be a day of sorrow. This day would be a day of great loss. This was the day her heart desperately hoped she would never have to endure.

As Jimms walked to school, he was abducted by rebels. He would remain in captivity for three years. Not only would he see and experience unspeakable atrocities, but he would also be the subject of physical and mental abuse, leaving him deformed. The boy Mama once cradled had now become a man—doing, seeing, and experiencing things a 10-year-old should never have to endure.

Many children, like Jimms, have been captured to be used as child soldiers in the brutal wars of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DR Congo) and Uganda.

Thanks to Exile International, Jimms’ story doesn’t end in sorrow. Instead, his story ends with hope, redemption, and purpose. Jimms is one of many children who have been given a healthy, peaceful future because of the rehabilitation programs and genuine love from the counselors at Exile International.

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Bethany Haley Williams in Uganda

After Jimms was rescued, he began working with Exile to start the healing journey to treat significant PostTraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). Jimms was placed in a safe host home, received regular meals, and began attending school. But this wasn’t a simple fix. Jimms had a great deal of trauma to work through, and this impacted his commitment to Exile, but it didn’t impact Exile’s commitment to him. Jimms dropped out of school and tried for a time to live away from Exile’s support. But just like the love of Jesus, Exile pursued Jimms, bringing him back into the programs and therapy. Through the dedication of counselors and staff at Exile, Jimms began finding emotional healing. Discovering his giftings and skills, he became trained as a welder. After a few years, Jimms transitioned from a broken victim to a leader in his community, training others in the trade of welding and living a life full of purpose.

This is just one small glimpse into the thousands of transformational stories that have occurred as a result of the Christ-centered and dedicated programming of Exile. In just 15 years, over 50,000 children have been impacted. In 2008, Bethany Haley Williams traveled to Congo’s war zone, where she met child soldiers and orphans who had been rescued. Bethany had a Ph.D. in counseling with a background in psychology and

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social work. She was recovering from her own personal trauma. Her own healing process helped her identify with the trauma these children were facing. She learned about the atrocities of child soldiers who were forced to kill their own families, little girls being captured for sex trafficking, and families who had forsaken these children because of the violent acts they were brainwashed to commit. Initially, Bethany began to question, “Where are you, God?” in these children, in these war-torn lives, but then she realized, “The answer lies in the mirror.

The question isn’t, ‘Where is God?’ He is beside these children when they are afraid in the bush. He is holding their hand when they are abducted and running from rebels. He is right there with them on the battlefield

"The question is not, ‘Where are you, God?’ The question we should all be asking is, ‘Where are we?’

Where are we in this story, and what is our role...”

"Over 6 million children have been left orphaned without any home or stability to return to should they even escape their captivity.

Exile International provides hope for these rescued children..." and in the midst of the bullets. The question is not, ‘Where are you, God?’ The question we should all be asking is, ‘Where are we?’ Where are we in this story, and what is our role in making the ending look different than the beginning?” So, Bethany returned to America and began to research ways to create a solution. She visited Uganda and made trips back to Congo. There she met Pastor Joseph, who is now the country director of Congo. At that time, he had already been working to help these children, but the organization he was partnered with was only a temporary band-aide, providing immediate crisis relief but no long-term care.

He, too, longed to do so much more. When Bethany met Pastor Joseph, their hearts were aligned. They had a vision for children to go from child soldiers to leaders of peace—for holistic rehabilitation.

Bethany networked with various agencies and researched what was and was not working.

She vetted a variety of curriculums to determine which had tested and proven transformative results. Soon Exile International was born with the mission of “Empowering rescued child soldiers & children orphaned by war to become leaders for peace through art-focused trauma care & holistic rehabilitation.” About three years into Exile’s mission, Matthew Williams, a master’s level trauma therapist who shared the same passion and experience of working with traumatized youth in developing countries, began volunteering at Exile. Eventually, the two became married and ran Exile International as co-CEOs. Throughout the war period in Congo and Uganda, over 100,000 children were abducted and forced to become child soldiers, some as young as

6, with an average age of 12 years old. These children are brainwashed, forced to carry guns, and forced to kill, sometimes their own parents and siblings. Young boys and girls are captured and held hostage as sex slaves. Over 6 million children have been left orphaned without any home or stability to return to should they even escape their captivity. Exile International provides hope for these rescued children through art-focused trauma care, conflict resolution, and peace-building curriculums.

Exile focuses on healing spirits, minds, and bodies.

After the child is welcomed to Exile, they are evaluated for their level of trauma so that the counselors and staff have a better understanding of the support the child will need. The child is then invited into art-centered therapy, which involves singing, worship, dancing, and drawing— all with the purpose of helping them share their story, exposing their pain to the restorative power of Christ.

This helps the child find healing, joy, and a reason to smile again. Healing minds through education and leadership development, Exile works with gifted

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“'Jesus is the first counselor we have.' The love that is shown is the love of Christ. A child may walk away from Exile, but Exile continues to pursue." counselors who are native to the location to mentor, support, pursue, and walk hand-in-hand with the recovering child. Many of these counselors have been victims themselves to the wars but have found victory through God’s work in Exile. They are now able to empower younger victims to also grow into freed leaders of peace. All of these healing programs are provided in the safety and security of Exile’s third cause, healing bodies. Exile ensures that children are placed in safe homes. Some families will not receive their children back because of the disgrace caused or the heinous crimes the children were forced to commit against them.

Additionally, many children are orphaned as a result of the war. Exile ensures that the child is either reunited

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with their family or a host home, similar to an American version of the foster system. Exile also provides other basic needs such as medical care and food security.

The key has always been Christ. Doreen, a female counselor from Uganda, said, “Jesus is the first counselor we have.” The love that is shown is the love of Christ. A child may walk away from Exile, but Exile continues to pursue. Exile runs towards the wounded, the dysfunctional, the broken, and the layers of complicated pain and becomes a strong, steady source of emotional and physical support. Everything starts and ends with prayer. The counselors bear the pain of recovery alongside these children, meeting the child where they are and drawing them into freedom.

Deuteronomy 31:8 says, “The LORD himself goes before you and will be with you; he will never leave you nor forsake you.” This is how Exile relentlessly reflects the image of God. They understand the darkness and bondage these children have faced. They understand the tremendous amount of courage it takes to overcome the trauma experienced during such formative years. And many of these staff understand firsthand, as that was their life until Exile met them with the same pursuing love of God. Co-CEO, Matthew Williams, reflects, “There is no better place for them to go in that country other than Exile. There is no other option… we provide the highest level of care that you can get. The others are transit centers.” Children are evaluated every six months to assess their progress and ensure favorable outcomes. 37 out of 44 of Exiles’ care programs are led by graduates who once were child soldiers or slaves themselves, 95% of sponsorship program beneficiaries complete their education, and 78% of children experience a decrease in PTSD symptoms. “These programs are literally pushing back the darkness,” says Matthew Williams.

Jaxon was one of these examples. On his way to school, he was captured at age 15. He remained in captivity for a year. After being rescued, he came to the Exile center. There, he was empowered to change his behavior, but because of his past, the community was not ready for his re-entry. Exile worked with the community and Jaxon. Jaxon is now a pastor, impacting his community for the Kingdom of God instead of a kingdom of war. Francine is another example. At age 16, she was one of the ladies in the rebel group. She described it as, “hell on earth.” When she came to Exile, she felt life was meaningless, and in her anguish would ask why she had to go into the bush. Why her? Coco, a counselor at Exile, said they kept reminding her in big and small situations how much they loved her and how much God loves her. Through therapy, Francine’s confidence has been restored, and she is currently studying to be a doctor. It is stories like these that show the redemptive work of God through Exile International.

“Every child is important. Give these children a chance to enjoy, to have a life and a chance to smile,” says Doreen, a counselor in Uganda. “Even though the guns are silent, there is still a lot of work to be done,” reminds Geoffrey, Executive Director of Exile

International in Uganda. These children need to see the love of God and experience the healing power of Jesus. Exile believes deeply in the power of prayers, not only praying for the children but praying for those who partner with their mission. If God is moving your heart to become involved, you can help by financially giving to Exile International, 3534 West End Ave, Nashville, TN 37205, or visit www.exileinternational.org. You could also become a child champion through monthly or onetime giving. Whether big or small, financial or spiritual, God will use any and all support to help one more child find peace. //

Exile International 3534 West End Ave., Nashville, TN 37205 www.exileinternational.org

Rebecca Greenfield is a certified Nuclear Medicine Technologist who carries a Master's Degree in Theological Studies. She is blessed to pursue both of her passions, science and theology, by working in nuclear medicine and at Lifeline Christian Mission. One of her deepest desires is to create spaces and places where people can experience the presence of God through the power of written art.

She is the author of five books including, RAW Inner Workings of a Reawakened Soul, The Prayer Crossing Personal Devotional, and her most recent release, a children’s book called Dusternuffle. To order a copy of any of her books, visit www.Rebecca-Greenfield. com or make checks payable to Reawakened Ministries ($16.99/ copy) and mail to Cross Point Christian Church, Attn: Rebecca Greenfield, 10659 Johnstown Rd., New Albany, OH 43054.

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