Posted on 12/04/2023 11:58:02 AM PST by Morgana
My testimony when I jumped the fence and left the Amish lifestyle behind me and joined the English lifestyle.
(Mr. Eli Yoder left the Amish to follow Jesus Christ. Video is 30 minutes long so may want to bookmark for later. Mr. Yoder exposes the good and evil in the Amish community)
(Excerpt) Read more at youtube.com ...
I think one of the good things about the Amish is their emphasis on practical matters. Only getting enough education for the jobs they want to do, for example. Not requiring people to spend hundreds of thousands just so they end up working as a security guard or barista.
There are many good things about the Amish.
But too much emphasis is on traditions, and not necessarily biblical.
This guy talks about their work ethic but there is much more to them.
I love his stories.
But too much emphasis is on traditions, and not necessarily biblical.
But this could be said of various sects of orthodox jews and mormons, jehovah witness, huterites. These are communities that have been in the USA for over a century or three. We don’t know much about the millions coming over the border now. Likely some of them belong to tight knit communites.
The deep problem is that American culture now so radioactively toxic—that people really need as much mooring in some kind of culture—bibilical or otherwise—to keep them properly moored.
This was not the case 60 years ago when there was a decent culture to assimilate into. Now there is none.
“This was not the case 60 years ago when there was a decent culture to assimilate into. Now there is none.”
But with the Amish that was not the case 60 years ago, or much before that.
Find a Bible Church to Springen into.
I disagree. There is "a decent culture to assimilate into" in the U.S. today. I know plenty of "evangelical" Christians black and white who IMHO exemplify much good. Unfortunately we're not front and center in any kind of media or education as part of how the left defines who America is today. We need to do a better job of saying the quiet masses represent America more than the loud left does.
I suppose you’re now an expert on the Amish too?
This guy has a bunch of stuff on Tik Tok, too. I enjoy some of it. Love the Amish., though they remind me of the mormons. Lots of good in them, certainly. Plenty of attempts to hide the bad, though. With mormons, you see the fakeness of it all.
I guess you did. OTOH, Is it hard to instead go to a different Amish community?
‘I know plenty of “evangelical” Christians black and white who IMHO exemplify much good.’
is the above the sum total of what you consider ‘exemplifying much good’?
I don’t love the Amish at all. Terrible to women. Plus, they run puppy mills with dog piled in cruel wire crates one on top of the other. Overbreed poor little girl dogs til they die.
This jerk can go suck rocks.
I agree with your point about evangelical christians black and white. Agree too that they participate less and less in popular culture. Not for want of trying so as that they are excluded.
I do that myself.
But emigrants and americans alike are given all kinds of false signals by the liberal media.
Terrible to women? You mean the women work as hard as the men? (if so, I would agree.)
Peter Santenello
They represent most of the people I know who live exemplary lives of raising kids in marriage, treating others with love and respect, finding honor in personal responsibility instead of demanding a handout, and being happy with the good things in life instead of looking for excuses to be angry because the Dim media tells them to.
For 300 years the Amish have been known as the 'silent in the land' but now a growing number of them are breaking the silence
[music]
Rebecca Graber: I loved being Amish
I loved the old fashioned ways
I would have wanted to be more old fashioned than most of the Amish were
Joseph Graber: For several hundred years the Graber family has been Amish
My parents, Lester and Rebecca Graber had 7 children.....
In this episode we will hear my family's story
And we will find the answer to the question, "What happens when an Old Order Amish man starts studying the Bible?" Peter Marshall Graber: When my Grandpa was Amish um, he preached in the Amish Church
Joseph: As a boy I felt important because my Dad was an Amish Minister and I would sit with him on the front bench
I loved hearing him preach
We kept all the rules and were good examples of what it means to be Amish
Rebecca: Coming home after dark in the buggy everybody together and Dad is singing up front
The buggy wheels rattling on the gravel and then on the black top
The horses hoofs going clip clop, clip clop, I loved that sound
When my Dad had the reins and everybody was on the buggy all was right with the world
.. And then in the winter we had story time
My Dad was a story teller
And after supper when the dishes were washed he would get a book
We couldn't understand English so he would translate the book in German for us
..You would be as close as you could to Dad to see the book and to hear him and feel his whiskers tickling you..
.. Lester: Those old Amish threshing rings, that was about the most fun...And I'd be out with the boys, and I would drive the horses and the wagon, and they were the ones that would be out in the fields loading. Every summer we looked forward to that and then at the end of it when it was all done we'd get together one night and we would have ice cream
Big old ice cream dinner, and cakes, and more food than you could eat
It was just a great time for a kid growing up...
..
Now in the Amish the ministry is not desired or chosen based on calling or skills
Rather the congregation chooses a small handful of men and then lots are drawn..
And then they opened Lester's book, and there it was
The Bishop read it and then he shook Lester's hand and welcomed him to the ministry
Lester: After I was ordained a minister in Arkansas I had a real desire to really get into the Word
Rebecca: Lester started reading the Bible like he never had before and getting ready to teach it
Lester: We still believed that the Church that we were familiar with, the Amish Church could be a biblical church and it would be a bilical church and it should be a biblical church
And that everything we do should be, um, based on the biblical patterns
In my first year, there was an issue that had come up in the community and I asked the Bishop about it
And this was my uncle, Ura, and he says, 'I know
But don't rock the boat
We can't do everything at once.' 'We can't do those things'
..
Lester: If I had lived in one community all of my life, you'd have accepted that and never thought much of it
But we did move around
We did ask questions
You know, Why can you have one set of Amish over here and they're so liberal, and another set over here and they're so conservative? [I] decided that if I'm going to be Amish I'm going to be the best Amish there is
We're going to be conservative, we're going to be the real Amish...
I actually replaced...with a hydrostatic drive out of an old lawn mower and used a Briggs & Stratton engine running independently of the other engine that actually cut the lumber..
Lester: At this point I had decided that I would take the standard...Make it perfectly Amish but perfectly Biblical so that everything was substantiated by the Bible
And I actually tried
Started working on it
But I didn't get very far, I could never finish it, because it couldn't be done...
.. But my Dad was more concerned with their inner struggle than with their outward conformity
Rebecca: This one week, one of the guys came and told Lester that he's really been being convicted of something that he did that was against the Amish rules...Joseph: The members are informed of the nature of the infraction and a vote is taken to see if any punishment will be given..
Rebecca: It was like a revival meeting in the Amish
Lester: Within a week I heard from the Bishop, 'You don't have the authority to do this.' 'To take sins off of people.' I said I did not take their sins off
They confessed them before God, I let them do it
And that was one of the counts that was against me..
Ruth: The thing that I really appreciate about my parents is that they kept all the rules of the Amish church
and everything, making sure that they were doing everything right except believing that Jesus is the only way to heaven...
.. Lester: And we were now coming into the fall of 1993, so finally Eli Miller(Bishop) just came out on his own
He took me aside one day, and said, ...' 'Do you support the standard that we have here, or don't you?' And I said I don't really have an issue with the standard for the most part, That's not the problem we're facing here
We have a spiritual problems that are a whole lot bigger than the standard
But there are things that clearly aren't Biblical
And I upset him and he yelled, 'I DON'T CARE WHAT THE BIBLE SAYS, WE DO IT THE WAY WE HAVE ALWAYS DONE IT!' He said, 'You know what, we've 'been going through this all summer, I don't need a vote from this church, 'I can take care of this myself
As of today you're silenced.' 'You can no longer preach in an Amish church.'...
the fact that my Dad thought he was saved, proved that he was going to hell!
.. Lester: We had fought the battle for 14 years
It was time to leave, it was time to go....I was having a real hard time with this, because I knew if we left the Amish that would be the end or our relationship
We couldn't go back to family reunions, no weddings
Joseph: When the struggle would come too strong, Mom would walk up the mountainside to be alone in prayer...
Rebecca: And that night, Ray Wenger preached a sermon on why Jesus suffered on the cross
And he told us that it wasn't the physical part that hurt Jesus the most
The worst part for Jesus was the rejection he felt from his Father
Because his Father had to turn his back on him so he could die
Our sin on Him separated Him from His Father! It was as if the Lord was speaking directly to me
Answering my question that I had asked on the mountain
And it was just like that, one thing after another, that I would just cry out to God
And He would either show me in the Bible, show me a verse, or else a preacher would preach about it
Or I would open a book and the answer would be there, or some way, I always got an answer
.
Ruth: As our Amish relatives shunned us, the Lord provided us family, Christian family, Rebecca: The brothers and sisters in the Church, they were there for us
Lester: The things that we were told would happen if we left the Amish, didn't happen
God is faithful
Today our children are all serving the Lord, some of theme are married and we have some wonderful grandchildren
[singing] ♪ The world behind me,...
the Cross before me ♪ ♪ The world behind me, the Cross before me ♪ ♪ No turning back, no turning back
♪ [music]
.. Joseph: This has been my parent's story
But they are not alone.
.. Join us next time for some more stories, including one with heartbreak, and romance.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AtR1k4bqlCo Breaking the Silence III | An Amish Romance | Joe Keim | Sam Girod | Polly Bontrager Girod
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.