by Keim, Joe
“Let’s walk back downtown,” Eli suggested.
We had no idea where we would live as we headed that way in our bright white shoes, new blue jeans, and our Amish haircuts minus our hats. To picture this, imagine how my dad cut our hair in a bowl-cut style. The hair had to cover at least half of our ears, and once our hair completely covered the ear, it was time for a haircut. That wasn’t the rule in Holmes County where we came from though. They could show their whole ear, but our hair had to look identical throughout our community. So, there we were, two teens who were English dressed with Amish haircuts when we came across a porch sale. The lady sitting behind the table greeted us.
“Where you boys from?”
“We just left the Amish last night.”
While we were on that porch rifling through the clothes and looking for some possible buys, a big van pulled up to the curb. It was loaded with Amish people. Among them was my mom. She spotted us. Less than twelve hours after we left our notes about leaving the country, I was found.
She climbed out of that van, marched up on that porch, and grabbed on to me and cried and cried and cried. I’m ashamed to admit it today, but I was very cold toward her.
“We’re not coming back. All the begging won’t do any good,” I said in a wooden voice.
They finally left without us. That was hard. It shattered my world – and my mom’s world.
The woman on the porch asked, “Where you staying tonight?”
We looked at each other and offered a shrug.
“Well, you can stay with me for just a couple of days. I have a spare bedroom upstairs.”
To say we were relieved is an understatement. Even though it was only for a couple of days, that gave us a place to stay while we figured out what we were doing. What we didn’t know was that her husband was in jail. When he found out his wife invited two men to stay with her, he made a promise to himself that as soon as he got out of jail he’d kill them both. Of course, we didn’t know any of this was going on. We ended up staying with the woman for three days and became friends with another family who lived across the street. The Clantz family invited us to come live with them.
We moved in with the Clantz family, but my parents knew where I was. The first time my dad came, he begged and pleaded for me to come home. I gave him the cold shoulder too. To my surprise, I woke up to find Dad still there. He slept on the concrete steps leading into the house. He did that several times. I ignored him. At sixteen and emotionally disconnected, I didn’t feel my dad’s love, and had no love for him.
One time, Dad met me in a busy parking lot in town. While Dad begged me to return to the Amish, cars drove by, coming and going, and suddenly Dad asked, “Can I give you a hug?”
I was shocked and couldn’t believe what I heard. I’d never been hugged by him. There we stood, him in his Amish clothes, me dressed English. Awkward doesn’t quite cover it. We were like two trees, stiff as a board, hugging each other. I mostly felt embarrassed, but deep down I also felt genuine love coming from a man I hardly knew, other than on the surface. When I refused to go home with him, he wept bitterly as he walked away.
From day one, Dad began to fast. Twenty days went by with no food. I thought a person would die after two weeks. Then three weeks, then four weeks. No food. Everybody knew my dad wasn’t eating. Eli couldn’t stand it.
“Joe, you have to go back. Your dad is going to die.”
I refused.
One night Eli couldn’t handle the thought of my dad going without food another day. He and one of the Clantz boys (Scott) said, “Get in the car. We are going on a ride.”
The next thing I knew, they were driving me right out to my dad and mom’s farm.
“Joe, you’re staying here,” Eli said. “If you don’t, your dad is going to die. You’re going to have to stay home.”
I got out of the car because I felt I didn’t have a choice. I slammed the door. Anger simmered toward Eli. How dare he do this to me!
Dad met me before I reached the house. He said, “I began to eat last night.”
I wished Eli had known this. Dad went on to tell me how the night before, while in bed, he had a vision – not a dream. In the vision, a bright light shone from heaven onto his bed where he lay. He looked up through this light beam to the heavens and saw a pure white lamb walk out of darkness into the light beam. When it got to the center of the light beam, it turned its head and looked down at him. He knew right away it was Jesus. The lamb looked down for a time and then walked into the darkness again, and my dad snapped out of it. Following that vision, he had assurance all would be okay.
So here it was the day after Dad started eating, and sure enough, Eli dropped me off. It seemed really weird. When I walked into the house, all my brothers and sisters stood around staring in disbelief at their oldest brother dressed in English clothes and wearing an English haircut. I’m sure they were relieved that I had returned and wasn’t going to go to hell.
Mom and Dad reached out to me, trying to understand why I did what I did. Dad even made a few promises about neighbors that had said and done things to me that were uncalled for. He shared how he had met with them and discussed their wrong actions. They in turn made promises to Dad that things would change, and they would be kinder toward me. But that only lasted a short time before life was back to normal – very busy, long hours, and no real emotional connection to those closest to me. I stayed home a couple of months, and then I left again.
This time, Dad visited the juvenile court judge, Judge McKinley, and talked to him about what he should do. The judge decided he would help Dad out and came to meet me at the Clantz house. After an hour-long conversation, he ordered me into the back seat of his car and took me home. He pulled into the driveway and got out. I, on the other hand, stayed in the back seat. The whole family gathered around the car, but I refused to get out. After coaxing and begging, I finally crawled out of the car. I was right back home but filled with anger.
Working part time on the farm and part time in my father’s machine shop became a daily routine for me. But as time went on, my mind drifted back to the English world. I missed the freedom of turning on country music, living in an air-conditioned house, using the car for transportation, and yes, even the handy little electric light switches and outlets on every wall in the house. Another few months went by, and I ran away from home again, back to the Clantz house for the third time. This time I stayed away for three months. Dad decided to lay off me and stayed away for the most part.
While I had returned to the Amish several times, Eli remained English. In time, he made enough money at his job and was able to get a car and his own apartment. He also became involved with drugs and alcohol, and most weekends, he and I hung out together.
One time when partying with Eli, we smoked marijuana while driving in the country. I took a hit of marijuana and held it in as long as I could. Suddenly, it came to me that I was dying. I couldn’t hear myself breathe, and it scared me.
Another night while I was English, we were having a party at a friend’s house. That night I decided I was going to drink as much alcohol as I possibly could, hoping it would help me get over the fact that I was missing my family back home. Sometime during the party, I decided to take the stairway to a lower level in the house. As I stepped out at the top of the stairs, I lost my balance and fell headfirst down the long flight of stairs.
My cousin Eli rushed from the kitchen and came to my aid. He made me sit on his lap at the kitchen table, checking to see if I was okay. This is a perfect example of the colliding of the two worlds in which I lived. I sat there and cried. My life was messed up and miserable. I could see it happening but felt helpless to do anything about it.
One day in the winter, an Amish guy by the name of Andy called me from the home of an English man he was doing some carpentry for.
“I’m working out here,” he said. “If you have a way, I’d love to sit down and talk with you. I want to try to understand what you’re going through.”
No one was home at the Clantz house, but the keys to the car hung on the wall. I had no license, but I swiped the keys and headed out to the car. I put that key in the ignition and started driving. I drove out to the country to see Andy, who would later become my brother-in-law. We sat and talked for a long time. Andy was easy to talk to and seemed to understand my life. It felt very good to get it all out.
Finally, I said, “Andy, I miss my family and friends, but I’m not going to come back to the Amish.”
By the time I climbed back into the car, it had started to sleet. About a mile from the Clantz house, a truck slowed down to turn. I tried to brake on the icy road, but to my horror, the car slid. The next thing I heard was a loud crash. It all happened so fast. I slammed into the back of the truck. Within minutes, cop cars surrounded me. Police accused me of stealing the car because I didn’t get permission to use it.
The cop said, “Your choice − detention center or back to your parents?”
Scared and shaking all over, I chose to return to my parents. So they drove me home. I got out of the squad car without hesitation, but for my parents and family, all this was getting a little old.
Chapter 7
Baptism and Joining the Amish Church
In the Amish church, baptism and church membership happened on the same day. But to get to that day, the church required future members to go through three months of preparation, much like catechism classes in some churches. In our community that process began the year we turned seventeen. To start at an earlier age was forbidden. To start later meant you were a rebel.
The year I turned seventeen, my father arranged a meeting with me to discuss baptism and church membership.
“Mom and I are excited and looking forward to you beginning the baptismal classes this spring,” he said.
“Dad, I’m not so sure I’m ready to take the step,” I replied. “But I will spend some time considering it.”
Seeing their child follow the footsteps of our forefathers was a parent’s greatest dream come true. The pressure was significant. I didn’t want to let my parents down, and I knew if I didn’t begin classes, the entire community would classify me as being disobedient to my parents, my forefathers, the church, and God.
The problem for me was that I didn’t feel ready. It mostly had to do with the fact that before baptism, I was under my parents’ authority. If I acted up or did anything out of line, my father and I dealt with it, one on one. However, that would all change after my baptism day. From then on, I would have to give account to the preachers and church body. I already knew I couldn’t live up to their rules, and whenever I didn’t, they’d make an example of me in public. Even with all the pressure to meet everyone’s expectations, I wasn’t sure I was going to go through the process.
Decision day arrived far too quickly. Depending on what I decided, my life would be changed forever. As I jumped on my buggy and headed out the driveway toward William Weaver’s place where church services were being held that day, I thought of all the rules we had to follow in the Amish culture. And here I was about to make a decision that would include making a vow to God and the church that I would never leave nor forsake the Old Order Amish church. It was all part of the membership package.
As the congregation began to sing from their hymnals, the bishop stood to his feet and left the living room to go upstairs. The deacon and two lay ministers followed. Now it was my turn to get up and follow the ministers to my first baptismal class. Elmer Weaver, who sat next to me, elbowed me in the ribs.
“Please, Joe, go with me. I don’t want to go by myself.”
Any other year, there’d be at least six to eight seventeen-year-olds going through membership class, but this year there were only two of us – Elmer and me. The two of us weren’t that close, but we did have one thing in common; we went through eight years of school together.
Elmer stood to his feet and headed toward the door that led upstairs where the preachers sat waiting. At that moment, I felt like a puppet with someone else pulling the strings. I got up and followed.
We sat in a circle: the deacon, two lay ministers, the Bishop, Elmer, and me. The Amish have eighteen articles of faith, and we had to go over each one of them before we could be baptized. Since we only met every other week and they went over two articles at each meeting, it took nine weeks. The problem for me was that all eighteen articles were written in German, and I didn’t understand it well.
Our forefathers drew these articles up generations ago, and as I figured out later, they contained many scriptural truths. The problem in preparing for baptism was that the main focus wasn’t so much the articles of faith as it was being challenged to submit and align with the ordinances of the church. During our nine weeks of training sessions, the membership was to keep a close eye on us. If any part of our lifestyle didn’t measure up to the church standard, the membership was to report it to the deacon, who would in turn bring it to our attention. I failed miserably.
The deacon stopped by to talk to me throughout the week. I had bent the rim of my hat and decorated it to make it look like a cowboy hat. He said, “We cannot take you into the church and baptize you if you don’t straighten your hat out.”
So, if I wanted to become a part of the church, I had to change my hat back.
When I turned seventeen, Dad bought me a black horse named Mike and encouraged me to build my own buggy from the ground up. The horse and buggy would be used as transportation to go to the Sunday night singings and to take girls home for a date. Dad and I took a day off work, hired a taxi driver, and traveled to Holmes County, where we shopped at various buggy shops to buy the proper items needed to get started: shafts, axles, wheels, oilcloth, upholstery, paint, etc.
Over the next two months, I worked on my buggy every chance I had. Eventually the day came when everything was done except one thing. I still needed to paint the buggy black. As I stood in front of my buggy, feeling good about my accomplishments, an Amish man from the neighborhood walked in. The first thing he did was pull a tape measure out of his pocket and check the height of my front dash.
He looked around and said, “Joe, come over here. I just checked your dash and found it to be fifteen inches in height; according to our church ordinance letter, the dash cannot be any higher than fourteen inches. Yours is one inch too high.”
I couldn’t believe this man had the nerve to check my work, much less tell me I was one inch off on the height of my dash. He was the kind of church member who would go straight to the preachers and rat on me. If I refused to fix it, the church leaders would make it public to the church membership, and it would stop me from getting baptized. After talking things over with my dad, we decided I could either shave one inch off the top or tear the whole front end of my buggy out and rebuild the dash. We decided on the latter.
At seventeen years of age, it didn’t make sense to me that I had to tear the front end of my buggy out over a dash being one inch too high. Liberal Amish communities have higher buggy dashes and, in some cases, windshields. According to the thinking in our community, lower dashes meant more humbleness, but this type of nitpicking over an inch played a role in driving me to leave the Amish community.
Blotting out the handwriting of ordinances that was against us, which was contrary to us, and took it out of the way, nailing it to his cross. (Colossians 2:14)
Another time, I drove my buggy to the gathering, and someone pointed out that I’d installed the wrong upholstery. I had used soft, brown upholstery, and it had to be replaced with black vinyl upholstery right away. I couldn’t complete my baptism and membership until everything lined up with the ordinances. As a result, Elmer’s and my baptism kept getting postponed.
Fin
ally, we met with the ministers one last time, and they said, “Tomorrow we will ask you these questions and you will answer yes to each one.”
The following day, people filled the barn. Next to a wedding, being baptized into the Amish church is the most attended event. Every parent and church wants this for the individuals, and at the time I thought it was what God wanted.
The church services that day were similar to any other, except at the very end Elmer and I were asked to kneel and make four vows to God and the church. The Bishop asked, “Do you believe Jesus Christ is the Son of God?”
“Yes, I believe Jesus Christ is the Son of God.”
And I did, but my belief in Jesus Christ was a mechanical head knowledge that didn’t reach my heart. It was just part of the extensive list of other things I was taught to believe.
Then the Bishop asked, “Can you renounce the devil, the world, and your own flesh and blood?”
I answered, “Yes, I can renounce the devil, the world, and my own flesh and blood.”
“Can you commit yourself to all the ordinances of the church, according to the Word of the Lord, and be obedient and submissive to it and help therein?”
I said yes.
“Can you commit yourself to God and His church and abide by it and live therein until you die?”
Again I answered yes.
Making a vow to “commit yourselves to God and His church” meant the Old Order Amish church I was about to be baptized into.
Now that I had made all four vows, the Bishop poured water on my head three times while the deacon used both of his hands to create a funnel for the water to land on the center top of my head. Afterward, the Bishop kissed me with a holy kiss. If a girl was getting baptized, the Bishop’s wife would have given her the holy kiss. I had been informed by the preachers during membership class that as the water ran down over my head, it would wash away all my sin. I truly believed them. I got up from my knees as a member of the Amish church, believing all my sins were gone. I felt lighter. If I died on the way home, I’d go straight to heaven. Or so I thought. Later, I learned that while I got wet, that was it – nothing more happened to me that day.