by Linda Byler
Sarah interrupted her father. “But we have to! Matthew said!”
“Let me continue. When a breeze stirs the leaves on the maple tree, as the Spirit stirs the hearts of people, we know the leaves are moving because of the wind, but we don’t know where the breeze is coming from or where it’s going, in Jesus’s words. We really don’t. Tell me, Sarah, where does the wind come from and where does it go?”
She shrugged her shoulders.
“That’s right. The power of the Spirit is God’s, and only His to know. We are mortals. That is our way, Sarah. Yes, I know exactly what you’re going to say, Sarah.
“Many ausre gmayna (other churches) accept powerful testimonies. They accept the faith of each individual by their moving reports of visitations by the Spirit. They highlight the condemnation, the repentance, the saving of their souls by the blood of Christ. That is all good and right. That is our way as well but with less fanfare, of course. You know that we cannot exalt ourselves by that alone.
“It is only by the fruits that we can know someone. And the fruits of the Spirit are a gift of God. They are nothing we do ourselves. So we choose to remain humble, exalting only the Father above and no mere mortal.”
“What about Matthew? He’s a new person, in Jesus.”
“For awhile. He’ll be back down.”
“Dat!”
Sarah was shocked, angry.
“I’m serious. An English man told me once that a person who has come to the knowledge of the truth should be incarcerated for a while. They’re on fire for the Lord, handing out tracts, just sure they are sent to save mankind.
“Likely they still disagree with their wives, spend money unwisely, and lose their tempers. They are human. Just like us. So our set of manmade rules—the law, if you will, the ordnung—serves its purpose, keeping our exalted selves restrained.”
“So then, who will got to heaven, the Amish or the…the…others?”
Dat stroked his beard thoughtfully in the light that was visibly fading into the night.
“I think we all have the same chance. It’s God’s job to separate the weeds from the healthy plants, and not ours.”
“What about Matthew?”
“I think he’s on a dangerous road, but it’s not in my hands at all. It’s up to God to judge, to know what he will need in later years to mold him and purify him.”
“What would happen if I chose to leave the church and to follow him?”
Darkness erased most of Dat’s features, but the silver trickle, the trail of Dat’s tears, sliced through her heart, leaving a physical pain somewhere in the region of her stomach.
He breathed in, a long, shaking inhalation of love.
“Eventually, you’d be excommunicated for your disobedience.”
“I thought so.”
“Are you seriously thinking it over?”
“I’m waiting to see what Matthew will do.”
“Then, we’ll leave it at that.”
“What do you mean?”
“Just that. I can’t tell you what to do.”
When Matthew’s letter arrived, Sarah could not hide the shaking in her hands, so she escaped to the privacy of her room in spite of the sweltering afternoon sun burning through the glass panes of her windows. The screens below allowed only short puffs of hot air, sullenly ruffling the silky panels and barely stirring the air in the room.
A fine line of perspiration beaded her upper lip, and stray curls clung to her damp forehead as she sat on the edge of her bed. She pressed her knees together, her bare heels inches off the floor, the tension distributing her weight over her bent toes.
The envelope was plain white, and the folded paper inside plainly visible. The letter was thin—surely only one sheet.
With shaking hands, she lifted the flap and ripped open the top of the envelope, hurriedly extracting the one folded sheet of lined paper. He had always had good handwriting.
Dear Sarah,
You must come to me. I am leaving for Haiti in two weeks, on the 15th of August. I want you to be with me, flying above the earth.
I think I can make you understand my way. Please come to me. This freedom is unbelievable. The chains that have kept me bound to the Amish are gone.
I’m free!
My cell phone number is 717-342-6801.
Call me!
Matthew
She could not contain the conflicting emotions that surged through her body. She held the paper to her heart, a sob catching in her throat. Her breath came out ragged, edged in pain and suffering.
She would call him. She knew she would.
Rocking forward, then backward, she opened her mouth as if to cry, but only a raw moan of misery emerged. The inner conflict was an unbearable thing. She could never leave Dat. She knew he was a barge of truth, plowing steadily through all kinds of weather, waves crashing around him, and he never faltered. The closest he had ever come to being undone was in the aftermath of their fire and then losing little Mervin in the flood.
But she could not live without Matthew. She loved him. Unconditionally. English or Amish, Mennonite or Catholic, Lutheran or Baptist. What really was the difference?
If the leaves on the trees were like human beings the way Dat said, did they all look alike to God from way up there, and did he love them all the same?
Immediately, she flew down the stairs, burst through the door, and sprinted across the lawn, the grass crinkly and dry in the late afternoon sun. Her feet only skimmed the ground before she yanked open the door of the phone shanty, bent over the dusty white telephone, and punched in the numbers. The desperate need to hear his voice surpassed every other emotion.
On the fifth ring, his voicemail greeting washed over her aching heart, the sound of his voice a drop of water to a dying soul. Instantly, she dialed again and listened to his message a second time before replacing the receiver and slumping down into the old, cracked vinyl seat of the phone shanty chair.
Should she leave a message for him? No, she’d try later.
With a song in her heart, she went to the wash line and took down the black socks, denim trousers, and red men’s handkerchiefs. She tugged on the line to bring in the multi-colored dresses, the black aprons, and pale shirts.
Whistling softly under her breath, she carried the large basket of clothes to a kitchen chair, took up a pair of trousers, and began folding them. Her thoughts raced, hysterical with the joy of Matthew’s invitation.
Suzie came into the house, letting the screen door bang behind her, which provoked a snuffling sigh from the recliner, where Levi lay stretched out for his afternoon nap.
“Shh! Levi’s asleep!”
“Time for him to come help in the garden. We have about a mountain of green beans waiting to snap, and now Mam says we have to hoe the rows yet today. It’s at least a hundred degrees, and I am not kidding you.”
Sarah smiled at Suzie.
“Well, see if you can get him awake.”
In the evening, the air turned uncomfortably humid, the lowering sky threatening, ominous. Sarah perspired freely, sitting in the phone shanty, unsuccessfully making another attempt at reaching Matthew. She held the receiver to her ear and was amazed to hear the beep indicating a message had been left on their voicemail. Quickly she checked the caller ID panel and found Matthew’s number.
With bated breath, she listened to his voice. “Hello, Sarah. This is Matthew.” His voice! But it wasn’t really Matthew. It was low and smooth and polished, with a hint of a western accent.
“I hope you are well. I’m sorry I didn’t answer my cell phone, but where I am, the service is sketchy at best. Call me, leave me a message. I need your answer by the second of August.” No goodbye.
Well, the second of the month was today. She couldn’t make a choice of such magnitude in a few hours. It would break her parents’ hearts. The church would eventually cast her away, shun her. She needed to understand excommunication better.
Sarah looked anxiously around th
e property. The wind was strangely stilled, the black clouds churning above the barn roof, jagged knives of lightning breaking out of the restless thunderheads. A fear of times past enveloped her. Surely not another flood!
There was another thin, high crackle above her, followed by a distant rumble. Immediately the heavy foliage on the maple trees danced to life as the wind kicked up with the approaching storm.
She couldn’t leave a message now, so she turned away from the phone shanty, shutting the door firmly behind her and running swiftly across the lawn.
Mam was on the porch, grabbing the Zip-loc bags she’d washed and hung on the small clothesline with wooden clothespins.
“Close the upstairs windows!” she called out as Sarah bounded onto the porch.
When she was in Suzie’s room, she was surprised to see a team come in the driveway at breakneck speed. She peered anxiously through the window that was already splattered with fat raindrops. She recognized her cousin, Melvin, leaning forward, his eyes searching the sky as he surveyed the oncoming storm. Sarah greeted him in the forebay, just as the hailstones came crashing down on the new metal roof and the wind reached a high crescendo as it whined around the corner of the barn, bringing the hail and rain along with it.
“Melvin! What are you doing out on an evening like this?”
“Oh, nothing much. I was on my way to meet Lee at Lydia’s, but I saw that I better find cover immediately.”
At the mention of Lee’s name, Sarah averted her eyes, her bare toe pushing bits of loose straw across the packed cement.
Dat suddenly burst through the milk house door. He greeted Melvin effusively, wiping the rain from his face with a soiled, wrinkled handkerchief.
“Whew!”
“Some storm. I’d let you know how bad it’s going to be, but I can’t check my cell phone with you around, Davey.”
Dat grimaced and said he shouldn’t be so worldly or so outspoken. Melvin grinned cheekily and clapped Dat’s shoulder and told him not to worry, that he was raised to be respectful of the ministry.
Dat’s eyes twinkled, and he shook his head.
“Ach Melvin, you’re as full of hot air as you always were. If you were as respectful as you want me to believe, you wouldn’t have mentioned the cell phone at all.”
Melvin floundered about as his face turned red. He could not come up with a decent reply. Sarah burst out laughing, understanding Melvin and his need to look good wherever he went. Dat laughed, too.
“Probably the weather forecast would say it’s stormy with a chance of hail in Lancaster County.”
“Southeastern Lancaster County,” Melvin corrected him wryly.
They all grimaced as the storm worsened. The sound of hailstones hitting the roof was deafening, like the din of thousands of projected golf balls. Speaking was impossible, so they stood in companionable silence. Each of them winced as the square barn windows turned an electrifying shade of blue for an instant, followed by dull rumbles of thunder. The peals reverberated among the storm clouds as if God had ordained a heavenly roll call in an attempt to catch his mortals’ attention.
Finally Dat raised his voice.
“Good way to start a barn fire!” he shouted.
“You betcha!” Melvin agreed, vehemently nodding his head.
As the brunt of the storm abated, grumbling its way reluctantly to the south, they splashed into the house, dodging puddles and low hanging branches dripping with water.
Mam met them at the door, a worried expression erasing the serenity that was so commonplace.
“Thank goodness!” she said. “Sarah, I wasn’t sure where you were, and I guess as long as the world goes round, storms will bring back memories of our little Mervin.”
Her mouth wobbled visibly, and she blinked back the tears that so easily rose to the surface.
Melvin settled himself comfortably in a kitchen chair, his expressive eyes watching Mam’s face, mirroring his own emotion. Mam shook her head, composed herself, and disappeared into the pantry as Levi stumbled from the living room, pure delight written across his face.
“Levi!” Melvin shouted.
“What’s up, chap?” Levi said, loudly imitating the English man who drove the large rig that hauled their milk.
Melvin laughed.
“Not too much, Levi. How about you?”
“Oh, I think we got the barn fires stopped. Nothing going on since the Widow Lydia’s.”
“It hasn’t been that long. Don’t hold your breath.”
“I don’t look for another fire. The Amish are more aware of what that guy did. They’re sleeping in barns, got big dogs that bite hard, alarms. Everyone has something,” Levi said, his voice rising with excitement, aware of Melvin’s attention.
“Levi’s right,” Dat said.
“Yeah, maybe the fires themselves aren’t the real danger now. What about that Elam’s Matthew taking off like that? Sarah, did you know he’s texting the youth all the time? Surely you’ve broken up with him by now.”
With Melvin, there was no tiptoeing around feelings. Everything was blunt, spoken in plain words, his recipients allowed to accept his words or disagree.
Sarah’s face colored with misery, and she blushed self-consciously.
“No,” she said in a cracked, hushed tone.
“What? Why not?” Melvin asked, his eyes popping in disbelief.
“Well.”
“Well, what?”
“I thought perhaps he’d change his mind yet.”
“Ha! Ever hear of that happening? Once they get ahold of their Jesus, they’re GONE!” Melvin brought his arm up and swished it through the air, a vivid symbol of the disgust he felt.
Dat’s eyes watched Melvin. They were sharp in their disapproval, but his voice was gentle.
“Melvin, it’s a good thing for someone to be concerned about his soul, finding Jesus, accepting redemption, any way you want to word it.”
“Yeah, but those holy rollers that take their vows and then break them—they’ll be surprised on judgment day, let me tell you.”
“Be careful, Melvin. It’s a narrow and slippery path when we condemn, and when we refuse to try and understand, we do not have the right kind of love in our hearts.”
“Well, they’re wrong—people like Matthew.”
“There’s a huge possibility we’re all wrong if we fight about Scripture.”
“What do you mean? You’re a minister, and you’re uncertain?”
“Let me explain, Melvin. I don’t agree with Matthew doing this to his parents, to the ones who love him, especially Sarah. But we have to be careful. We need to carry our own cross, let Matthew carry his, and leave him to God’s hands.”
“So, Sarah, knowing you, you’ll probably go puddling off after him.”
“I doubt if I’ll puddle.”
Melvin didn’t acknowledge the humor. An angry blush crept across his cheeks, and he became almost belligerent.
“You’ll be put in the bann (excommunicated). Then you’ll slide straight to hell.” He addressed Sarah angrily, his face working with suppressed feeling.
“I wanted to ask Dat about the true meaning of excommunication, as I have to make a decision today,” Sarah said. “Matthew left a message for me. He invited me to go to Haiti with him on the fifteenth.”
Dat’s face was a mirror of Mam’s with the color receding, leaving only fear and pain. They tried to grasp the fact that Sarah may actually want to leave, thereby breaking parental and godly rules. They knew they would be unable to restrain her if she wanted to go.
Pushing back the urge to cry out or hold back his darling daughter bodily, Dat calmed himself as a thick veil of confusion drew over Sarah’s features. Her misery was so apparent, the reason for it so obvious. It drew its strength from the deep root that was her overwhelming infatuation with Matthew Stoltzfus, the single object of her desire.
No one spoke.
The rain still streamed down the kitchen windows, but the wind had died down and
no longer whistled around the corners of the house.
Melvin was pouting, his mouth drawn firmly into a line of disagreement. He refused to accept the fact that his favorite cousin just could go skipping off scot-free, leaving his uncle’s family with broken hearts. He’d love to have ahold of that arrogant Matthew about now.
The dripping from the faucet turned into a steady trickle, so Mam got up to adjust the handle. She checked the coffee in the stainless steel drip coffee maker, settling the top back with a bang to hasten the hot water dripping through the grounds.
She stood at the sink, her back turned, watching the rain creating a pattern of tears on the window pane. Her mind just could not grasp what Sarah was actually contemplating.
Dat drew a deep breath.
“And you want to go?” he asked, his voice gravelly with pain.
“Oh, of course. I’m just afraid of the bann.”
“You should be!” Melvin exclaimed, leaning forward with intensity.
“Sarah, it is not fear of excommunication that keeps us together. If the pattern of life is as it should be, your love toward us is what should secure you to your heritage. The whole thing in a nutshell is love. Even the bann is a form of love. So many don’t understand that, even our own people. But when we place someone outside of our church, we are acknowledging that they need chastening—trials and adversity—to become a better person, so their soul may be saved.
“Sarah it would be wrong for you to go with Matthew, because it would be blatant disobedience. It would be completely without love. In this day and age, we Amish believe in the saving grace of our Herren Jesu (Lord Jesus), and you would be turning your back on that.
“In the end, the choice is yours. Of course, you would be welcome to return, to visit. But our spiritual unification would be gone. The freedom from guilt would be lost as well. Matthew promises you freedom, but you would not be free.”
Mam watched Sarah’s face, the struggle darkening her once carefree face. She missed that face from the years prior to Matthew.
“So, you’re saying I have to choose between you and him.”
“Yes.”
“Why? Why do the Amish have to be so thickheaded? Why can’t I go off and do what I want with your blessing?”