An Amish Family Christmas

by Murray Pura

  Naomi smiled and leaned her head against her brother’s back, squeezing him with her arms as tightly as she could. “So did I.”

  Thirteen

  Naomi jumped down from the horse and ran into the barn.

  “Micah!”

  He spun around, a coil of rope in his hand.

  “Micah!” She threw her arms around him. “We can talk! We can hug! The bann is ended!”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “The bishop has announced that the bann on you has been lifted.”

  “What does this mean?”

  “It means they believe God called you out from among us to heal the wounded on the battlefield. It means they accept what you have done.”

  Micah put a hand on her face. “I can’t believe it.”

  “It’s true.”

  “But the others, the church, what do they think?”

  “I don’t know. But you have the bishop and the ministers on your side, and that’s the important thing.”

  “No—not Minister Yoder!”

  “Of course Minister Yoder. You should have heard him speak.”

  Micah’s face split open into a grin. “Is this some sort of miracle?”

  “That’s exactly what it is.”

  He put his other hand on the other side of her face. “Look at you. Look at how beautiful you are.”

  “It’s because I’m so happy.”

  “Well, you always look beautiful. But now it’s something special.”

  “Ja?”

  Rebecca stepped down from the buggy. “Take this you two and go somewhere far away from here.”

  “No,” protested Naomi. “We shouldn’t.”

  Luke, still in the saddle, said, “Becca’s right. Take the buggy and disappear. The next thing you know Minister Yoder will have changed his mind and come running with the Ordnung under his arm.”

  Micah laughed and picked Naomi off the ground. “If he does, just tell him we went to the Amish in Montana. That way he won’t find us at the Kissing Bridge.”

  Blood rushed into Naomi’s face. “What are you talking about?”

  “You know what I’m talking about.”

  “Why, even when we were courting we didn’t go there.”

  “So now we’re married.”

  “Even when we were married we didn’t go there.”

  He carried her to the buggy. “So now I’m back from the army and we’re out from under the bann, and it’s past time for us to go there.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous!” Naomi kicked her legs, and snow flew off her boots. “Only the teenagers go there!”

  “Well, I feel like a teenager.”

  “Put me down and we can have a sensible walk in the woods.”

  “Who wants a sensible walk?” He dropped her in the buggy and climbed in. “Do you want us back for supper, sister?”

  Rebecca smiled. “Ja, but a very late supper. When more than a thousand stars are out you must come back.”

  Micah lifted the reins. “Gut. I can’t count that high, so we will be gone a very long time.”

  Naomi made a face. “We can’t stay at the bridge all day.”

  “Why not? We have a lot of time to make up for.”

  “Micah, for goodness sake, we don’t need to go to a covered bridge.”

  “Ah, but here comes Minister Yoder,” Micah teased. “Quick. We do need a covered bridge.”

  Naomi swung her head. “Oh, he is not!”

  The buggy pulled out of the yard. “Well, then perhaps we’ll meet him at the bridge.”

  The corners of Naomi’s eyes crinkled. “If you’d heard all the nice things he had to say about you, you wouldn’t be teasing him like this.”

  “You must tell me all about it. Every word.”

  She leaned her head on his shoulder. “Not now. That can wait. Tomorrow will be soon enough.”

  “You won’t forget?”

  “You said it yourself—it was miraculous. Who forgets to talk to others about the miraculous?” She kissed him on the cheek. “So but now we’re concentrating on something else that’s miraculous—you and me permitted to be alone together.”

  They reached the old covered bridge after a ten minute drive. It had been given a fresh coat of red paint for Christmas. The river it spanned was frozen in parts and still moving in others. Naomi was relieved to see no one else was inside. Like everyone else in the community, she had taken a buggy through it many times and once or twice spotted a carriage or wagon parked in the shadows. This would be the first time she would be one of the ones in a parked buggy.

  “Here we are.” Micah’s face was dark once they were out of the afternoon sunlight. “Is there anything you want to tell me?”

  “Besides I love you, you mean?”

  “Haven’t you missed me as well as loved me?”

  “How could I miss you? You’ve been in the house all along.”

  “No embracing. No kissing. No soft voices.”

  “Well, of course I’ve missed all that.”

  “Anything else?”

  She winked. “The scent of your shaving cream.” Her fingers found their way to the beginnings of his beard. “Only on your upper lip of course.”

  “I think the Ordnung should be changed to allow married men to be clean shaven if they want to.”

  “Oh no, you don’t.” She slapped him on the arm. “One Ordnung change per lifetime is more than enough.”

  He kissed her softly on both cheeks and both eyes. Then he stopped and held her tightly.

  “Is that it?” she asked.

  “What were you expecting?”

  “Well—a bit more of a windstorm than a breeze.”

  “I don’t feel like a windstorm. It’s just sinking in that I can hold you in my arms. I feel so grateful. All I want is to take in the scent of your hair and your skin and feel the warmth of your face.”

  “I’m only teasing you. I like your gentleness.”

  His lips brushed her hair, tightly bound up under her prayer kapp. “You’re perfect, Naomi.”

  “Oh, Micah, don’t get carried away. I’m far from perfect.”

  “I know you handed those cards and letters to the leadership. I know they made a difference to the bann being lifted.”

  “Not as much of a difference as you saving Timothy Yoder’s life.”

  “All I did was stabilize him. And you helped.”

  “That’s all? That’s all you did?” Naomi pulled away and ran her small hands over both sides of his face. “You did it in Afghanistan. Hundreds of times. Now you’ve done it in Pennsylvania too. Our leadership may be as stubborn as you, but they also have eyes in their heads and wisdom in their hearts. It didn’t take them long to make the connection between what you did here and what you did over there. And to realize if they thank God for what you did for Tim, they must also thank God for what you did for the soldiers and their families. It’s the same thing.”

  “But you went to the bishop with those letters—”

  She kissed his lips. “It wasn’t the letters that changed the bishop’s mind or Minister Yoder’s mind. It was seeing wounded soldiers with the same eyes they saw Timothy with. Shall God be involved in the healing of Timothy Yoder but not in the healing of the soldiers? Is he only the God of the Amish, or is he the God of all the people of the earth?”

  “You sound like a theologian.”

  She kissed him again, longer and with a bit more force. “It’s not for the Amish to be theologians, especially not Amish women. I only know I see the love of God at work in your life. And now the bishop and the ministers see it too.”

  “What about the rest of the church?”

  “That is the Lord’s next great task. I’m sure he’s up to it.” She kissed him a third time. “Just as I’m up to being your wife and companion again.”

  He laughed. “This doesn’t sound very romantic, but I keep thinking I can sit up in bed with you and we can read the Bible out loud together. That I can watch you
put your lovely long hair up. That we can sit down and play crokinole and maybe checkers too.”

  She ran her fingers through his hair. “Oh, all that sounds very romantic to me.”

  A fourth time her lips found his. “How lonely our lives have been. How painful. But now the world is brand-new. And our old love is a brand-new love too.”

  Her arms were around his neck and after the fifth kiss she whispered, “I want to go to the house.”

  “So soon?”

  “Not my parents’ house. Our house. The one we lived in the first year of our marriage. Before you left to join the army.”

  “Are you serious? But it’s boarded up and cold.”

  “If we stop kissing a moment and you look in my eyes you will know how serious I am.”

  Micah looked and smiled. “Your wish is my command.”

  He flicked the reins and steered the buggy out from the roof and walls of the covered bridge and back the way they had come. The December sun had set, and the first stars shone like gems against a sky of dark blue and gleaming bronze. The horse moved at a quick trot.

  “How many stars can you count?” he asked.

  “There are not a thousand yet.”

  “So we have plenty of time.”

  “Oh yes, plenty.”

  Lanterns and candles were lit in the houses all around, making theirs look cold and black and empty. Micah drove around to the back and sprang down from the buggy. With his hands he gripped the board nailed over the door and pried it loose. Naomi came and stood beside him as he flung the plywood to one side. Then he opened the door with one hand, scooped her up with the other as she laughed and slipped her arms around his neck, and brought her into the farmhouse they had once lived in.

  She shivered, still smiling. “Ohhhh, it’s colder than I thought.”

  “Do you want to go to your parents’ house?”

  “No, I want to stay here.”

  He placed her down so that her boots settled firmly against the hardwood floor.

  “One minute. I’ll light a fire.”

  She grabbed onto his hand. “No, you don’t. I don’t want a fire.”

  “But you’ll freeze.”

  “I won’t. Hold me. Kiss me. Hug me and hug me in this house where we were newlyweds. That’s all the fire I need right now.”

  “I can’t make you as warm as a wood fire, Omi.”

  Her fingers were playing over his face in the dark. “Yes you can, my husband. I will never be warmer than when I am in your arms. You are like a desert sun. My big desert sun from God.”

  Fourteen

  The simplest things now gave Naomi the greatest joy.

  That evening she sat down at the table with her husband Micah, her brother Luke, and her friend Rebecca, and she felt like a princess in a story with a happy ending. Platters of food were passed, everyone had something to say, and Micah and Luke tucked into the meal as if they were starving. After the plates were cleared the four of them laughed and hooted their way through several games of crokinole, Naomi getting the highest scores while Micah was happy enough just to clear the board of everybody else’s counters. After crokinole they all went to a hymn sing at the bishop’s house, Naomi’s arm linked through Micah’s as they sat on a bench in the front room, the first time she had been to a worship service with her husband in more than a year and a half.

  “It’s perfect, thank God, life is perfect again,” said Naomi as they drove back under the stars.

  “Now you sound like me.” Micah looked up at the night sky. “There are well over a thousand stars out, Becca.”

  Rebecca spoke from the front, where she sat with Luke, who held the reins in his hands. “It would have been nice if there were a thousand people at the singing this evening. Half the benches were empty.”

  Naomi closed her eyes. “I’m so grateful for my own blessings, I forget there are other struggles going on. Forgive me.”

  “I didn’t mention this to rebuke you in any way, Naomi. Why shouldn’t you thank God and enjoy his gifts to you? Your brother is now well, your husband is at your side, the two of you are finally at church together, soon you will be living in your own house again...no, it would be wrong not to praise the Lord for what you’ve received. I only say this to remind us that we should pray. I don’t know how the rest of our community feels about the change in the Ordnung.”

  “Obviously not too well,” responded Luke.

  She put a hand on his arm and then withdrew it. “The bishop is coming for coffee tomorrow morning after chores. He can give us a better idea of what’s going on. His wife told me he and the ministers spent all afternoon going from house to house.”

  Micah’s mouth formed into a rigid line. “Because of me.”

  Naomi squeezed his hand. “Because of what God did through you.”

  Micah and Luke had just come in from looking after the cattle Monday morning when Bishop Fischer drove into the farmyard in his buggy. They entered the house together and sat down at the kitchen table after removing their coats and boots. Rebecca began to pour fresh coffee, starting with Luke and then moving on to the bishop and her brother.

  “Velkommen.” Naomi set out a plate of chocolate chip oatmeal cookies. “Have you had a busy morning?”

  The bishop took four of the cookies, each of which was three inches across, and leaned back with his coffee. “Ja, ja. I went to some families and the ministers went to others. We wish to visit everyone before the Christmas service.”

  “That’s a lot of visiting.”

  He shrugged and raised his eyebrows. “The good work the Lord has given us. The talk is necessary.”

  Micah folded his arms on the tabletop. “I’m sorry for it.”

  “What? Sorry for the leadership seeking God’s will and finding it? It is we who spoke. You demanded nothing. In our hearts and minds it was settled, and we shared that with the people as we are called to do. Now we ask them to go with us to the place the Lord has appointed.”

  “And will they?” asked Micah.

  The bishop finished a cookie, drank some coffee, and swallowed. “Perhaps not all. Every time the Ordnung is affected, people move on to another Amish church or start their own.”

  “How many will leave?”

  The bishop shook his head once. “I don’t know. We are praying all the time. There is anger in some, but who knows? The prayers may soften their hearts.” He reached to the center of the table and took another cookie. “You must understand, Micah Bachman, that we lost families years ago when I felt the Lord would have us put rubber tires on our buggy wheels—such a blessing for our elderly when it came to the rough spots in the road. But others didn’t care about the rough spots. Why could the rough spots not be endured for the sake of following the Amish way as closely as possible? So four families left us and began another Amish church a mile from here. What can we do? The other families stayed and thanked God for the decision.”

  “How many will thank God for the decision that has favored me?” asked Micah.

  “I don’t know. But this is not about you. This is about God and whether he reveals his will to his servants, regardless of what that will is, regardless if his will is hard or easy to take. Some say we have been led astray. Others say it is a mistake that must be corrected before Christmas or they will not attend the Christmas Eve service. By that they mean they will stop attending the church altogether.”

  “And no one has told you what they’re going to do for sure?”

  Bishop Fischer nodded as Rebecca poured him more coffee. “There are those who say they won’t stay unless the decision is reversed and repented of. Others aren’t sure but are leaning toward separating from us. What you must not do, young man, is take it upon your shoulders. It is upon God’s shoulders. Each member of the leadership is convinced of his word to us—can we go back on that even if all the people leave? Never. Either God speaks or he does not speak, either he leads or he does not lead. This is as basic to our faith as the Ordnung—ah, no, it
is even more basic, like the earth the fence post is grounded in. We say that God speaks and makes himself clear and that he is not a muddled or wooly-headed God.”

  The bishop took the cookie in his hand and rapped it on the tabletop. “The Lord reveals his will to his people. Never have I seen our ministers so united in their belief that the Ordnung must make room for healers like you, Micah Bachman. And there is no human reason they should be united. Even with his gratitude to you for saving his son’s life, Minister Yoder was by no means convinced the Ordnung should be altered or, as we say, corrected. No. He was dead set against it. But his testimony on Sunday made it clear how God has changed his heart and his mind and how he used a military hospital to do it. No, this affair is not a matter of human will.”

  He put the cookie down without biting into it. “You must not take this upon yourself, Micah. That is a sin. God is the one at work, not you, my son. Who knows what he has in store? Perhaps he wishes to begin another Amish church a mile or two away or even next door to me. It may be he is pruning our own church to make it stronger. Suppose this is a test of our commitment to him? There are many possibilities. We can only move ahead in faith and trust our church and our future to God.”

  He laid his hands palm down on the table. “We must pray. The Christmas Eve service will be held here in this home. We are not going to hide you away, Micah Bachman, or you, Naomi Bachman. It will be here and the people will come or the people will not come. The church will carry on as it is or it will carry on as a different church. May the Lord be praised in all things, in hard times as well as good times, in winter as well as in spring.”

  The bishop stood and prayed and sat down. Then Micah stood and prayed. Then Luke. When Luke was done, the bishop got up to leave.

  “Micah.” The bishop patted him on the shoulder. “We have not touched on the fact you are one of the ministers now. We agreed we would not ask you to visit the families with us. But Christmas Eve shall be your beginning. We will meet for prayer before the service, the ministers and myself, and we ask you to join us.”

  “Of course. I haven’t said anything about it. I was waiting for today, when I knew you would visit, but it’s both a surprise and an honor to be a minister in the church. Thank you for including me.”