News
Amish Bull - Rider Aspires To Big Leagues of Sport
| May 28, 2009Being an Amish bull-rider might appear a bit against the grain, but Yoder said it’s a natural fit for him. Yoder grew up around farm animals on his parents’ farm at Jamesport. When his parents weren’t looking, “my cousins and I would dare each other to try to ride calves and young steers....."
Mattie Shetler
| May 15, 2009While I was Amish, many of my Amish friends, including me, were hiding some of the things we did that were not Amish-like listening to the radio, calling someone on the phone, and other things. I always wondered why God made some people to be allowed to have cars and we were in this little Amish community-having to work hard with our hands alone.
Man's Spiritual Journey The Focus Of Book
| May 3, 2009ABINGDON, Va. – For David King, a change seemed to be in order. This farmer had grown up in an Amish community at Lancaster County, Penn., then settled along the North Fork of the Holston River with his wife, Barbara, in 1995 and helped start an Amish community in rural Abingdon. King followed the traditional rules of the Amish, like shunning modern machinery....
Bennie Shetler
| April 28, 2009 I am at the age of 20!! I was born and raised Amish and lived that way until I was one month away from age 17. When I was in the 6th or 7th grade my cousin Andy B. Shetler left the Amish. When I heard that he left, I knew right away that I was also going to leave when I get old enough.
Johnny Raber
| April 22, 2009I can't really put it into words what it was like when I got saved. Brother Eli told me a lot of things about how Jesus died for our sins and that we must be born again in order to get to Heaven. I started reading my Bible and I started realizing what a sinner I was and where I would end up without Christ and salvation.
Father to Son: You are no longer part of the family
| March 25, 2009Dear Son, So at this point, you are on the outside of our family and you don't belong in the family anymore. So whether it's a wedding or a funeral, you don't belong in the family. You know you can't come home again. Unless, like I wrote earlier, if you want to...
Abram Raber
| March 13, 2009I left the Amish when I was seventeen years old because I did not believe in all their rules, but still I did not realize the importance of salvation for some time, so I was very confused with my new life for quite a while but the more I studied the Bible, the more I realized that a person must be saved to enter the kingdom of heaven.
David Shrock
| February 22, 2009I left the Amish in May of 2003 and moved in with one of my older brothers. I was 16 years old at the time and was out to explore and enjoy the world. I left with 16 dollars in my pocket, a few things such as hunting, fishing, and camping gear.
Rachel (Keim) Raber
| February 18, 2009I left the Amish "and my family" on a beautiful Sunday afternoon 10 months ago not knowing what would become of my life, not realizing what a big step I was taking.
Mose Slabaugh
| February 16, 2009I left the Amish on August 18, 2007 in California, MO. We went to Wal-Mart to get some clothes, but I only had five dollars in my pockets so my brother bought my clothes.
David Mast
| February 10, 2009As an Amish teenager, I always knew there was something that I didn't understand about God, but I didn't know what it was. At age 18, I got baptized; I didn't know why, other than, just because everybody else did it.
Abraham Shrock
| January 21, 2009I'm Abraham. I grew up Amish and the Amish are very strict. It's like they think it's all the good works that lets them enter the gates of Heaven instead of trusting and believing what Jesus Christ did on the Cross. Their rules got me to realize that I have a lot of sin in my life and I got very frustrated, angry and depressed, because I thought I had to work myself into a good enough position in order to be forgiven, and I couldn't do it.
Focus on Faith: The story of an Amish woman
| January 11, 2009Lucinda Streiker-Schmidt grew up on an Amish farm in Indiana and has nothing but fond, loving memories of her childhood. Yet, throughout her early life, Lucinda never stopped questioning the differences between her life and the "outside society." When she got a little older, Lucinda experienced the horrors of abuse, incest, neglect and emotional torment after being forced to marry into another Amish family.
Former Amish man honored for volunteer driving
| November 24, 2008In the first nine months of this year, Ken Hershberger volunteered 422 hours to drive more than 1,200 veterans a total of 15,733 miles to their doctor appointments.
Edwin Hostetler
| November 15, 2008Then, in 1993 I was at my lowest point in life. I didn't want to live anymore and suffered with deep depression; it was awful. Then one day my wife handed me the Bible and told me to read it so I started reading Romans. The light at the end of the tunnel was getting brighter. God was truly working on me and for the first time I started to feel His love. I knew God was talking to me.
Katie Hershberger
| September 14, 2008As most of you know I am former Amish. I was 21 yrs. old when I converted. I felt like I got off the leash. I got into partying and drinking and had no idea where I was heading. I sure had my share of problems. At one point I was like I might as well enjoy life while I can. I couldn't figure out why things were going wrong for me.
Albert and Cindy Miller
| August 30, 2008When Albert & I got married, the first week was so good; this was 13 years ago. Then I began to notice the anger and resentment that Albert had toward the Amish preachers and at times he would direct it toward me. So many years I lived in fear and depression; many a sleepless night, praying to God that He would help me, and to touch Albert's heart, as his heart had grown very hard.
Mary Schlabach
| August 19, 2008I joined the Amish church at the age of 18 and lived the lifestyle until I was 49 years old. For many years I wondered what was wrong with me that I dreaded going to church. The preachers always said one only gets out of church what one puts in.
Jonathan Helmuth
| July 2, 2008I too was raised in an Amish home and married an Amish girl, (Dorothy Stutzman). We had 3 children when we left the Amish and have had 3 more since then. I met the Lord beside my bed, through an old book when I was 16 years old. I had bought this box of old books at an auction and in it were a lot of books on the Christian life, including a couple of Bibles.
Escaping the Amish
| June 24, 2008Those peace-loving bearded folks from Witness? I called Torah, and after just a few minutes, I knew this post had to be written. For those of you who feel trapped because of a job or self-imposed obligations as an entrepreneur, this will put things in perspective. How do you escape your environment if you’re unable to control it? If almost no one on the outside realizes what’s happening?
Daughter to Parents: I Weep for Your Return
| May 6, 2008Dear Father and Mother, You are our dear parents and we don't expect you to listen to us, but we also have a concern for you. Oh, so sad that you left us. How can you go on and forsake...
Special Report: Leaving the Amish Life
| May 2, 2008It's the perfect May day in Elizabethtown, and the Schrock family is out enjoying the breeze. Today, the family's five strong, but seven years ago, Saloma and Isaac were a young dating couple in Senora, Tennessee as part of an Amish community.
The Rumspringa years
| March 20, 2008The definition of Rumspringa is running around. This term refers to young Amish people, anywhere from the age of 16 until they get married. It is the time of dating and getting together with other Amish young people that have not married and it is a chance to get to know one another. This is also the time for the boys to take the girls on dates. In my experience (24 years living as an Amish person) it was not okay for the girls to ask boys on a date, the boys always asked the girls.
Shunned from her Amish family
| March 19, 2008Anna Dee Olson, who lived the Amish lifestyle until age 24, describes her journey from growing up Amish to be shunned by her family for sinning and acting against the Amish faith.
Life with and without the Amish
| March 18, 2008I saw many of the people I grew up with, went to school with, and worshipped with do a lot of wild things on Rumspringa – the time when Amish teens get to live outside traditional Amish society without strict rules. I wasn’t nearly as adventurous as many of my friends, but ironically now live a life as a musician that perhaps many English (non-Amish) would consider wild even by their standards. Though, from what I have seen on television, still relatively tame compared to most musicians.
Coach at loss over wins
| February 14, 2008Part of his childhood was spent without electricity or running water, and his family traveled to town each week by horse and buggy. In fact, the first time Leroy Troyer rode in a car he got sick; he wasn't used to the speed. He grew up Amish in Wilmot, Ohio. There was no television, or time for sports.
Portrait of a young Amish man: a world apart from "Englishness"
| January 22, 2008Jacob Stoltzfus is in his final year of formal education, and it shows. His bright eyes and smile exude the confidence of a pupil who has mastered all that his school has to offer him, a young man who is about to put his childhood behind him and start the rest of his life.
Jonas Yoder
| December 22, 2007My name is Jonas Yoder but I like to be called JD. I left the Amish on January 22, 2007. The reason I left the Amish church is because I did not like all the rules that the church put on me.Amish life was also very boring and lonely at times ----- I had nothing to live for.
