Christmas in Alaska

December 13 is St. Lucia Day, but it is also the day many remember the life and death of St. Herman of Alaska. I’d never heard of him until this year, but he truly led a fascinating life. He was one of the few who brought the gospel to Alaska over 200 years ago, enduring many hardships, and protecting the native people he had grown to love with his life. Some of his fellow missionaries were martyred. Father Herman died and was buried on December 13 (December 25 in the West).

I had the privilege of hearing his liturgy sung in a beautiful cathedral as a special birthday treat this year. (I have loved cathedrals ever since my mission trip to Romania in 2003). And I’ve thought about him several times, as the days here continue to get colder and darker. How blessed I am to have a warm home and relatively easy life; yet how wont I am to complain when my feet are a bit cold in the car, or there is ice covering the parking lot at the grocery store. I am humbled when I remember that many Christians have endured great hardships and horrible conditions to bring Christ to a dying people.

I believe that God has given us this great cloud of witnesses so that no matter what challenges we face in our daily lives, we can know that we are not alone. Someone at some time has faced similar things and more, whether in Alaska, or Jerusalem, Romania, or Ecuador. We remember them and rejoice in the faithfulness of God. He has a long history of doing great things with small people.

Merry Christmas from Alaska!

- by Elizabeth Jackson
photo by Sarah Plett

Hundred Year Predictions

This article, published in the Ladies Home Journal in 1900, is quite the read! Apparently they thought that due to better health care, the average lifespan would move from 35 up to 55. Transportation on the bus would cost only one cent. And...well, you'll have to read it.

Step Aside, Indiana Jones - Part Two

We found pottery roof tiles, thick pottery oven lining, and the occasional mosaic piece. Oh, and I found part of a ring-shaped pottery stand for pointy-bottomed pots. Meanwhile, the excitable young man hit the jackpot: he found not one, but two coins in his drain! Tiny, slightly irregularly shaped coins no bigger than the tip of your pinky finger. People crowded around to see and photograph them.

Pretty soon it was 9 am, and time for breakfast. The dozen or so of us all sat under the low-slung tarp near the entrance, and while I ate my yogurt , my cheese sandwich, and a few almonds, everyone else dug into the puddings, peppers, cucumbers, grapes, blue cheese and very white "dark wheat" bread sent by the hotel where they were staying.

And we were back to work. Our square was no bigger than a small room, and there was some difficulty in fitting up to six people in it at once. I had trouble knowing what to do with my feet and legs, and spent a lot of time crouched on my heels (a decision I was later to painfully regret). But if I thought I was having trouble, it was nothing compared to that of a big, burly Paul Bunyan sort of guy by the name of Tim, who spent a lot of time carting heavy goofas of dirt away from the site.

As I dug, I came upon half a dozen or so palm-sized potsherds that looked like they belonged together. Rather than being tumbled amidst soil, they looked like they were laid out on a surface. Our leader noticed what I had found, and got a little excited. It just might mean that we were reaching the floor of a room. As I continued uncovering shards, he coached me to lay aside my trowel, and not make the mistake of prying them out of the ground. They were to stay just as they were, while I brushed loose dirt away from them with a small broom. Meanwhile, in another corner of the room, stones were beginning to appear. I'm under the impression that we were digging in the Late Roman Period (after the destruction of the Temple in 70 AD), with a few first century items popping up here and there.

People were going by on the path above the site, and on the sidewalk below it: Ethiopian Jews, some in white suits and kippas, a colorful Christian group from Africa, a few Israeli adults on tour with a personal guide, large groups of Israeli schoolchildren on field trips. They all asked the same question: "Did you find anything?" I had enough Hebrew to understand the question, but I didn't have the Hebrew to answer. Besides, I didn't know what they'd been finding there all week long, before I got there. "Yes, a few small things," I said once.

"Time to clean up!" Someone took down the canopy, and almost immediately, I felt myself beginning to dehydrate under the intense sun. Whew! Thank God for shade while it lasted! Some people got busy squaring the edges of the areas with a miniature pick, while others swept away loose dirt. Anything that we came up with from these actions was thrown away, since it wasn't clear what layer they were from. As a result, one of the ladies go to walk away with a really beautiful jug handle. (Yes, I said "beautiful." When you're dealing with innumerable faceless flat shards of pottery, rims, handles and bases have a lot to say about the vessel they came from).

And just like that, we were done. Everyone's cameras came out, and people snapped last pictures of the site, pictures we'd been too busy to capture before. We stacked all the equipment by the wall that separated us from the road, which separated us from the parking lot. To get to the nearest opening in that wall would've been a bit of a hike, so some resourceful person had leaned a ladder over the wall. And that's how we got down to the street.

Arriving home dirty and elated, I was amazed at how fresh I felt. Of course, a couple of hours later, my knees and forearms began to be very sore...and by the next day, I was hobbling around painfully and feeling like an octogenarian myself.

But it was all so worth it!

Rarely have I been so relaxed or had so much fun! I guess I may not know until I get to heaven, whether I succeeded in being a good ambassador to the people I worked with, but I do know that praying for them will be successful!

- by Elisabeth Adams

Step Aside, Indiana Jones - Part One

I think I want to be an archaeologist when I grow up.

For the past several months, I've been helping my professor with research and writing. Last semester, at his request, I attended some of the graduate seminar lectures on Qumran - which we were writing about at the time. However, I didn't expect to continue the practice this semester. I continued working at my little computer screen, until one day my professor walked in and suggested that I attend the lecture that night.

Who, me?

Yes. (And, it turns out, he really meant all semester long).

Our first lecturer was an Israeli who has been professionally involved in archaeology since he was a young boy. As a teenager, he painstakingly mapped out tomb layouts. Now he directs digs of his own. After class, I found myself having dinner with my professor, the archaeologist, and his assistant, a German girl I'll call Maia. Earlier I'd seen her in pictures, fearlessly braving spiders to explore the burial niches in first century tombs. Other than that, her job is pretty much like mine: attend lectures, and do research. She spends hours translating archaeological reports from German into English, but her passion is most definitely the actual digging, and when she found out I'd never experienced it, she promised to let me know when their next dig came up.

Fast forward lots of weeks, in which I amazedly found myself understanding a bit about mitochondrial DNA, signa and triglyphs, and in which Maia and I continued to become friends. Then came the evening when I sat down in the lecture room at Hebrew University, and Maia immediately turned to me and said, "It's on Sunday!"

That's when the long-awaited archaeological dig would begin.

My alarm went off at 4:45 next morning. Bandana, check. Sneakers, check. Packed breakfast, check. Sunscreen, check. By 5:30, I was sitting at the bus stop, not at all sure when the buses actually started running. Fifteen minutes later, Bus 12 showed up. "That's funny," I thought. "I don't remember seeing that bus at our stop before." The bus stopped, the doors swung open, and the driver called out, "Forty-one!" My bus. (Never mind the number 12 clearly displayed on its front). I spent the rest of the ride smiling to myself as the bus driver called out, "Forty-one!" at every single stop. In answer to his puzzled passengers, he simply said, "That's what's written. What can we do?"

It was a glorious morning. And of course, since it was the anniversary of the recapture of the Old City, I couldn't help thinking about the battle that had raged there forty years before, as I entered through Jaffa Gate, wound through the Armenian Quarter, and walked out bullet-scarred Zion Gate. I turned left and began looking for the dig. Ah, there it was: in the grassy area between the Old City wall and the street, ringed with a wire fence, and already busy-looking. It was six-thirty, and everyone had been working for half an hour. I hitched up my backpack, and stepped over the fence.

Maia introduced me to the women, and before I knew it, we were chatting away while we sifted through one or two of the dozen or two of huge totes full of dirt from the day before. Bones, I learned, went into one of those tiny cardboard boxes. Pottery, of course, went into the bucket. And there was no need to be fussy: there's always more dirt to get through!

Pretty soon one of the leaders called us over to our square. To get to it, we had to walk through a square that was about a yard deep, and sported the edge of a Byzantine mosaic. They'd removed the mosaic in our square, and gone down another several feet. Ancient stone walls hemmed us in, and overhead a thick mesh canopy protected us from the sun. In one corner was a narrow drain which was undergoing the ministrations of an excitable young man and a calm middle-aged lady. A few feet away was the third square, narrower and deeper than ours, and attended by several of the guy students and a hired Arab helper.

We got right down to business, breaking up the top inch or two with a small pick, before simply crouching on our heels and doing more sifting through dirt with our hands, and pulling out pottery. It was thickly laced with pottery shards: sometimes handles or spouts, once part of a lamp (which was exciting because they are distinctive and easier to use for dating than other pottery). "What's this?" I kept saying, and my fellow diggers were most patient about answering. I quickly learned that the answer to "What is it?" was nearly always "Bone." Didn't matter that sometimes it's clearly a bone, complete with a nubbly joint, while other times it's long and shiny, and still other times porous and crumbling. The spot must have been trash heap or a kitchen, because there was lots and lots of bone.

The most ticklish item was charcoal. Yes, plain ordinary charcoal. Apparently it can be used for carbon dating the layer. If you don't touch it with your bare hands, that is. Oops. I got me a pair of Muppet-esque gloves just for picking up charcoal, but learned a much better way by watching the others: pick it up with the tip of your pointed trowel, and slip it gently into one of the miniature plastic bags for storage in the special finds box. Also into that box went: bits of Roman glass, with that lovely mother-of-pearl look that it gets after being buried for a couple of millennia. Once I found a chunk of packed earth which simply had a paper-thin layer of the sheen from glass that was no longer there. Oh yes, we found worms, too. I felt bad for them, as they got dumped into the goofas (rubber baskets) and trundled off to the growing row of giant totes.

Did I mention the fact that there's no need to be slow, because there's always more dirt to get through? Our hands flew to find just a few more shards, and start on the next level. It was amazing how quickly it became ordinary to sort stuff I should be staring at in a museum case. Perhaps my gardening experience came through, because I felt as if I'd always been doing this sifting-through-dirt thing. I was having a blast!

...to be continued

- by Elisabeth Adams

Genealogy Q & A

I do things in spurts. As time permits I'll do nothing but research ancestry for a few days. Then that will be set aside and I will be writing for days on end. Then I'll try to catch up on reading and emails. Since I wrote the previous post on genealogy I have accomplished very little, but I am excited because my maternal grandfather is going to start helping me when he returns from a trip. I am sure he will be able to offer more information and leads. So in answer to the general main question, Where do you find all this information? ...I really don't know where to start. I'll say Ask your relatives!

Unless you have names, birthdates, and location of birth (not just state but city and county, ideally) it is very difficult to make any headway. Older relatives are the best way to get these pieces of information, plus lots of stories that should be recorded for future generations. My grandmother is full of stories--I sometimes feel like I should keep a tape recorder on me because she is always surprising me with something I had never heard before about our family history.

Plus, relatives are the ones who can provide you with one of the greatest delights of ancestry--pictures! The ones I am sharing in this post are some of my favorites, but thanks to my aunt's hard work, we have digital copies of hundreds of old photos from as far back as the mid 1800's. If no one has protected your family's photographs, perhaps you are the one who can archive them for everyone to enjoy.

I'm wondering what are the best resources for tracing lineages.

Aside from relatives' information, stories, and physical artifacts such as diaries, legal documents, pictures, etc. your best source is online databases. Make sure they are reputable and keep careful records of your research; Ancestry.com has some free downloadable record sheets that can help you verify your data and keep track of what information you are still missing.

Lauren T. left a helpful comment I will include here: "The best way to start is to get names from grandparents, aunts, uncles, etc.... Then, you can use rootsweb.com or familysearch.org to look them up and look at other peoples family trees. Ancestry.com is really good, but it is too expensive for me."

My favorite is ancestry.com but I've also used genealogy.com. If you ever have the opportunity to invest in a month of database research though, I'd recommend Ancestry.com because it is the largest and they add literally thousands of new records every day.

But how do you research something when it's in, say, dutch? all my ancestors are originally from Holland.

I have no idea. :smile: Seriously, I have been blessed to be tracing the footsteps of others and have not run into anything that has not been identified, if not translated, into English. If you have the information in Dutch you may be able to find translating help through one of the heritage groups in your area. Here in Kansas City we have Scottish, Irish, Slavic, Italian, and other groups who love to assist others in tracing ancestry.

How did you ever find that much info from so far back in history?

If you manage to hit a "main artery" in history's family trees then the work has been done for you--all you have to do is find it. Family lineage is highly valued in nearly every culture and most have preserved their roots back to the early days of their country or clan. If you have Indian blood, like my husband-to-be, find your tribal roll. If you are Jewish and can trace to a specific tribe then you will likely be able to go back several thousand years (which I am hoping to do with Rick's heritage at some point)!

If you get far enough back in history, usually back to your country of origin (for me that is Sweden on my dad's side and ultimately France on my mother's) the records of marriages, births, and deaths can be astonishingly complete through the centuries. Again, if you happen to trace back to a larger clan or family group (for me this was the Franks royalty) it's all there....all the way back to the first century B.C. And further, I imagine, if one is willing to get their hands dirty.

In my case, one great-grandmother on my mother's side was traceable on Ancestry.com through her birth information. I looked at her father, her grandfather, her great-grandfather...as I dug deeper certain branches of our tree did not immediately yield further ancestors but I kept pursuing those that had some sort of verifiable data--a census listing, immigration papers, marriage documents, etc.

I traced through one branch to a William Burton (1760-1811) and Ancestry.com had 5 generations of a certain William Burton available. My job was to see if my William Burton was the one Ancestry.com thought might be a match. I checked the birthdate, death date, location, spouse and parent's names and...we had a match. This gave me five more generations of relatives and when I started searching with their data I found a couple who had four and five more generations of ancesters recorded. And so on it goes.

William Burton's father was Captwilliam Burton (I am guessing this might be Captain William but I'm keeping the info as I found it for now) and his father was Robert Burton (1687-1748). Literally billions of records are available on the major genealogy databases online--if you know where and what to look for. Again, you need names, birthdates, and locations. With those it is truly astounding what you can find.

Does that help at all? I'm sure many of you girls are more experienced and can offer some suggestions to those just getting started! Do comment if you have any helpful tips or resources to share. Thank you!

Captions: Above: My paternal grandparents back in 1948: My grandmother Rose celebrating her 16th birthday with Carroll (20). Isn't she beautiful?? They were married when Rose was 17 and Carroll was 22 and just celebrated their 67th wedding anniversary. Wow! Right: My great-grandmother Rachel Sophia in 1915. I remember climbing onto her bed as a little girl and she would tell me stories.

Yad Vashim unveils a Holocaust diary

“She wanted me to save the diary. She said, ‘I don’t know if I will survive, but I want the diary to live on, so that everyone will know what happened to the Jews." The writings of a young Polish girl have been released to the world this week. Rutka Laskier recounts in vivid detail the horrors of life in the Jewish ghetto in 1943. You can read more here (not for younger readers).

Tracing through history

This morning I learned that I am in a direct line of descendents from Charlemagne "Charles the Great" King of Franks, through his son Pepin Carloman and his son Bernard of Italy. Genealogy is fascinating. And addicting. I freely confess to being an avid explorer of my own family history. (It is likely I'm one of few girls my age who would dream about a subscription to Ancestry.com!) Perhaps it is because some of the analysis reminds me of textual criticism and translation variants in Scripture.

On my dad's side, my aunt has done unbelievable amounts of research and compilation; I've spent countless hours looking through the books and photos she's collected and reading the charts. Her work inspired me to begin my own exploration.

I stayed up far too late last night, er, early this morning digging through old Civil War military records, census counts from the 1800's, and immigration papers. An obituary from 1904, written in Swedish on Illinois Freight stationary is now scanned into the computer where I can pull it up at will. Centuries of photos, memorabelia and information digitized might be helpful for tracing ancestry but there is something much more "real" about feeling the chapped leather of the real Swedish Bible or running fingers on the cold gravestones. I finally called it a night when I tapped as far back on one strain of paternal family as I could get: circa 1490. Wow.

My father's lineage is Mansson and Monson. In the early 1900's a Mansson son came to America and changed his surname to Nyquist. And so we've been ever since. My paternal grandmother's side of the family arrived in America nearly a century earlier and took the surname Lofdahl.

Why not keep their native names? I smiled the first time I saw the manner in which surnames were formed back in the mother country. One 3rd great grandfather is named Lars Nilsson. His father is Nils Andersson. His father is Anders I am guessing, but I haven't found that information yet. Lars's mother is Cathrina Nilsdotter. Her father was Nils. So that would make me Natalie Jonsdotter, sharing the same last name as my four-times-great-grandmother, Catharina Jonsdotter born in 1785.

The faded faces on hundred-year-old photographs jump out at me. One of them looks just like my cousin--it's her great, great grandmother. Another is haunting in its solemnity. I wish I could peer through the edges of the frame and jump into their lives. What were they really like? What was life like for my ancestors in Sweden? What did my many-times-great grandfather look like when he was my age?

Born 07 Apr 1807 in Mangstorp, Nyed, Varmland, Sweden. Typing the names and finding the birth records and marriage certificates is like a treasure hunt. It is a satisfying search--unearthing a legacy of family which makes me feel secure. These are my roots. Could my ancestors who immigrated from Sweden have ever pictured the multitude of descendents who would carry their names and bear their image? A hundred years from now, what great-great grandchild might look like me?

I started from scratch with my grandparents on my mom's side of the family. With the help of databases and family trees, as of this morning I've managed to trace a line all the way back to Wildelphe de Sax and Clodius Franks in the late 300's A.D. -- and I'm still digging. My goal is to see if I can find a direct lineage (father of father and so on) to the time of Christ.

When I found the family name that kept going back and back and back through the Middle Ages I could hardly keep from bouncing with excitement. Sometimes when I would be on a really interesting trail I'd forget to sleep or eat til a family member brought me back to reality. But by now I've probably bored any readers still with me. What can I say...I love history, treasure hunts, and my family!

Update: I chose to pursue the line of Clodius Franks and then branched to chase two separate trails. One of them through Clodius's mother's side led to the ancient Roman emperors including Flavius Julius Constantius (317-361). Things got a bit sloppy around 250 AD but finally I made it to some well documented first century forebears. Are there any history buffs out there who would be as excited as I was to find names like Titus Flabius Sabinus and Julia B of Judea in her ancestry?

How about Herod Agrippa? I think that was when my jaw really dropped! I'm related to Agrippa and Herod I of Judea?

Incidentally...

US News and World Report's latest issue features "The 10 Worst Presidents." You can see the verdict here. Much more amusing (at least to me) is the current poll you can take--when I look our current president carried 79% of the vote. Take a look and scroll down the page.

Most of the presidents prior to our generation--certainly prior to the twentieth century--have hardly any votes. Is this because they were truly greater men...

...or because our under-educated culture doesn't know anything about them?

A Gold Star

December 7, 1941. The day that will live in infamy. “The Shadow” radio program was supposed to come on that Sunday morning. But it never did. Instead the announcer’s voice broke in with the news that Pearl Harbor had been bombed.

I wasn’t born yet. But when I was a little girl, the memories of those who lived in 1941 came alive for me in a book I found at Papa and Grama’s house. My cousins and I poured over the remembrances of World War II collected in We Pulled Together and Won. We studied the photographs. We memorized the stories. We relived those years of a country drawn together by war. Before our history schoolwork ever got to the 1940’s, we knew more facts by heart than a history book would ever teach us.

Like all little boys, my brother and cousins and their friends went through the phase of playing war. They started with World War II (I was a WAC then, part of the Women’s Army Corp), then they learned about the Civil War and started dressing like Confederate Soldiers (I was reading Elsie Dinsmore and baking cookies, too busy to play with the boys). I joined in their imaginary flights over enemy territory, I nursed their battle wounds, I took their pictures as they posed proudly in uniform—but through it all I prayed that they would never really have to go to war. That they would never really feel the fire of the enemy. That they would never really have to defend the land they loved. I knew they would, if they must. But I prayed it wouldn’t come to that, not in our lifetime.

Then came September 11, 2001. Almost sixty years since Pearl Harbor. The enemy attacked our shores once again. And I watched as boys I grew up with joined the fight. Nate from church, my friend’s brother Tommy, Mike from Summit, my cousin Derrek, my cousin Casey, our friend Robert, Doug from church, Joe from TeenPact, and I just heard that David enlisted. Some on foreign shores, some patrolling our own borders. All fighting for the same reasons the boys in WWII did. Love of family, love of country.

Casey got married in his Army uniform, and left his new bride Emily to fight for another man’s freedom. And suddenly, those weren’t just soldiers over there in Iraq. Those were our boys fighting over there.

Then Robert died in Marine boot camp, before he ever had a chance to fight for the land he loved. The sacrifice of patriotism became intensely real as I watched them hand that folded flag to his mother, my own mother’s childhood playmate. The tears we shed were tears of pride and yet heartbreak, as we heard Taps played for that rambunctious little boy who was always wearing camouflage.

And then Doug was killed. Bombs explode in Iraq every day. But one roadside bomb in November made the War in Iraq more real to me than World War II had ever been in those pictures. Doug had always been two Sunday school classes older than I. His mom had been so proud when he’d joined the Army. We’d all seen him at church when he made it home for Christmas last year. I remember Daddy had him stand up, so we could all applaud him, out of gratefulness for his service to our country. And then, just like that, our little town lost its first boy overseas. And a mother lost her pride and joy.

As I thought about Doug’s family, as I prayed for them through the hard days of the funeral, I kept seeing in my mind’s eye one of the pictures from We Pulled Together and Won. A gold star, hanging in a window. The sign that a family had lost a son in the war.

In 1942, a gold star used to bring neighbors with food, sympathy, and prayers. During World War II, a gold star in the window symbolized the fact that this family made the ultimate sacrifice.

If Jim and Cindy were to hang a gold star in their window, no one would know now what it meant.

But maybe we should start hanging gold stars again.

Interviews -- Part Two

More Misc. Questions

What are your favorite songs?

Elisabeth: I love hymns. They feed my heart and mind, and there have been countless times where God has placed a fragment of a song in my thoughts just when I most need encouragement. I've had different songs for different seasons. "He Hideth My Soul" helped me through a stressful senior year in high school, "Day by Day" during my first year of Bible School, and "Jerusalem the Golden" at the death of a comrade-at-arms from a prayer trip to Israel. A new favorite is in Hebrew: "Hodu L'Adonai," means "Give thanks to the Lord," and the tune is so refreshingly beautiful! Like the books, there are many more I could mention...

Jeannie: I have many, many favorite songs. I love music and singing, and my list changes depending on what I’m going through at the moment. I’m especially drawn to worship songs – songs that focus on God and His majesty. This is just the tip of the iceberg!

Hymns
To God Be the Glory
Day by Day And With Each Passing Moment
And Can It Be
Be Thou My Vision
Join All The Glorious Names

Praise Songs
Majesty
As The Deer
More Precious Than Silver
Shout to the Lord

(A few radio favorites include Lifesong, Praise You in This Storm, and Who Am I by Casting Crowns; Indescribable, How Great Is Our God, and Famous One by Chris Tomlin; and Blessed Be Your Name by tree63.)

Lanier: I love The Innocence Mission, and consequently anything they’ve done. My favorites of theirs would probably be ‘Walking Around’ and ‘Tomorrow on the Runway’ and ‘My Someday Coming Child’. Also, "Lady of Shalott" by Loreena McKennitt.

I adore Mozart, especially his masses. And the Oxford Book of Carols is full of favorites, as well.

‘Moon River’ and ‘Two for the Road’ by Henry Mancini

‘God’s Own Fool’ by Michael Card

Natalie: These vary tremendously depending on the season in my life. All of the radio favorites Jeannie meantioned are ones I treasure as well, especially Praise You in This Storm. Some that I have mentioned on YLCF in the past include Natalie Grant's Held, Waiting for the World to Fall on the Narnia movie album, Rescue by Newsong, and Embrace the Cross by Steve Green.

My favorite artists are: Steve Green, Steven Curtis Chapman (mostly his older works), Rebecca St. James, Newsong, and Rich Mullins. But there are so many good songs...and hymns...and instrumental works. Michael W. Smith's instrumental album Freedom is an all-time favorite, as is Riverdance music (I like to practice step-dancing to both).

What do you do for a living?

Elisabeth: I'm a student and a volunteer at my university in Jerusalem. That means that I teach English as a second language, transcribe classes, practice hospitality, write scripts for a multimedia presentation on the Dead Sea scrolls, grade exams and do whatever other oddments come my way. I consider my real job, however, to be a friend, sister (I adopt as many as I can), daughter, discipler, and intercessor.

Jeannie: Nothin’? I guess I’m a dependent. I do earn my keep, though – helping with homeschooling, housework, farm work, our home business (www.castleberryfarmspress.com), etc. The only outside work I do is serve as an election inspector for our rural township (maximum of four days a year, so it’s not really a regular job!).

Lanier: I’m a homemaker.

Natalie: I live at home with my family, and as a woman, do not have to "make my living." However, I have spent many years--from age eleven til now--as a babysitter and then full-time nanny or mother's helper. I do a fair amount of freelance writing and editing. Next month I will begin serving at a friend's Christian tea room near our home.

What's your favorite time period?

Jeannie: History was always my favorite subject in school, and I love it even more now – in fact, I’m currently helping write a history book for our rural township’s centennial. It’s hard to narrow down my interest to a particular time period, but I guess if I had to pick I’d choose the World War II era. Note of interest: Both of my grandfathers fought in WWII, and both met their wives (my grandmothers ?) as a direct result of their service.

Elisabeth: To imagine myself in and write about? First century Israel. To read about? 1940's Europe and 1800's Britain.

Lanier: Living in an antebellum home, my husband and I really love the furniture, customs, lifestyle, dress (well, that would be me J) of the early half of the nineteenth century.

But I’m also irresistibly drawn to the late eighteen hundreds—on Prince Edward Island.

Natalie: I am fascinated by ancient history--the older the better. Of particular interest is the ancient Middle East and China, the Crusades and Reformation, and the Civil War. I mostly study Biblical history and the first century church these days.

Buried Treasure

In the past month, my work has included writing a piece about the finding of the first Dead Sea scrolls in a cave. According to the story, it was completely accidental: a Bedouin shepherd casually threw a rock that happened to sail through the cave's small, high mouth and clatter against the pottery jars inside...in which were found at least seven ancient scrolls. From there, it turns into pure intrigue.

There's Kando, the shrewd cobbler/antiquities dealer who sold four scrolls.There's the head of the Syrian Orthodox church, whose title happened to be "the Metropolitan," and who bought those four scrolls. There's Eliezer Sukenik, an archaeologist who took advantage of a one-day postponement of the UN vote on the partition of Palestine to slip into Bethlehem and buy the other three scrolls. There's Yigael Yadin, Eliezer's son, another archaeologist. He slipped into the role of soldier long enough to fight his country into existence, and when the war was over, finally bought the other four scrolls which his father had been unable to get from the Metropolitan.

But long before that, there were the Essenes, who sound remarkably John-the-Baptist-like in their love for a baptism of repentance. I've also been transcribing a seminar on the Dead Sea Scrolls: everything from what books of the Bible Essenes considered canon, to the way hair-follicle patterns can be used to match up scattered pieces of parchment, to the way tracing the track of a long-dead worm through a scroll can help you decide how long it used to be, to... Well, you get the idea! It's long, hard work, but fascinating stuff, especially when you consider Dr. Pfann's idea that perhaps God used the Essenes as forerunners to the forerunner. I'm putting it into my own words, but the point is this: perhaps the real reason that some of the Essene writings sound so much like Christianity is not because John the Baptist grew up with them, or because the Christians copied the Essenes, but simply because they were moved by the same Holy Spirit.

This is not to say that the Essenes were perfect. In fact, some of Jesus' cautionary teachings seem to be aimed directly at Essene beliefs. For instance, they did not allow the blind into their assembly, because a blind person could not see whether or not he was touching impure things, and thus might spread impurity to others...and because they might offend the angels (whatever that means). Jesus, on the other hand, welcomed - and healed - the blind. Still, it is encouraging to see the continuity of God's purposes. However He does it, and whoever He uses, He is at work at every time and in every place. And especially where there are people with hearts to please Him.

- by Elisabeth Adams

A Tribute to Ronald Reagan

Ringing the Bell for a Generation’s Heritage of Freedom
By Gretchen Louise Glaser

The bell in the Scio Baptist Church bell tower rang 40 times on June 11, along with bells all across the nation, in honor of our fortieth president, Ronald Wilson Reagan.

President Ronald Reagan once said, “Freedom is a fragile thing, and it is never more than one generation away from extinction.” With his passing on June 5, he left a rich heritage of freedom to this generation. And while you don’t see it on the endangered species list, “freedom” should be listed at the very top. The erosion of our rights has been gradual enough to escape the notice of many. And now that America has lost one of freedom’s finest champions, it is now our job, as the next generation, to keep that freedom from going into extinction.

What were these freedoms President Ronald Reagan sought to protect? What was it about him that made President Reagan such a hero to this country? What inspired him to leave this heritage of freedom?

First of all, President Reagan believed firmly in God, and that America was one nation under God. He stated in 1984, “America needs God more than God needs America. If we ever forget that we are One Nation Under God, then we will be a Nation gone under.” Ronald Reagan drew his inspiration from God. He asked, “Do we really think that we can have it both ways, that God will protect us in a time of crisis even as we turn away from Him in our day-to-day life?” And after a close encounter with death, he said, “Whatever days are left to me, they belong to Him.”

Out of his belief in God as the creator of all mankind, President Reagan drew his belief that abortion is equal to murder. In a lecture in 1982 he said, “God’s greatest gift is human life and we have a sacred duty to protect the innocent human life of an unborn child.” He told reporters, “The fact that they could not resolve the issue of when life begins was a finding in and of itself. If we don’t know, then shouldn’t we morally opt on the side of life? If you came upon an immobile body and you yourself could not determine whether it was dead or alive, I think that you would decide to consider it alive until somebody could prove it was dead. You wouldn’t get a shovel and start covering it up. And I think we should do the same thing with regard to abortion.”

What I will remember most about President Ronald Reagan is how he loved his wife. He described her as “the one who can make me lonely just by leaving the room.” He once wrote to his wife Nancy, “When I was young I thought marriage might be this way for a while: I never knew it could go on and on, getting better and better year after year.” In a generation lacking commitment to marriage, theirs is an incredible example of faithfulness to each other and their marriage. In the book I Love You, Ronnie, Mrs. Nancy Reagan wrote, “We’ve had an extraordinary life, and I’ve been blessed to have been married for almost fifty years to a man I deeply love… Alzheimer’s is a truly long, long good-bye. But it’s the living out of love.”

It was that love, that respect for human life, and that faith in God which made President Ronald Wilson Reagan the great man he was. And that is the heritage we are left with in this generation. Will we let it slip away? Will we let marriage be redefined, let abortion become even more prevalent, and let God be taken out of our schools? Or will we fight the good fight to protect our freedoms from extinction? Let us endeavor to do as Ronald Reagan did, and preserve the freedom we love for the next generation.

Published in the Scio Community News, July 8, 2004, Vol. 20, No. 28

Gods and Generals

"Gods and Generals is not only the finest movie ever made about the Civil War, it is also the best American historical film. Period."
-Bill Kauffman, American Enterprise Magazine

It is not often I recommend a movie. In fact, I've only seen two movies in the theaters, "Gods and Generals" being one of them! But once I had, I urged my friends to go see it. When I read Doug Phillip's review and heard that "Gods and Generals" was better than "Chariots of Fire" (one of our all-time favorite movies), I knew I had to go see it. And when I did, I discovered that true to what I'd heard, "Gods and Generals" is one of the most God-honoring movies ever. And amazingly, it was produced by Hollywood and Ted Turner. "Gods and Generals" came out on DVD and VHS on July 15, 2003. I encourage you to buy or rent it, and experience this spectacular movie! No matter your beliefs on the Civil War, it will be an eye-opening history lesson, a thought-provoking tale, and an inspiring example of true Christian manhood.

For God and Country,
Gretchen Louise Glaser

Gods and Generals - DVD

Gods and Generals - VHS

Gods & Generals Soundtrack CD

America Will Always Stand
Ron Maxwell Presents New Songs of the Civil War

Beloved Bride: The Letters of Stonewall Jackson to His Wife
by Bill Potter and Stephen Lang

Gods and Generals...

a wonderful example of Christian manhood
amazing portrayal of trust in and reliance upon God
completely historically accurate
heart-warming
plenty of action for the guys
enough romance for the girls
succeeds "Chariots of Fire" as the Christ-honoring film for this generation
refreshing encouragement
a wonderfully amazing and inspiring story

"My religious belief teaches me to feel as safe in battle as in bed. God has fixed the time for my death. I do not concern myself about that, but to always be ready, no matter when it may overtake me."
-Stonewall Jackson (in the movie and real life)

The Official Gods and Generals Website
Director Ron Maxwell's Website

"Among Gods and Generals" - excellent article on WorldNetDaily

Reviews of "Gods and Generals":
by Doug Phillips of Vision Forum
Follow-up by Doug Phillips
from Christian Spotlight on the Movies
from Focus on the Family's Plugged In
by Charity Bishop of CharitysPlace.com
from Hollywood Jesus
from Michael Elliott of Movie Parable

A poem on Honor

"Gods and Generals" presents orthodox, no-holds-barred Christianity. Not because the film was designed as a tool of evangelism, but because the film is faithful and true to the life of a soldier who was first and foremost an obedient evangelist for Jesus Christ.
This is not a "nice" film, but Christianity is not always "nice." It's not nice when a general is called to execute his own soldiers for desertion. It is not nice, but it is biblical, as Jackson explains with tremendous clarity and precision. It is not nice to pick up the sword and go to battle, but when one is defending one's homeland, it is mandatory.
...Ron Maxwell has defied the political correctness police of both the Right and the Left by giving the American people a truthful vision of their past. He has shown a time when men defended women, when faith in God defined a man's vision of duty, when the greatest leaders were also the most committed Christians. For the first time in the history of modern major motion pictures, a director with guts has given us the opportunity to understand the complexities, the beauty, the horror, the glory, the tragedy, and the Gospel witness found in one of the greatest fratricides in the history of any people.

-Doug Phillips

"For the future glory of this Replublic, it is absolutely immaterial whether on this battlefield or that the blue or the gray won a great victory, for, thanks be to God, every victory won in that war by either side was a monument to American valor."
-John Brown Gordon, February 7, 1901