The Welsh Mountain

Anyone who is familiar with the Welsh Mountain south of New Holland, Pennsylvania, has probably heard stories of the Buzzard Gang of outlaws who lived there. The notorious members of the Buzzard Gang were brothers who grew up in the Welsh Mountains, raised by a single mother who lost her husband in the Civil War. Of the six boys raised by Mary Buzzard, three of them, Abe, Isaac and Jacob, had the most run-ins with the law. 

Abe, by far, was the ringleader, but his brothers were equally wild. Another brother, Martin, served 16 years in prison for shooting a farmer in the head during a botched robbery, although the elderly farmer survived. In and out of prison for most of their lives, the brothers terrorized communities throughout the region with robberies, gun battles and a string of thefts too numerous to count. 
Back in 1883, the Buzzard Boys organized the largest prison break in Lancaster County, taking advantage of lax security to free more than a dozen prisoners. At times, there were bounties out for Abe Buzzard that were larger than those offered for Western outlaw Jesse James. Abe was shot several times in gun battles, but he survived those encounters. Despite his outlaw ways, the end came quietly for Abe, who died in 1935 at age 84 in his home in Reading. 

The Buzzard Gang was not the first or only outlaw gang to live on the Welsh Mountain. It had a reputation for their type long before they were born.

The mountain reminded the Welsh people of their homeland and they named it the Welsh Mountain. When they settled in the area in the early 1700s, Indians still lived on the mountain. It was sold out from under them which, of course, did not sit well with them. How would you like it if someone came to your house, claimed it and sold it to someone else? 

Black slaves and white indentured servants who escaped ran to the Welsh Mountain. The Indians helped them hide from their masters. The three races mixed on the Welsh Mountain and produced a Tri-racial group of descendants that lived in crude huts. They made it clear they wanted to be left alone, fiercely defending their freedom with vicious dogs and guns. 

An article in the Philadelphia Gazette in 1790 warned travelers on the State road near Gap in Lancaster County that they were liable to be attacked by "Green's Banditti." The leader of the band was identified a burly black man, Thomas Green, who had control of the mountains. A few years later he died in an attack on a waggoner but his wife and family survived and perpetuated the name and family tradition.

In 1898 the Mennonite church established an industrial mission on the Welsh Mountain in an attempt to evangelize the people and provide a way for them to earn an honest living instead of begging and stealing. While their intentions were noble, generations of hardscrabble living on the mountain was not easily changed to the German work ethic of the mission's founders. The industrial part of the mission was not a stunning success and the residents of the mountain largely continued in their lifestyle.

In 1899, Cal Green was the leader of the black outlaw gang on the Welsh Mountain. She was a descendant of Thomas Green and fiercely defended their territory with guns and vicious dogs. At great peril, Leslie Gilliams managed to interview a few residents on the mountain and photograph the huts in which they lived. A report of his adventure was published in The Wide World Magazine, Vol. IV, Oct. 1899-Mar. 1900; p.366-371.

Today, the Welsh Mountain has been tamed. The industrial mission evolved into a home for low-income elderly. The outlaws are gone and their huts have been replaced with comfortable homes.  A paved road crosses the ridge that once was dense forest. It is safe to drive across the mountain in the dark without fear of being attacked by bandits. 

It's Not Fair

      We have so much to be thankful for in this country. I feel guilty when I hear about so much suffering in many other parts of the world. Why should I have such a comfortable life when other people are hungry and cold? Why have so many people been driven from their homes through no fault of their own and had their lives and families destroyed? It's not fair that they should have so little while I have so much. We have not been blessed to indulge ourselves. We can't fix all the inequality in the world but we can share what we have with those in need. 

      Why was I born in a land where there is freedom of worship while others are persecuted for the same faith? Why was I born into a Christian family that made it easy for me to learn about Jesus and the way of salvation while millions live in spiritual darkness and never heard the name of Jesus? It's not fair that I have had the opportunities and they had none. I am humbled to be so blessed.

     Today, as we gather in houses of worship and around tables loaded with food, give God the credit He deserves. All we are and have comes from Him. Happy Thanksgiving!

Life and Death

Last week was unusual in the life of our congregation. We had two ladies pass away a day apart on November 2 and 3. Then last week we had four days in a row of either a viewing or funeral. As a result, our revivals which had been scheduled for that week were canceled. Although both ladies had terminal illnesses and their deaths were expected, it is still a reality check when it happens and the person is gone forever.

Today I am remembering our son Steve who left us unexpectedly 24 years ago. He was 18 and would be 43 today. I can't quite imagine how he would look by now for he is forever 18 in my memory. Out of sight does not equal out of mind. Although he is no longer with us here, he will live in our hearts as long as we live. 

Solomon said, "love is as strong as death." I would say it is stronger than death for death cannot end love. First Corinthians 13 says love is greater than faith and hope because love is eternal and goes on after faith and hope are no longer needed. 

I have reached my "three score years and ten" so I know there are more years behind me than ahead of me. Because the future is hidden from us, we go on living as usual and the thought of our own death seems somewhere out there in the distant future. We are busy living and can easily ignore the fact that life is a terminal condition. Sooner or later, each of us will reach our last day on earth. The only thing that will matter then is what we have done with Jesus. If He is our Lord and Savior, we already have eternal life and death is merely a transition from earthly life into His presence forever. Death does not end life. And someday death itself will die.

"The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death. But thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ." (1Cor. 15:26,57).

John Donne said it this way:

Death, be not proud

though some have called thee

mighty and dreadful,

for thou art not so.

For those whom thou thinkest

thou dost overthrow

die not, poor death,

nor yet canst thou kill me.

One short sleep past

we wake eternally

and death shall be no more. 

Death, thou shalt die.

A November Day

I posted this nine years ago, but it's worth repeating on this dreary November day.

Changing of Seasons

The dawn was made of smoky purples, grays and reds. It was like the background music for a movie about the Creation. Although the mood was somber, it was nothing you could really put your finger on. The colors were subtly intermingled and changed rapidly from one to the other and to mixtures of two or all three.

The day, according to the calendar, would be a November day and, after the nature of the brute, hardly anybody knew how it would all come out. It began brilliantly after its dawn had dissipated and the sun struck the east sides of houses and trees with a brightness that was altogether foreign to dusky November.

In this eleventh month of the year Nature's patience is running out. She is tired after having produced the bounty that fills barns and freezers and quart jars to feed animals and people through the winter ahead. Fatigue makes her fretful and the weather she brews in fit for neither man nor beast.

Sometimes, as in this year, there is snow before we are psychologically or physical prepared for it. Consider, if you require evidence, the bewilderment that struck us as we looked out upon a white world at a time it should have been green. Snow fence segments lie, still rolled, in fields and there was the unusual experience of the maples, spectacular in yellow---trimmed in white.

November is notable for its cold, dismal rains that slant into the faces of pedestrians and for sleet that dresses them and the objects of their culture in glassy sheaths. Its winds rattle doors and moan softly about the corners of houses in a tune-up for winter. They will become more proficient with rehearsals and, by January, should be in excellent voice.

Sometime in mid-morning, long after the somber dawn had faded, a thick mass of forbidding clouds began to move out of the northwest in a line that stretched from horizon to horizon. There was no turbulence within the mass and its passage across the heavens was orderly, almost sedate.

The mass was not of a consistent thickness. In it were brighter areas of thinner cloud. Some parts of the mass moved a bit faster than others and in some areas had compressed the gray bulk ahead of them into formal rows until they resembled a squeezed accordion.

Torn By The Wind

Immediately preceding this darkening curtain across the overturned bowl of the sky was a wide line of thin, white cloud, ragged and torn on its leading edge by the winds. The larger mass retained its white border until there was nothing left of blue but a wide sliver that stretched across the southeastern sky.

The advancing clouds consumed the sliver in the end and the sky was gray from horizon to zenith over 360 degrees of its earth boundary. In the northwest, where it had all begun, the sky was a leaden gray curtain of uninterrupted gloom. This curtain was to bring a very brief spate of raindrops in mid-afternoon.

The countryside seemed moody and depressed under its heavy cloud cap. Farms appeared deserted, although, in Lancaster County, it must never be assumed that an absence of visible people means idleness--the work goes ahead inside buildings. Snow lay in patches about these buildings and there remained a light frosting on portions of their roofs. Where the blanket of snow on fields and meadows had melted or was very thin, strips of emerald green broke the monotony of adjoining brown fields.

There were still traces of color in the foliage of a woodlot that climbed a hill behind a snowy cornfield. The whiteness in the foreground accentuated the dim color in the woods that had been so brilliant a short week ago.

Most of the trees had lost their leaves. To the sycamores the absence of their crowns does not seem as great a loss as it does to other woody plants. The sycamores, with their whitish limbs exposed, are now the most spectacular and easily recognized of all the trees in the woods.

In the upper elevations where there was more snow originally and where more of it had remained there was the feeling that Thanksgiving was just around the next bend in the road. Warm feelings that accompanied this thought were supported by a thin column of smoke that rose from the chimney of a farmhouse where, in a few days, a turkey will be roasting in the oven. The smoke curled away from a northwesterly breeze that was not yet a wind.

A flock of starlings, perhaps the homeliest birds on earth, flew crazily overhead and landed clumsily in a field. Further on, for contrast, a pair of cock pheasants, bursting with pride at the glory of their own plumage, stood by the road and haughtily surveyed the landscape.

A lone gull made his way down the course of the river and disappeared into the gathering gloom of late afternoon. The surface of the Susquehanna was troubled by a breeze and its reflections of the hills opposite were indistinct, but not without a faint hint of color. Patches of snow shone among wooded areas on the tops of the York County hills. It seemed later than November over there.

There was no indication of it in the west when the day was over. The sky simply became more leaden and darker and evening settled in, chill and comfortless, around houses where lights came on. It had taken all day for it to become November.

Milestone

We reached another milestone today. It is fifty years since we moved into this house. 

We were married in July 1967 and lived in a rented house for fifteen months while we bought a little over an acre of land and built a house on it. 

The carpet had not been installed in the living room when we moved in and the lawn and landscaping were not done. The upstairs was one big attic room. On the main floor were two bedrooms, kitchen, living room, bathroom, and laundry, plus an attached one-car garage. We had one three-month-old son and very little furniture. Walls were white plaster and decorating was limited to a calendar on the wall. Multiple bathrooms and central air were luxuries we didn't even consider.

Leroy worked all through the next spring and summer to seed the lawn, one section at a time. I took the picture below after we had grass, shrubs, and a tree in the front yard. They are so small you can hardly see them!

We had a lot of ideas for improvements to the place and it took almost fifty years to get them all done. Maybe that's why we never moved. As the family grew, we added a bedroom upstairs and later a second bedroom and a half-bath. That floor was crammed full with five boys. Our bedroom was downstairs and our daughter had the second bedroom.

As the years passed we built a two-bay garage beyond the right of the attached garage. When the boys were teenagers another two bays were added.

We also added a patio behind the garage end of the house and sometime later turned it into a sun room by enclosing it. Several years later it was finally finished when tiles were laid on the floor. This place was a work in progress, doing things only as needed and we could afford it.

The basement was unfinished with cement block walls and concrete floor. That was fine since it was a rec room. We had a wood stove down there which heated the basement and main floor. The concrete floor was perfect for the children to ride tricycles and roller skate. Leroy hung some swings from the floor joists and the picnic table was stored down there for the winter. In the 1990s we got rid of the wood stove and installed an oil furnace for heat. The children were growing up and our tribe was increasing as grandchildren were added, so the time had come to finish the basement and turn it into a family room for parties and Christmas dinners.

One of my dreams had been to have a sewing room in the second bedroom on the main floor. I thought I would spend my time sewing when I was an old lady. By the time that room was no longer needed for a bedroom, things had changed. I was spending more time writing than sewing so it became an office. We had an Amish man custom-build a desk to fit the room.

Some non-essential items on the "someday" list were adding shutters for trim and blacktopping the driveway. They eventually happened and we chalked off the final one when the driveway was finished last year.

Of course, there were a lot of other changes and upkeep that happened through the years. Wooden windows were replaced with vinyl ones, the roof was replaced, the garden expanded to cover almost a third of an acre and kept shrinking as the children established their own homes.

This place has served us well and could tell a lot of stories. It is the only home our children ever knew. God has been good and we are very blessed.

Moral Questions

Medical science has made great strides in modern times. A hundred years ago, during WWI, people died by the thousands from the flu. Today joint replacements and open heart surgeries are almost routine. People are living longer as a result of better health care. But some of the advances raise difficult questions, especially as it relates to the sanctity of life in reproduction and end-of-life issues. How much effort and money should be spent to prolong life? When is it time to "pull the plug"? What methods of birth control should a Christian not use? Is it morally right for an infertile couple to try conceive a child by IVF (in vitro fertilization)? Medical science has created a quagmire of moral questions that were not an issue a generation ago.

The first test tube baby, Louise Brown, was born in 1978.  Many of those who successfully undergo IVF end up with leftover frozen embryos. As the use of IVF grows, the number of embryos in storage also grows. An estimated 600,000 frozen embryos are now in storage across the United States. 

The government views these embryos as tissue and personal property rather than a human being. Most of these frozen embryos will eventually be destroyed. Since we Christians believe life begins with conception and these embryos are human beings, this creates a moral problem. 

The year Louise Brown turned 20, another couple welcomed America’s first "snowflake baby,"  the term advocates of embryo adoption use to describe the children born from this procedure. President George W. Bush began an initiative through the Department of Health and Human Services to promote embryo adoption.

When couples use IVF, one option available to them is to donate the leftover frozen embryos to another couple. This is an alternative way for an infertile couple to adopt a family. After the doner releases their embryos to the adoptive parents, the embryo is thawed and implanted in the womb of the adoptive mother. She carries and gives birth to the child, allowing the adoptive parents to not only have a child but also experience pregnancy and childbirth. A child that would have been destroyed (technically aborted) is given a chance to live. Most people have not heard of embryo adoption but I believe it is not morally wrong and is a valid way for an infertile Christian couple to build a family.

America Needs the Lord

This past week was déjà vu time for everyone old enough to remember the Clarence Thomas-Anita Hill controversy. But in the midst of many striking parallels between the Senate Judiciary Committee hearings in 1991 and 2018, we have largely overlooked a very telling, quite ironic comment from Justice Thomas.
But first, some of the parallels.

Then, As Today

Then, as today, there were two compelling stories.
Then, as today, there were two believable witnesses, a qualified male judge and a respected female professor.
Then, as today, there were charges of sexual impropriety.
Then, as today, there were concerns about political hit jobs.
Then, as today, the judge was a conservative nominated by a Republican president.
Then, as today, the woman was brought in by the Democrats.
Then, as today, the male judge was hailed as courageous for his impassioned denial of the charges against him.
Then, as today, the female professor was credited with helping to empower women who had suffered sexual abuse and harassment.
Then, as today, the woman was reluctant to come forward and wanted to preserve her anonymity.
Then, as today, the woman’s anonymity was compromised by leaks to the media.
Then, as today, the judge was considered to be a virtually certain appointee until the charges were leaked.
Then, as today, the man felt his reputation had been tarnished for life.
Then, as today, the man denied the accusations “unequivocally and categorically.”
Then, as today, the Republicans and Democrats voted along party lines.
Then, as today, the hearings were brutal.
Then, as today, the judge and the professor received death threats.

“A Travesty … Disgusting”

In fact, it was John Sununu, President George Bush’s chief of staff and a supporter of Thomas, who knew that Bush’s picking of a “true conservative” would result in a “knock-down, drag-out, bloody-knuckles, grass-roots fight.”Yes, the parallels are beyond striking, as indicated by these comments from Thomas in 1991 when asked by Senator Joe Biden if Thomas had anything to say to the committee.
Thomas remarked, “I think that this today is a travesty. I think that it is disgusting. I think that this hearing should never occur in America,” referencing the “dirt” and “sleaze” that had been dug up (really, manufactured) against him “by staffers of members of this committee.”
He continued, “I think something is dreadfully wrong with this country when any person, any person in this free country would be subjected to this.”
Dreadfully wrong, indeed, and a sentiment echoed by Kavanaugh.

Lesson Not Learned

But here’s the sad irony of all this. We have not learned our lesson, and the hopes of Clarence Thomas were not realized.
It was Senator Orin Hatch who asked Thomas if he had expected to go through the particular hell he endured as a result of his nomination.
Thomas responded, “Senator, I expected it to be bad. And I expected the awful treatment throughout the process. … I expected to be a sitting duck for the interest groups. I expected them to attempt to kill me. And yes, I even expected personally attempts on my life. That’s just how much I expected.”
But, he added, “I did not expect this circus. I did not expect this charge against my name. I expected people to do anything, but not this.”
And then the words that are so sadly ironic.
Thomas said, “And if by going through this, another nominee in the future, or another American, won’t have to go through it, then so be it [my emphasis]. But I did not expect this treatment. And I did not expect to lose my name, my reputation, my integrity to do public service.”
Tragically, we have not learned our lessons. We have not improved our conduct. We have not become more civil.

Healing, Restoring, Awakening

Quite the contrary.
Through the tidal wave of social media and endless news outlets, through our increasingly divisive politics, we are on the verge of tearing ourselves apart. And if the Thomas hearings could be likened to a “circus,” the Kavanaugh hearings can be likened to gladiatorial combat, with the bloodthirsty crowds cheering on. What in the world is coming next?
Recently, Rev. James Robison urged Bible believers to, “Release the powerful weight of [God’s] kingdom presence — right here, right now, for His glory and eternal kingdom purpose.”
Nothing other than divine intervention will do. Nothing less than a great awakening will work.
America needs the Lord. Desperately.
So I pray, “Heavenly Father, have mercy on us, and come and heal and restore our broken nation.”
Can I hear an Amen?
 By Michael Brown, Published on September 29, 2018