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I love the fellowship of fellow homeschooling mothers. One thing I have noticed about us is how quickly we share our hearts with one another. Sometimes it seems that what is in our hearts is right there at the top of our hearts just waiting to pour out into a listening ear. As I have listened to story after story while we have traveled across North Carolina for the last two weeks, I have heard the tales of many heroines.

Let me introduce you to some of them. I’ve made up their names, but not their stories.

Cherie is settling back into “normal” after a year of taking care of her mother while she fought a losing battle with cancer. The chemotherapy was two hours away from Cherie’s home. For that year Cheri’s children learned more about serving than they did about academics. They volunteered while they hung around the hospital. When one patient was released from the hospital, she refused to leave to return to the nursing home until she found Cherie to thank her for her children being her “grandchildren” while she was there.

Jenny serves as president of her large homeschool support group. She is the mother of four: three teenage boys and a little girl who is five. As an only child, she decided to move her mother in with her after her father died in his nineties in 2004. She thought, “Why should I wait until she needs to move in? Why not go ahead and have her here while she is healthy?” Jenny’s aunt is 100; Jenny had to take her keys away from her just three years ago. For two weeks each month, Auntie comes to stay, too.

Homeschooling moms Jessica and Melanie came together to one of our meetings. The fact that they were sisters was obvious. They told us the story of their parents homeschooling them and their five other siblings, beginning forty years ago in 1973! When their parents first made the decision to homeschool, officials where they lived told them that they would be arrested if they took their children out of school. Finding that it was legal to teach children at home in Virginia and Mississippi, their father moved his family to Mississippi. Many years later several family members moved to North Carolina. Jessica’s family, Melanie’s family, and their parents all live on the same street. Being close by is wonderful every day, but is especially helpful now that their dad sometimes needs help in caring for their mom.

Let your light shine before men in such a way
that they may see your good works,
and glorify your Father who is in heaven.
Matthew 5:16

You certainly do.

 

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One comment

  1. Lovely and inspirational stories. I know there are great people everywhere in all walks of life, but I must say that I think the homeschool community has a disproportionately large share. Maybe I’m just biased! 😉 Maybe there’s something about the decision to make such daily sacrifices on behalf of your children that causes you to be more open to sacrifice in every area of your life.

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