Pulling Up Stakes and Putting Them Down Again
This weekend I am in Louisville at a retreat for homeschooling mamas. I met an amazing woman last night. I’ll call her Janie. She is an amazing woman with an amazing dad.
While meeting the women sitting around me at dinner last night, I asked Janie where she was from. She said Watauga in Tennessee. I was immediately interested because that is the area my ancestors left when they came west with other pioneers to found Nashville, Tennessee.
Janie told me that she had not always lived in Watauga. When she was in her mid teens, her hometown in Louisiana got so dangerous that she wasn’t even safe going to get her family’s mail — in their yard.
Janie’s dad decided that enough was enough. He closed down his business, loaded his family in the car, and headed east. When they came to Johnson City in the far eastern tip of Tennessee, they saw a rainbow.
This is it, he decided. The family moved to Johnson City and Janie’s dad began a new business.
A few years later while Janie was in college, she met her husband. They’ve been married for eighteen years. Her parents still live in the area, too, That’s what you call pulling up stakes and planting new ones.
Very few of you were homeschooled yourself. You are like Janie’s dad. You have pulled up stakes in the education system you knew and planted them in homeschooling. I admire Janie’s dad and I admire you, too. Thank you for being brave.
Be strong and courageous,
do not be afraid or tremble at them,
for the Lord your God is the one
who goes with you.
He will not fail you or forsake you.
Deuteronomy 31:6
I needed to hear that today!