The Story of Ferman Yutzy

Ferman Yutzy shares the story of growing up Amish, sensing his mother’s living faith, struggling through school and youth temptations, and finding personal peace in Christ as a young man. He describes years of searching for church life shaped by Scripture, Bible study, brotherhood, and open communication, including painful seasons of church conflict, leaving, bitterness, and later making things right. The testimony centers on God’s patient love, the Holy Spirit’s work at each “next intersection,” and the danger of reacting in offense instead of responding with humility.

Key Points:

– Ferman remembers his mother’s prayers and singing as an early witness that she had a real connection with God.

– As a young man he struggled with fear, bitterness, temptation, and guilt, but found peace when he cried out to the Lord and began walking with Jesus.

– He and his wife searched for Amish church settings where Bible study, Sunday school, and shared brotherhood could help seekers understand and follow Christ.

– Church conflict and excommunication decisions eventually led him through loneliness, hurt, bitterness toward the Amish, and the realization that he had also reacted wrongly.

– A dream helped him stop focusing only on what others had said and ask what he himself had said and done, leading him to apologize and make things right.

– He learned that problems are deeper than man-made rules alone; heart issues, control, offense, and lack of trust in God can follow people into any setting.

Scripture References: Jesus’ promise not to leave or forsake His people; the Holy Spirit reminding believers of Christ’s words

Guide me, oh, the great Jehovah, pilgrim through this barren land. Good morning and welcome to Hope for Wondering Amish. We’re so glad you’re with us here this morning. Today is October 4th and normally we hold Hope for Wondering Amish the first Saturday of each month. There’s a live meeting.

You can check out the website. This morning we have Ferman Yutzy with us from Central Michigan. I’m really excited to hear what Brother Ferman has to share with us this morning. And yeah, so I think he’ll have a very interesting testimony and message for us here this morning from Growing Up Amish and his faith journey and so on. Ferman Yutzy and his wife Mary live in Central Michigan. They’re empty nesters.

And Ferman and his wife enjoy traveling and meeting people. So Brother Ferman, are you ready here this morning? I’m ready, but there you are. I couldn’t see you no more. Yeah. Okay. All right. Well, I’ll have a prayer for you and the time will be yours. You can interrupt yourself a bit more then and share your message with us. I look forward to that. So let’s have a prayer. Father, we thank you for this beautiful morning. Thank you for loving us and caring for us. Thank you for Brother Ferman.

And his heart to share with us here this morning. We pray your blessing and your peace upon him. And we pray that many people could be touched. Many people could be drawn to you and your kingdom could be advanced. Bless us all. Bless everyone in the audience in the precious name of Jesus. Amen. Amen. The time is yours, Brother Ferman. Well, good morning, everybody. I can’t see. I’m not sure. I can see you, but I can’t see the rest. I’m not sure what I’m doing wrong. I think we can all see you. Okay.

That’s what matters, right? Yeah. Good morning. I’m mentioning everybody that I know. That would be nice. Plus, yeah, it’s been a journey. The blessing of it is I feel loved as I go through my journey. I guess I might start on when I was a little child.

I was born in Arkansas. My parents would have come from Ohio. All my siblings were from Ohio, born in Ohio. I was the youngest out of 12, and I was born in Arkansas. Then I was two years old. They moved to Iowa. For my childhood years, what I remembered at home, alone with mom a lot of times, the children were in school, and that’s my first memory.

I spent myself through the day with mom. My first memory, the one thing that comes to mind is that a lot of people say that Amish people don’t know how to pray out of their heart. That’s something I can’t resonate with. But I realize since I’m older why they say that.

I had a different upbringing, but my mom would sing a lot. She’d sing and sing and sing and sing and sing. She could be at the sewing machine or fixing lunch or doing a dinner for people with a family or something. Once everything would get quiet and get quiet and then she’d start crying. And then she’d come and get me and take me over to the rocking chair.

And she would be praying to somebody. I didn’t even know what she was doing. Only she was crying and tears were dropping on me. And then when she got done, she’d get up, put me back to the toy box, and she’d start singing again. So I was raised to where I knew that mom had a connection with something that she could rely on and trust.

So that was a blessing. I actually got that rocking chair in my house. That’s a blessing too. Then I started the school. I was just five years old. I never had Amish teachers like Amish people do. We had certified teachers.

I was old enough and didn’t know English very good. So I had quite a struggle to get started communicating with the teacher. And then my school life was kind of rough. It seemed like I started the school with a conscience and come out without any. That was hard.

Because I didn’t want to get made fun of. I didn’t want to get made fun of. So I ended up joining the bad boys or the bully group, we would call it. But we knew at that time, I knew at that time that I knew I was wrong. I knew I shouldn’t do that stuff. I knew it was wrong.

I wasn’t innocent. So quite a few things, quite often things would happen in school that things would go wrong and dad would find out about it. And I remember more than one trip that dad told me, well, go get the horse and hook up the horse and we’re going to go talk to people. If I’d say, no, it’s not true or whatever, he would take me with him and we would go visit people.

Four different stops to find out where it come from and what happened. And this was always hard on me. The others in the group didn’t have to go through that. But now looking back, I’m so glad dad did that. It took me through, it taught me some lessons. It was really, really hard. I remember it actually helped me out once.

It always actually helped me out on that part. I thought dad was being mean to me. My idea was that taking me through this and going to all these different people and finding out what’s really the truth and where it came from, where it started. I remember one time my, there was an auction, my sisters, their husband, they were selling out and writing neighbors to him. There was a, there was a deacon, oh, I’m a deacon.

And they always called name, nicknamed him Tight Yuri. I don’t know why that started, but anyway, and in my mind, he was always a bad person because everybody was talking about this guy and Tight Yuri this and whatever. And so us boys run over the neighbors there and got started talking. Of course, these school boys were thinking about the big boys, what they would do. And so the first thing we know, knew we,

were stabbing holes in feed bags and feed was running out. And then some of them ended up breaking some windows there in the garage. And so of course this came out. So dad took us, took me around and finding out what’s really true. So I went over to Yuri’s place and dad asked him about it. And he says, yeah, and showed him what happened.

And I was surprised by the time I walked out of there. I had already had a different opinion of this bad guy, Yuri. He was really nice about it. And he said, well, dad told me, of course, he told me I have to say I’m sorry. At that time, I wasn’t ready to say I’m sorry so much, but I did. He told me to. Then Yuri said, well, I forgive you, you know, and I just love to work with you.

After school, I had to pass their place to go to school. So why don’t you stop in the evenings after school and I’ll show you how to fix windows. Cut out glass and fix these windows. Just finally all excited to be with me and wishing this guy would get out of here before he breaks some more windows. It wasn’t that way. It was nice. It was friendly. So that’s what happened. After school, I’d stop and help him.

Cut out the glass and put the glass in and puttied it in there. And by the time we were done, I don’t know how many evenings I was there, I had a new friend. It was a totally different story. And then that’s what happened that I got a different picture of my dad. One of the others, I was telling the other boys about it. And one of our group, bully group, we call them.

And he says, Ferman, I know your dad loves you. And I said, well, how do you know that? What do you mean? And he says, because he’s helping you and disciplines you. And I said, well, how can you explain that? And he says, well, all my dad ever does is chew me out. He just hollers at me and chews me out for something. He doesn’t help me through that.

So I started getting a different picture of this is actually love. I felt bad because I was different. I felt so different. But anyway, things started getting worse. And with the youth in Iowa, there was a lot of drinking going on. And dad wanted to get out of there. And his idea was I was still in school age. Maybe he could get out of there and save me from that mess.

So he went back south and started another settlement in Arkansas. The oldest children wanted to go back down, the married children anyway. So we went to a different place. We started another settlement. But in the time in Iowa, when I was a little boy, growing up, I think I was nine years old. I had a dream one night that my brother Enos got killed just down the road from our house.

Sure enough, about a week later, he got killed. But it was like a mile and a half from home instead of a quarter mile. A car accident. Just pretty well like I dreamed. And from then on, I was deathly scared of dreams. And when I dreamed something, I just knew it’s going to happen. And so I was scared. I was badly scared. And still I was living. Dad was thinking about moving out of Iowa.

I did not want to. I was getting into teenage years and I wanted to just turn teenager. And I did. And still, I was looking forward to be with the youth group, the wild boys, you know. And still, I was living in fear. I was actually living in fear, but I wanted to do it. I knew it’s wrong. So I got really bitter with Dad. He moved to Arkansas and the next two boys just older than me

one took off and went for Ohio. He didn’t want me to leave. He didn’t want to go. And then the next, just older than me, he left the Amish and went and stayed with an English family there and worked for them. So we moved to Arkansas. It was just me and Dad. So the communication to me and Dad had this. We were communicating more. It was. And yeah, the other children weren’t there and he bought 200 acres in Arkansas.

In Iowa, he had 200 acres, farm with horses. So I was working more directly with Dad. I had to do the farm work and back and forth with Dad more. But I was still bitter. I was into things that wasn’t good. And I always felt kind of guilty. And somehow I got ahold of one of these little English Bibles, the little pocket-sized Bibles from the Gideon Bible.

So I carried that in my pocket. I was in the field a lot. You imagine farming 200 acres with horses. And so you’re resting the horses. I’d read my Bible. I’m actually like a dyslexic, they call it dyslexic as far as remembering something, doing something.

Peace that way. And it didn’t seem to have peace. And then I just still didn’t seem to have peace. And one, I remember one time I was reading and I was starting to understand a little more what I was reading, but it’s still, I just couldn’t have peace. And I remember one day reading about Jesus and how he came to save us.

So that we can have peace. And what he did for us. And I remember coming home that day behind the barn. I’m guessing I was, I’m guessing I was probably 15. I was probably 15. Somewhere, maybe 16. I think I was 15. I’m not sure. And I remember turning all the horses loose for their water.

And taking them in. And turning them loose to go in for the barn. And I remember falling on my face behind the barn out there. Crying out to the Lord. And just giving my heart to Him. And I remember getting up. Getting up from the ground. And just getting up and just praising the Lord. I felt so good. So free. And so totally free and happy. And I was just full of joy.

Struggles still kept going. But I had a place to go to where I could feel better. And then there was quite a row of things that happened. I felt so loved. There was quite a few things that happened that I could go and just cry out to the Lord. At that time, the Amish never talked. They never talked about getting converted. But I felt that. And I felt loved. And then I remember.

Quite a few times things would happen. And I would cry out to the Lord. And I’d get peace. But one thing that really stood out to me. Every time I’d go to town. Sometimes we did a little bit of carpenter work. But I’d go to town for something. Or with dad. I’d see women that weren’t dressed properly. And I’d have a terrible struggle with myself. I had to really struggle with it.

I really stood out. I remember coming home one evening. And just going to the barn. And just crying to the Lord for help. And I remember asking him. I didn’t even think how to pray. I didn’t even. But I remember asking him. Show me. Show me. Show me what you think. And how you feel when you see these girls and these women. And I just can’t believe the difference. When I went to town the next time.

The difference. I just. I can’t. I can’t hardly break it down to explain it. How different I felt. I did not get aroused. From seeing them. I didn’t. I’m still a human. But it was a total different story. I felt. Pure love for him. It was more like a sympathy. Love. For their heart’s sake. To me. I got a picture. Actually I got a picture.

The hedge of protection. They’re like moving. The hedge. Pity for them. It’s like. They’re moving the hedge of protection. When they’re uncovering their body so much. And the love I had for them. And actually I still feel that. When I actually. When I see. When I see women. Doing that. It to me. It actually turns me off. As far as. As far as. Sexually. It actually turns me off.

That part. And I feel the love. It’s a total different story. When I go out. And I see that. So I. And there I got a real connection. With the Lord. I felt so. Blessed. I feel. I just felt. I just felt like the Lord was right with me. When that happened. It was so. And. It’s not always been that way. All my life. That I.

Felt that close. But. That was one of the. One of my first really. Really true steps of. In other words. I felt it before. But then after that. I. I realized more. And I. Got more. Power. From the faith. In God. But then. Of course. At that time. We never talked to me. I don’t know.

Now. And looking back. I didn’t want him to be baptized. Right there. You know. In a way. But. We didn’t even talk about that stuff. You know. But I. Started walking with the Lord. More and more. And then. Another. Another. Thankful heart I have. That. I don’t know if. Anybody on here. Probably. There’s probably people on here that know Yuri Yoder. Yuri Yoder.

He came down to help us out there in Arkansas. And you talk about somebody. Preaching. He would. He shared the gospel. There was no doubt about it. And. And. He taught it. And. So I. I’d spend a lot of time talking to him. And I told him I got a struggle to memorize like I’d like to. And I told him some of my stories.

I feel the love of God coming through me from Jesus. And accepting Jesus. And he told me to spend a lot of time and. Spend a lot of time in the gospels. Through Matthew and Jesus reading. And that really helped. For. I don’t know. Seemed like a couple of years I spent in there. But. Then. Ended up. He. Ended up. I did.

Go through. Classes and got baptized. And I felt so good. I tell you. When I got baptized. If it goes everybody like it did for me. I was ready to die that night. I was ready to go and be with Jesus that night. I was so felt so free. It was. It was good to me. So that’s one of the reasons I think I can’t. Can’t quite see into.

Because there was. To me, it was a different thing to me. I still feel. I still feel that connection all these years. Only they’re not. Now I’m looking back. There was so many things I totally misunderstood. I totally misunderstood the Bible. What it meant. If you know what I mean. I don’t know if I can break that down. To me it was. To me. To me it was.

Like. Joining the church was part of it. And. And the outward things and the things that went with it was. Had to be there. It wasn’t. I never. Even though I had that personal connection. I never realized that you could. Live without it. But still on a way. You need church. You know. There’s no way around that. But. Anyway.

So I met my wife there. And. We ended up. Getting married. And. Dad had 200 acres there. And. He. He didn’t have nothing else in mind. And I didn’t either that. That. I would end up. Getting the 200 acres. I was. I was actually. When I got married. I was farming 50-50 with dad. And I just got $100 a month.

For groceries. Otherwise everything was gone. I was on the farm like I was before. I could buy my groceries. And then I. That would be. And. I ended up in 10 years. I’d have the farm. And I didn’t have nothing else in mind. But somehow we got. We felt. More and more that we should. Do something. With the family and. Move more of a. More.

Where there’s more people. More people. More not. It was. It ended up by that time. It was mostly family there. Brothers and sisters and family. And we wanted to be more of a. With a bigger group. And. So we didn’t know what to do. Of course I couldn’t sell the farm. We. I had 10 calves we were raising. And they were. About ready to freshen. So that would have been. I had half the cows.

And. And. So all I really had was some cows to sell. I didn’t have much money. To move somewhere. And. So we ended up going to. A different place. We were there. And got to a big Amish settlement. So we went somewhere else. The Amish settlement where we go to. They didn’t. They didn’t. Good carpenter work much. It was just farming. I wanted to farm anyway. But I didn’t have money to buy the farm.

So I went to. One of my. Had two sisters living in a settlement. They could work out. So I got a farm job. That guy. Farmed 400 acres. And I was there. Moved up there. And it was hard on me. To leave dad there. Now as I look back. I realize more and more. How hurt dad probably felt. He put all these years in. Especially for me.

He put up a lot of buildings. A big horse barn. And for the cows and the horses. And a regular milking parlor. And a lot of buildings he put up there. On the place. And he expected that. Now since I have children. I realize how hard that is sometimes. If we’ve gotten intentions for them. But anyway. We ended up. In Wisconsin somewhere. And that.

Okay. I’ll step back a little bit. When I was. When we still lived in Iowa. We. When we started traveling back and forth from Iowa to Arkansas. Thinking about buying property down there. We would stop by Uncle. Get. Get you. For the night. And. The first thing he did in the morning was. We’d get up. And we’d all sit in a circle. And he’d read. Read the Bible. And we’d sit there. And just. Discuss that.

And that got stuck in my heart. So when we got married. We started having devotions in the morning. Dad never did. He always read the Bible. I can’t remember hardly ever seeing my dad reading a book or anything else but the Bible. But he did it in the evenings. In the evenings he would sit there and read the Bible for hours. He said the older you get the less. Less sleep you get the more rest you need. And he can rest reading the Bible. He loved to read.

In the evenings. But he didn’t have devotions. So we moved to Amherst, Wisconsin there. I had these couple sisters there. I got a farm job. But I wasn’t there that long until I realized there’s people that have a problem with devotions in the morning. They didn’t say much about it. They didn’t say a lot about it or much about it. And we wondered why would you have a problem with devotions.

And there was different things coming up that we realized that we’re on a different page than some of them. Anyway, so we ended up searching. We decided to go some of these bigger settlements that we thought we’d move into. And we visited there a few times.

We’d become home. We really were discouraged about the youth and the way the youth responded. And it seemed like the youth weren’t interested in God’s word. And I remember one time coming home from visiting one of them places. And I told my wife that I think we’re just going to leave the Amish. I have no idea where to go, but I think I’m going to leave this. It’s just something don’t seem right. It’s just not right.

They’re enthused about the Bible. It doesn’t seem that that’s what they’re enthused about. They don’t talk about it. And I went to visit my brother David at that time, one time. One of his children got married and we were over at the wedding. And I remember the men sitting out in a circle after the wedding.

And joking around on sex jokes. And I was so discouraged. I was up to 40 years old. They were out there talking about this stuff. I got so discouraged. And I think when I come home, I told them that. She says, well, where are you going to go? And at that time, there wasn’t fellowship or charity and all them groups around even.

And I started praying and looking around and asking the Lord and praying. And then my wife’s brother showed up one day, stopped in there. And we got started talking about this subject. And he says, well, over here in the other part of Wisconsin was actually in Hillsboro, Wisconsin. They got Sunday school there. And I said, wow, that got me all excited. So we went over to visit and ended up moving over there.

And we just freshly started. It was just the first, it was just one church at that time and a small church. And I got all excited when we ended up moving over there. And by the time we moved over there, we got all excited and went over. And by the time we actually got there, we decided not to buy any property. We decided to move with the people that are thinking about moving

in Virginia, or started and did in St. Virginia. Starting a new settlement and actually having Bible studies too. And the bishop that started that, he wanted to have Bible studies and more things and the people didn’t let him change it. He didn’t. So I ended up with not buying any property. We decided just to go with that group.

We ended up living there, I don’t know, a couple of years, something like that. And we enjoyed it. It was so different with the Bible study, with the Sunday school. It was so different. The more people talked up, it wasn’t just the ministers talking. Everybody put in a word. So then from there, we ended up going to Virginia, Paris, Virginia. I ended up going to that group.

And we talked about it. And I remember talking. We pretty well had the same idea a lot of people do when they leave the Amish now about different things, about the Amish. What they do is Amish are kind of back, the old order Amish are kind of back to doing like the Catholics on the way, baptizing babies.

Was one of them. And baptizing people that don’t even understand what’s going on. We actually talked about doing our, having our services in English instead of doing translating. We had, there was some seekers come into Hillsboro at the time and we were translating. We were talking about just doing it in English instead of

translating. And, but of course, we didn’t end up doing that because of the name, the idea, the fear of losing fellowship with the Amish people. So we decided not to, we will not do that. We’ll just, we’ll just keep on translating, make sure they understand it. And, and plus the minister that, the bishop that went with us, Sam Chupp, most of you,

Noah. He used, he did, he did study in English and knew a lot of English. Yeah. Oh, that’s another thing. I’ll back up. Now, since I’m older, I hear people saying that the Amish were not allowed to read in English, the Bible in English. That was all Greek to me because I didn’t know German. I had an English teacher and we didn’t have, I didn’t know the German except in what,

the preacher said, the scriptures that they would read, I could kind of read them in German because I, from hearing them say it, otherwise I didn’t know it. I read mostly in English. I couldn’t understand that. And Sam used, Sam Chupp used a lot of English words in his sermons to break it down more. And people kind of had a problem with that too.

So we made that step. And our heart was out to help the people, the Amish people that didn’t have, didn’t understand it, didn’t have Bible study, didn’t have Sunday school. So we thought, well, the way to help them people, get them people in, we will have a real low ordnung, whatever you call that, ordning.

And we didn’t have a problem with things. So we decided to not even have motors. We do everything by hand, just help each other. And that way we actually meet each other. We help each other with things instead of the modern stuff. Not that we had a, that we thought that you’re going to hell if you use it. Our goal was maybe we can help the Amish that, like the Swartz and Troubert Amish and the Low Amish, they could come to our settlement

because we have the low ordnung. But we’d have Bible study in Sunday school. They’d find out their self how that is and why. And found out about Jesus and living for Him instead of our man-made rules. But that didn’t last long. We weren’t used to doing things by hand. And it was, plus if people come to us

and they had heard Sunday school or Bible study, they got scared. So we got very few people. There was some moved in. There was some moved in from Scottsville and some places. But there was very few people that we got because of that low ordnung. So we switched back to more like the Amish do change that. So of course, some of them moved out because of that.

And because they wanted to keep that. So we went through. We really enjoyed the first years there. We really enjoyed it because we were together and helping each other out all the time. And we could talk about scriptures all the time to each other and work things through. It was just it was really interesting. But then years went on.

And I’m not sure. I’m slow at seeing into things. But I’m not sure what happened. Once things happened again. And I loved everybody there. And I’m not sure what’s going on. But finally, a bunch of people moved out again. I didn’t understand everything. And our children were getting older. And I remember one thing that come in. We had a lot of people coming. Youth that would come down.

And stay for five, six months. Stay with the group there. That were struggling youth. That were struggling. And I know them youth could come down there. And end up leaving free. And realizing that they don’t have to be Amish. In order to be saved. And so. And I realized a lot of them did not.

Stay Amish either. And I know Harrisburg got blamed for it. That they. Led their youth astray. But anyway. I think the Lord was working through that stuff myself. I really do. Even though we were still Amish. But we were growing. I always felt love through God. As we stepped. Through steps as we went there. And.

I remember. Then things. Things started changing. Our Bible stuff. We had youth Bible studies. And. Youth were always really excited about it. We always tried to have youth. Spatial youth Bible studies. And they would. Sit around the table. They and the ministers. And they would have a question or a topic. That they wanted to discuss. They could all pick a copy.

Around the circle. Around. Took turns. And anybody could come to the Bible study. But the men would sit back. So the boys would feel more. To talk up. So they wouldn’t be. You know. So it’s. It’s theirs. It’s their topic. It’s their discussion. And that was really interesting. To hear our youth go through that. And study the Bible. And. And they were really into it.

I was. I was so blessed. I felt so blessed. And then all at once. Things started turning. And. Some of the youth. Some of the youth. That. Couldn’t hardly wait. Until the Bible study was over. They wanted to go play volleyball. They. Got. More into. Sports. And more into different things. With some of the sports. We didn’t have a problem with playing ball. But it was.

And it was more about that. Bible study. It was more about that. And so. Things started turning. And. Oh. That’s one of the things happened. Lobelville come. I don’t know. A lot of you people might. Lobelville people. They came through there. And. And. So it. Kind of made a split there. It wasn’t like. No. There was an excommunication going on. But there was a split. And they had their little group. And we had ours. And.

That was one of the things that happened. That kind of. Struggled. And we had a struggle with. And. So. And my. My youth. My children. Got involved with this thing that. They got more excited about other things. And Bible studies. It seemed like it. And it was getting worse and worse. And then some people. Started. Moving out again. To different churches. And.

And. And all at once we had a brothers meeting. And our brothers meetings were always. Everybody was involved. It wasn’t just the ministry making the decision. Everybody was involved. And would talk things through. And. Had our Bibles laying there in front of us. And discuss things. And talk things through. And made a final decision right there with all us together. If we made some decisions. And then. One time.

There were three people that left the Amish. Again. That happened quite often. And three families. And. And they talked about excommunicating. And quite a bit of the group was not. Was not agreed for that. We didn’t agree on it. And. Then the minister stepped off to the side. That was the first time. In my life. And then 20 years. That they did that. They stepped off to the side. Discussed things.

And they came back. And they said. Well. We’re going to have to do this. That’s the way we used to do. Years ago. And we’re going to have to do this. Because so and so and so and so. And. Then they went around the circle again. Discussing it. And. The time that got. To me. I just said. Well. I don’t understand this. But I guess. The Lord does. The Lord is in this. I guess. And I agreed with it.

And I said. To me home. Going. That was in the mountains. Going through the mountainside. Walking home. I just. Cried out to the Lord. I said. Something is not right. And I remember that time. When I was praying. I cried out to the Lord. All at once. I felt. All I did. That on there. In the meeting that night. Was like. I can’t remember his name. Wash my hands. Just wash my hands. And thought I was.

Free. I can’t remember the name. There when they crucified Jesus. Pilate. Or whatever his name. I think it’s Pilate. He just washed his hands there. And all I did was wash my hands. And that does not make me free. So. There’s what we decided. I think there was a lot of more things kind of going on. But. Here and there. But I don’t know if I remember everything. But. I. Then. The next brother’s meeting. I gave it out.

I says we’re just gonna. We’re gonna move out. And. And look for a different place. I can’t. Just can’t go along with that part. I just. I just couldn’t see into it. And. So. We spend the next year. Moving. Going around. And checking out churches. Of course. Amish churches. We didn’t. Think nothing else. Different kind of churches.

And we always came home. Kind of discouraged. We. We just didn’t feel right. And. And in that time. We didn’t get excommunicated. But in that time. We got silenced as far as. We couldn’t talk up in Sunday school or Bible study or. We could be there. But we couldn’t. We’ll give a word. And I felt so alone. I felt so alone.

To me. I felt like. I didn’t have no brothers. I needed brothers. And I didn’t feel like I had brothers. And in that time, the communication level just. Went to zero. And you couldn’t communicate with the ministers no more. That was so opposite. Communic. Before that. Before that, the communication level was. It was always kept up right. Right in front. I mean, it was always there. If something came.

You communicated about it and talked about it and worked things through. But then the communication level went to zero. And you just couldn’t talk about things. It was just like, well. We got to wait. We got to wait till you. Till you change and can completely fit in. And that was. It was totally different from our whole idea. Of. Of starting that settlement. And.

I guess I missed something. A couple of years before that. We were always having struggles and splits and. And we were thinking there’s something wrong. Didn’t know what’s wrong. And we’ve got some ministers in to help. I think we could work these things through. And ended up. And ended up. Our bishop went to different settlement for a year to walk behind some other ministers and see what’s maybe going on.

And. That’s kind of what happened when they came back. When he came back is where we had this meeting. He was kind of pushed to put these excommunicate these people. That’s something I had missed there. But anyway. So we had quite a few meetings. The ministers would come. In other words, instead of communicating, regular communicating, something came up about.

Just things came up, what we were doing and where we were searching and meetings that we would go to in different places. They instead of talking to us about it and discussing it, they talked to each other about it and called around for this and that and for advice. And then we’d have the meetings and they’d come to our place and have them. They just leave a message on the phone and tell us they’re going to have a meeting a certain evening. We had no idea what’s going on or what’s going on.

The meetings were about. There was no communication level. So we ended up going through five different meetings like that. And it was heartbreaking. And so we ended up, yeah, we ended up going to Northern Indiana there in Bern. I think it’s called Berne Christian Fellowship or something several times in the men’s seminars.

I was there. All at once I recognized. I got hundreds of brothers. And to me, I felt empty. That was another turning point. I felt so loved and so different because I had a lot of brothers. I knew there was a lot of brothers in the world. On a way, I kind of knew it, but it was different. It felt so good. I just thanked the Lord over and over and over.

I didn’t feel connected as a solid church. I felt loved. And so we ended up moving to Michigan. I thought we moved out of there. I give the bishop there a big hug, I remember. And as we left, then I thought everything is good.

We didn’t leave there in a harsh way or something, I thought. But inside my heart, inside I felt the next couple of years, every time something came up about Virginia, I’d tighten up and tighten up inside and just get really upset. And I kept pleading to God and asking God and pleading to God for help.

Because I just don’t feel right. I just don’t feel at peace. And I want peace. And of course, in my mind, without thinking about it, I was thinking they should change. They should do something. But I kept pleading for help and pleading for help and directions. And I remember, this is one of those things that had come up again, where I felt the love of God,

touching me and the Holy Spirit nudging me and answering my questions that I was praying for. Actually, I was home and I was sick that day with a high fever and I fell asleep. And I started dreaming. I started dreaming with the first meeting that we had with the ministers. And we were all sitting there in that exact little circle there.

And I just popped up and I said, you said that and you said that and you said that. And everything went deathly quiet. And then it was like a voice behind me. It was almost like a voice. In my dream it was that that’s right. That’s exactly right. That’s true what you said.

That’s what they said. That’s true. But what do you say? And I was mumbling and stuttering trying to find words what I said. And it actually woke me up. It was really disturbing.

And what I did say there, I felt kind of, wow, did I actually say that? Wow, that wasn’t very nice, though. So I ended up going for a hot tub and a bathtub and soaking with hot water to try to sweat out whatever was in me, sweat out my fever. I had a fever. And I took myself through all them meetings. And I do the same thing. The first thing I noticed is what they said.

And then I’d ask myself, what did you say? And by the time I got out of that tub, I was ready to make a trip, 600 miles to trip in and make things right when I did wrong. I was, then I was ready to make my things right. It wasn’t about them. It wasn’t about them. It was all about me to make my things right.

It didn’t take long. We still got a daughter living there. Our oldest daughter is married, lives there. We got some grandchildren there. Anyway, so we made that trip and I didn’t even feel, I didn’t even feel I had to tell them what they’re doing wrong. I just, I give them all a big hug and apologize. The things I said wasn’t right, wasn’t good. And I didn’t feel responsible that I had to tell them all their wrong things.

So I think I missed a lot of things here. I got, I got really bitter at Amish. I missed that part. Yeah. At first I was really bitter. I was, I thought I’m on the right track and I’m with a group that doesn’t have no standards and all that. We’re going to go with the Bible. Just whatever the Bible says, that’s what we’re going to do. And I kind of thought, I think a runaway. I think God,

God was leading us, but I think I ran ahead of him instead of keep listening. And I was, I was really, I ended up getting really bitter. That’s the reason I had these feelings coming back and I didn’t realize what’s going on, but I was, anyway, so I, coming back then where I was there then and I give him a hug and I, and I apologized for what I did wrong. And I said what I said wrong.

And I didn’t have to, I didn’t, I didn’t feel I have to tell them what they’re doing wrong. I felt the Holy Spirit could do that. I just, I just felt so much at peace again. It was so much a blessing. I can’t explain it. I can’t put it actually in words how much a blessing that was. That big step, that big step in faith that God will take care of that.

God will take care of them people. He took care of me. He loved me all the way through here. I didn’t understand this. I didn’t understand this here. And I didn’t understand the Bible here and there. I totally misunderstood things. And all at once things got really clear to me that I don’t have to be in control. That the Holy Spirit walked with me and I felt loved all the way through this. It’s just like a little child.

That’s a little child that we’re training, training to walk. We’re all excited that he can walk now. We’re all excited that he can make the next step. And that’s the way I felt all the way through this, that God loved me. And I remember one time I was praying. This is another thing I didn’t get mixed in here. I was praying about something and all at once.

It was a while later after the prayer and stuff and all at once. And as I was praying, yeah, I was praying through this and I have a quiet time in prayer. And all at once I felt this, that God meeting me at the next intersection. I realized what God wants me to do, but then I take off running. I got it. I know I’m running and I run ahead of him. But he loved me so much.

I remember that time feeling that feeling that he met me at the next intersection again. He loves me so much. He’ll meet me at the next intersection. And all at once I realized I got to turn that over to other people over and stuff to holding them. I got to turn that over just like and realize the Holy Spirit will meet them at the next intersection just like he does me.

Even though they don’t feel exactly like I do. Yes, I think my time is about up. And I don’t know. I can’t read and talk. So I’m not sure if I got every point through there or not. But the last thing, the idea of we’re just going to go by the Bible. That’s the way it worked. And in that group, we ended up having a lot of struggles. Things would come up.

And we’d sit around the table. If we would sit around the table, it wouldn’t happen too often. Try to discuss something. We couldn’t discuss it. All at once I realized the problems are deeper. Okay, before this, I could always blame. Well, it was man-made rules. Man-made rules was the problem. Man-made rules was the problem. And I think a lot of them were. There was a lot of problems in the man-made rules.

And all at once my eyes were opened that some of these problems go deeper than the man-made rules. They’re deeper. They’re more of a heart issue. And we can be very opinionated about things that we can’t even get together. We can have the Bible there. We can talk about things, but we can’t get to an agreement.

And get together at peace. Even though there’s no standard to blame. No man-made rules to blame. So that was one of the last things. Well, that was one more step the Lord took me through then. I had a brother in church I really had a struggle with. And I had to fight and fight and fight.

And all at once it got clear. There was just another one of these steps. I got clear to me that there is impossible. It’s almost impossible to take an offense and not be an offense. Not ending up being an offense. And not saying that it was right what the brother did, the things that came up. It was the idea that realizing

the Holy Spirit was helping me realizing that if I take an offense and not leaving up to him to take care of that, and I take an offense, I’ll do the same thing in a different way. I’ll come around in a different way and do the same thing that was happening. So anyway, that’s my journey. The Lord loves me and he loves all of you. So I don’t know. I think I’m done for now. Maybe I can ask.

If questions come up, maybe it’ll finish up the rest of it that I missed. So I’ll turn it back over to you. Well, thanks so much for sharing, Brother Ferman. It was a real blessing to hear. I’ve heard different parts of your journey, but I still learned a lot here this morning, things you didn’t share before or maybe somehow I missed. I didn’t realize you were such a wild boy back when you were a teenager.

I really appreciate your humility throughout your life journey, being willing to say you’re sorry or you failed. That’s a blessing. God resists the proud, but he gives grace to the humble. So I can tell the grace of God is on your life’s blessing. All right. Well, I know we’re past the seven o’clock hour a bit, but it would still be a real, real blessing to hear from some of you in the audience.

So you’ll be able to unmute yourself. And also there was somebody that called in from a telephone. It looks like a Canadian number. There was background noise and it was popping up on the screen. So I had to mute that individual. I’m really sorry about that. But I did actually ask you to unmute yourself if you want to and want to say something. So anyway, any of you in the audience, you have any questions or comments for Brother Ferman?

How about it? Yes, good morning. Hey, hello there. So one thing that really stands out to me is in the last part of what you were saying that we really can’t pin it down that it’s the rules that are the issue.

It’s remarkable of we want to get things in our own control, our own capacity, what we can do, what we can figure out. And it’s nice to pin something down. That’s the issue. And that’s actually the reason I found myself a little bit in that in the past year. That’s actually one of the reasons I, one of the very,

minor reasons. I didn’t have that much of an issue about rules and regulations as I had an issue with the fact that they were trying to gain something through that man-made thing, man-made standard. And they were putting a lot of trust and emphasis on it through that. And I did not agree with that. And I actually find myself there at times, again, just on a different spectrum.

So that was an interesting point. And a lot of the points that you made, Ferman, were interesting. And I could identify with them, but I can’t really pull one up right now. And thanks for your effort. I know you were up late last night. – Well, comment on that rules and regulations is, I still think that a lot of times the rules

that they’re making is to control. To make rules, and then if they go by them rules, that keeps things controlled. – Right. – That’s right. I don’t think that’s right. Absolutely not. But all at once I recognized, it goes way deeper than that. – Correct. – It’s more a heart issue. It’s actually, we can have the same problem. We can have the exact same problem just because of the attitude.

Yeah. So many times through my life, I didn’t get everything. So many times through my life, all the struggles I went through, I reacted instead of responding, and I ended up in the same shoes. And I think, I feel loved through the Holy Spirit reminding me of this over and over and over, that He loves everybody. You know? And anyway, yeah.

It’s simply a lack of distrust. It’s a lack of trust in God. Yeah. Yeah. Thanks, Nathan. Is there anyone else in the audience that would like to ask a question, make a comment? Feel free. There’s definitely a lot to ponder on here, what you shared this morning, Ferman. That’s a real blessing to have you. And I appreciate everyone coming on here this morning. But again,

if there’s anyone that would like to say something about it. All right. Well, what a blessing. I think maybe we’ll just close here. Would you like to close us in prayer, Furman? And then we can consider ourselves dismissed. Yeah. One more thing. If you’re scared out there and didn’t want to answer, I think probably a lot of them got my phone number.

I’d be glad to visit with you. You can give me a call if you want to. Anyway, so let’s pray. Dear Lord, we come to you this morning. I want to thank you. I want to thank you for your love. I want to thank you to keep coming to the next intersection with love and meeting me there and asking me if I don’t want to go this direction instead of this.

The love you have. And I want to thank you for your love. The first thing, what you did for us when you come on this earth and you walked it out. You walked it out and you said you will. Thank you for the Holy Spirit. You said you will not leave us nor forsake us. You will remind us of all the things you said to us, to the disciples when you were here. It’s all wrote down. I want to thank you that we can have this Bible.

In our hands, the Holy Spirit, that you could work with us. And I want to pray for all these people out here in the same way, Lord. All this in Jesus’ name. Amen. All right. Y’all have a blessed day. Thanks for joining us this morning.

Amen.