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| Just another day in geography (and geology, and natural science) class. |
“I only have one request. Do
something fun with your inheritance. Don’t spend it all on groceries.”
So Mrs. Zeller bought a motorcycle.
Imagine a middle-aged woman in
flannel zipping up a rock-smattered road in the mountains of Colorado, with one grinning barefoot
seven-year-old clinging to her back. Parking her metal horse at a house of
alpine wood, she wades through chickens, corgis, and children to the kitchen –
which her husband built – and breathes in fresh bread – which her husband threw
together, no recipe. The younger children, barn chores done, stream to set the
table with goat’s milk, goat’s cottage cheese, and venison. With breakfast they
had fed on the Word of God, and now lunch involves a seminar on lawn mower
safety for the boy’s new business. The boys are eleven and twelve. After lunch
the family scatters - the children to help each other with school, the father
to write tomorrow’s sermon, the mother to a million tasks which form the unseen
roots of a great and fruitful tree.
When our family first met the
Zellers, we could not understand what made them so perfect. The role models of
homeschool, they lived out their faith. The siblings – all thirteen of them –
actually treated each other as friends. They climbed mountains, built chapels,
ground grain – in other words, lived. If the entire government had collapsed, I
doubt they would have lost five minutes’ sleep. Mr. Zeller somehow served as a
faithful pastor, a personal father, a romantic husband, and an enthusiastic
teacher simultaneously. And as for Mrs. Zeller, ‘a wife of noble character’ was
her biography.
She inspired my mother; he supported
my father. The children befriended my siblings. What did they do for me? Well,
they brought me to Christ. Now, credit where it’s due: my mother’s faith and
love affected me first, and she alone walked me through the sinner’s prayer.
But Noelle Zeller, then my one best friend in all the world, invited me to the
Bible study where Jesus woke me up. I wanted to be like Noelle. She read the
Bible and loved her siblings, showed me kindness and taught me important
morals, such as, “Don’t say holy cow. God is holy, and he’s not a cow.”
When compared to her mother, Noelle
faded into a paper doll. One evening at Bible study Mrs. Zeller told us the
secret to her exceptional marriage. Once, she had prayed, “I am terrible at
this. I’ve been engaged twice and I’m done. God, please just pick a husband for
me. Let there be no romantic feelings involved.” Mere weeks later, a friend
casually told her he thought she would make a great wife, and would she kindly
consider it? After months of the Holy Spirit’s prodding, she agreed and married
a man she was not in love with. But the rest is history; now their weekly date
night is a given, and everyone agrees they are ‘a match made in heaven.’ Their
story impacted me greatly. From today on, let Christ be the center of every
marriage, and the Holy Spirit the instigator. Let virtue conquer romance and
godliness conquer affection.
Although my family sometimes
idealized the Zellers, we also caught glimpses of their flaws– a harsh word
here, a disobedience there; they were human. But back then we saw so much of
the Spirit’s work in their lives, and so little in ours. My parents sacrificed
mountains, and did more for their children than I will ever know. But the
fruits of their labor took years to emerge, while the fruits of the Zellers’
righteousness already drooped full and ripe. Sometimes the Zellers did seem
perfect.
One time my mother could not help
herself. She had to ask. “How do you do it?” Mrs. Zeller laughed. She replied
with the name of her daughter, “Grace; pure grace.”
What more need be said? After all we
had learned from their family, they were not the role models. They were only an
arrow pointing to the true Model, the Perfect, the Giver of pure grace. To him
I look; I follow his arrows. One day, Lord willing, I will be an arrow to the
Living God for my husband, my children, and their children. With rough-cut homeschool,
unblemished grace, and a pinch of faith, we will move mountains.
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