Sarah Price, popular author of Amish fiction, is also a contributor to the
One series, which is regularly posted about on this blog. Her story,
The Power of Faith, is currently available for ONLY 99 Cents with author proceeds going to a great cause. You can get it here:
http://goo.gl/xhE9w
Today, she wants to share her Triangle of Blessings: Amish, Writing and Readers
I was first introduced to the Amish when I
was only eight years old. It was my grandparents who took me to Lancaster
County, PA. I sat between them on the front seat of their Cadillac, bouncing up
and down with excitement as we passed each horse and buggy.
My grandparents came from a long line of
strict Old Order Mennonites. Back in the early 1700s, our ancestors escaped
persecution and travelled across the ocean to accept William Penn’s offer for
free land in Pennsylvania. I often think about that journey and how
terrified they must have been. Seeing the shores of Europe disappear over the
horizon, facing an uncertain future in an unknown land…how courageous they were
and how unfaltering in their faith in God.
There is something magical about the Amish.
In today’s world of technology, information overload and crazy schedules, there
is something to be said for a people who manages to maintain a simpler way of
life. A people who takes care of each other. A people who lives for
honoring God through their daily routines. How can you not fall in love
with such people? They are truly blessed.
Likewise, I consider myself a blessed person.
For almost twenty-five years, I have been staying among the Amish. In the
beginning, I found an Amish family that rented out an apartment over their mule
shed. For several years, I would rent the apartment and travel back and forth
from my home to their farm. In later years, I was introduced to an Amish woman
who rented me a room in her home. Through these connections, I have been
permitted the rare opportunity to straddle the fence between my current world
and this of my ancestors.
There is another blessing in my life (and I
believe we all have many). I have been blessed with the desire to write. Since
I was a child, I wrote books. It was my passion, my dream. I love writing,
telling stories that entertain and inform. It’s in my blood. I believe that a
true author writes for that reason: they have a passion to write. That’s it.
It’s as plain and simple as the Amish.
The beautiful thing is that I have been
blessed to combine the two: my passion for writing and my passion for the
Amish. It’s a marriage made in heaven, as far as I’m concerned. Like my
friend, colleague, and fellow author, Karen Anna Vogel, my knowledge of the
Amish comes from first-hand experience. It allows me to write authentic books,
books that are rich in true knowledge of the Amish, a special knowledge that I
love to share with my readers.
That brings me to my final blessing, one that
is so important to me: the readers. How fortunate it is that so many wonderful
people desire to know the Amish and to learn about their faith! These readers
are faced with so much stress: busy lives, illness, uncertainty, and hardship
in a time of economic distress. It is such a blessing to know that, even if
only for a few hours, they can slip away from this stress through the stories
that I love to write.
I invite you into my world, to pick up one of
the many Amish books written by wonderful authors that are available in
bookstores and online, and to sit back in order to escape, even if just for a
few pages. Who knows? Maybe you, too, will find some relief from the
everyday stress in your own life as you explore the world of the Amish through
our eyes.
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