Meanwhile, Back on the Farm

There once was a young man from Georgia. 

This Story about places will link=up with the Five Minute Friday crew (2017)

He did not know the Lord, but God had a plan. He met a young girl whom he could not live without. He pursued her until she accepted a date, but she gave one stipulation. If he wanted to be with her on Wednesdays or Sundays, he would be with her at church. He accepted the challenge and it did not take long until he loved the Lord dearly. He married the young girl and soon the Lord called him to be a preacher.

Off they went, far off to Mississippi, to pastor a small church. Over the next few years, they served God in several places. Along the way, they adopted a girl and a boy. Of course, the next month, they learned they were expecting a child .. a boy. They were all happy and served the Lord together. Before long, they moved back to Georgia. They were living in a small town south of Atlanta called Barnesville.



Meanwhile, back on a farm in Wisconsin ...

There once was a girl who lived on a dairy farm.

She loved the animals and working in the soil, but the hours were long and the work caused her to be late everywhere she went. She did not want to stay on the farm.

Her father wanted her to marry a neighbor boy so that the families could consolidate the farms and have a great big farm business together. This did NOT sound like a good idea to the girl.

Other people loved how she sang and played the piano. They said, "You would make a great pastor's wife."

"Oh no", said the young girl, "I don't want to be a pastor's wife."

So she went away to college in Kentucky to get a degree. She got a degree in computer science (which is very funny now because she and machines really don't get along. She always has to have help with her computer.)

One day, while sitting in the chapel balcony. This girl looked across the hundreds of students. She thought, "I wonder if my husband is sitting here in the chapel somewhere."

As clear as a bell, she heard the Lord speak to her, "You will marry a widowed man with children." "Hmmm..." she thought.

Well, the idea was so crazy that she just tucked it away, but did not tell a soul about it.

After college, she moved to the south (Columbia, SC to be exact) to write computer programs. She enjoyed the work, but what really tugged at her heart was teaching the children at church.

Back in Georgia about this time...

 a sad, sad thing happened. The preacher's family was on their way to school. As they made the left hand turn, their car was struck by a log truck. It was so sad because the mother and daughter could not survive their injuries. The older boy remained in a coma for nearly a month.

The younger boy, who was 8 at the time, had already been dropped to his school. This tragedy made him and his dad very sad. It was so hard to go to school. Every day, he wondered, "Will this be the last time I see my dad?"

Back in Columbia, SC

On Wednesday night, the computer girl went to Bible Study. The pastor shared a prayer request. He shared about a terrible car accident involving the pastor's family in their home church over in Georgia. This girl's heart was saddened. She wondered, how will this family manage without their mother and daughter? She prayed for them diligently.

It wasn't long before the pastor's wife began to talk to the computer girl about going to meet this broken-hearted pastor and his sons. She had the idea that the computer girl would be a good wife for the sad preacher. The girl thought this was a crazy idea. "This pastor must be much older than her", she thought, and it didn't seem like a feasible plot. But after much pressing and urging, the young girl decided to go to Georgia with her pastor's wife ... just to make her stop bothering her about it.

She went to Georgia and sang a special at the church that Sunday. Everyone there knew why the girl was really there. Everyone but the preacher, that is. He didn't have a clue ... until people began to tell him he should call the computer girl.

Well, that was a little scary for the preacher. He had not called a girl in over 15 years. And he didn't think that this young girl would be interested in a preacher with two boys.

But the girl remembered what God had told her years before,

 "You will marry a widowed man with children." 

This eased any fear when the young preacher called her and asked to see her. So she said, "Yes he could come to call on her."

Well, that was in 1989 and the beginning of a great and wonderful romance that continues today. The computer girl was me and the preacher was my husband, Michael Farmer.

We have raised his two boys and another boy and a girl. What a beautiful family God has given us. They have joined in our ministry and made our lives complete.

This Sunday, August 13,1989 is the day we met, over 30 years ago. We celebrate how God used my pastor's wife to bring two people together that would never have met each other any other way.

Here is an interesting side note

The girl who would NOT marry a farmer, and NOT marry a pastor, married Pastor Farmer!

Doesn't God have a sense of humor?

Happy anniversary of the day we met, Michael Farmer.

I love that you are a preacher! 

I love that you are a Farmer.

 I just plain love you!

I Don't Want to Play Anymore

"I Don't Want to Play the Piano Anymore!"



Did you ever watch someone doing what you are trying to learn and it just made you want to give up? That is how I felt whenever we went to family campmeeting every summer.

The Sing-a-long

I don't remember the gal's name, but she could outright play the piano. I recall being in a youth meeting one time where she was there to play the piano for us. We were having a sing-a-long. People were shouting out choruses and we would sing them.

Two girls suggested a song but the pianist had never heard the song before. So the girls got up from the chairs and began to sing the song acapella.

The girls didn't even get through the first verse before the pianist was picking out the notes on the piano. By the end of the second time through, she was playing the song like she knew it all her life.

Playing by Ear

She played by ear. I talent I have never had. I truly do wish I could do it. I have picked a tune out in my living room but I have never played a song in public by ear. I just never had the confidence to try to do it.

As a teenager, I would tell mom how amazing this lady was. Then I would say, it just makes me want to quit playing the piano.

Thankfully, my mother would not let me do that. I kept taking lessons and practicing every day. I would sit at the piano for hours playing through entire books of music. My siblings got pretty tired of hearing me play.

But it was worth it. 

Now, I can play just about anything you put in front of me.

It's been a great blessing to our ministry. 'Cause pretty much every church wants to know if the preacher's wife can play the piano.

Plus, I've been able to teach a few kids to play the piano along the way.

I still wish I could play by ear though.




This post was inspired by the gals at Five Minute Friday. Where we are given a prompt and asked to write fo 5 minutes with no editing. This was my attempt to write on the prompt: 

So, do you play an instrument? Were you ever tempted to quit playing? Let me know in the comments below.