As the cold winds blow and the snow is drifting, they stoke up the wood burning stove in the living room and throw another log or two on the fire. The young children carry one arm load after another of firewood into the house to fill the big hungry kindling box behind the stove. Their large two-story homes can be hard to keep warm in bitterly cold weather, especially the older houses.
But to whom are you referring, you're probably asking? Who would live like that in this modern day and age? That was the way of life centuries ago, right?
Wrong!
In the Amish world, some things never change, although the rest of the society around them is advancing every day.
Without electricity, the majority of the Amish homes are still heated with wood burning stoves. Cutting and stacking a gigantic supply of firewood is one of the major preparations for winter.
Fortunately, many of the Amish churches now permit the use of chainsaws, which is a great improvement over their former method of pulling the logs out of the woods with horses to the traditional stationary circle saw to be cut into manageable sized pieces. However, some are still forced to practice the traditional method where chainsaws are prohibited.
A few advanced Amish communities do heat their homes with hot water pipes running underneath the wood floors, sourced from an outside location.
I remember what it was like on a cold and windy winter evening when the stove couldn’t keep up with the demand in a two-story house. I’d pull a chair up to the stove in an effort to stay warm and snuggle down to read a book until bedtime. After getting ready for bed, I’d swiftly run up the stairs to the girls’ room before my bare feet would freeze on the wooden floor. I quickly dashed under the covers and shivered until my body warmed up my spot in the bed.
Needless to say, to this day when I’m tempted to complain about a chilly room on a cold winter day, when I need to adjust the thermostat on the wall, or when I crawl into a cozy warm bed, I’m reminded of the days back when…
I’m thankful for the experiences which make me more grateful for my daily blessings of the Lord!
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In my book, The Greater Inheritance, I share many more little-known facts like this!
The Greater Inheritance
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