Bittersweet Farm

Bittersweet Farm

Faith and Family

Home Before Dark

Filed Under: Bittersweet Farm, Faith and Family

The other evening I was clearing away a few leaves and Lois was puttering around the outside of the house. It was a lingering fall evening–the kind that gives you the sense that they are short and few and will soon be gone. She lit some candles on the porch and in the house. My heart was glad for her. We are different in many ways, but the longer we live together (almost 40 now) the more I see that the things we agree on are powerful.

-We both deeply love Jesus and want to build our lives on the truth of the Bible.
-We both a devoted to our children and grandchildren–that they would know and love the Lord.
-We love our home, Bittersweet Farm… and know it was a special gift of God to us.
-We are deeply thankful for Bethel Church and know it, too was a special grace from God to us.
-We are both child-like, intuitive, creative types…
-We don’t worry–we are not overly “responsible” That keeps us young and light on our feet.

But there are a couple things more that we agree on that are as small as they are sweet.

We like to light small lights to drive out the darkness and create and atmosphere. That is one reason we like to say; “On Bittersweet Farm every day is a beautiful day and the little light in the kitchen is always on.” We believe in the little light in the kitchen…

And another is like unto it… We don’t have to, but we like to get home before dark. We are often out late, of course because of the ministry or visiting family… but on an evening when we go out for a drive or for coffee, or when we go to Horton for ice cream… we like to leave and time our trip so we pull back into Bittersweet farm before dark…. In the dusk the little light burning within welcome us home… Going around lighting up dark places and seeing people home before dark… that is what we are about.

And may all the children be home before dark.

Ken Pierpont
Bittersweet Farm
Summit Township, Michigan
October 26, 2018

Sitting in Church

Filed Under: Bethel Church-Jackson, Faith and Family

During a difficult childbirth Lois’s mother Allene had a vision that comforted her. She said in her vision she could see Lois sitting in church. Thus was prophetic. At 13 Lois became a follower of Jesus and was baptized at a small Baptist church with a southern flavor in her neighborhood in Ypsilanti, Michigan in the West Willow subdivision. Her youth pastor encouraged her to attend Bible College where I met her in the fall of 1978.

On September 8, 1979 we married. Since then Lois has spent a large part of her life sitting in church–and listening to me preach. For most of my ministry I have preached three times a week, Sunday morning, Sunday evening, and Wednesday evening and Lois has been there to listen.

Today our friend Ken Wyatt snapped this shot just before I rose to preach. It was Lois’s birthday. We have been blessed. We have served the Lord together for 39 unbroken years.

I wrote this on Facebook on her birthday yesterday morning:

At 13 years old Lois walked down the aisle of the Southside Baptist Tabernacle in the West Willow subdivision in Ypsilanti, Michigan, where she lived at the time, and became a follower of Jesus.

39 years ago today on a grey autumn day she walked down the same aisle and vowed to spend the rest of her life as my wife.

We drove away in our little green Plymouth Duster. She changed from her wedding gown to a pretty mint green dress in the car. My heart raced at the intimacy of it. We sat close on the bench seat. She smelled like “Windsong.” The song “We’ve Only Just Begun” by the Carpenters played on the radio as we drove south along Interstate 75.

We stoped for our first meal at Bob Evans in Lima, Ohio. She had ham. I had chicken noodles. We started our life together in a cozy apartment in the up-stairs of a neat farmhouse near Pleasant Hill, Ohio. On autumn nights the wind off the fields blew the curtains in our open windows and scented our love-nest with the fragrance of autumn air.

God has given us an amazing life in spite of our very real brokenness and ever-present faults. She’s been a tough, loyal, woman of stubborn conviction and simple faith. She is still following Jesus and she is still my loyal wife. God has given us four sons, four daughters and soon 12 grandchildren. God has allowed us to be in full-time Ministry almost 40 years starting in the corner of a corn field in the parsonage of a little country church.

This is a testimony to the truth of the Bible and the every-morning new mercies of God.

Two simple kids drove off together crunched together on the front seat of a little Plymouth—looking back over the decades I know we were not alone.

Thank you, Lord for Lois. Thank you Lois Pierpont for the Life you have given us.

Old Correspondence

Filed Under: Faith and Family, Read Aloud Stories, Village Parson

Today searching for an old e-mail to encourage a friend I stumbled on this cozy note from Janny Moore a number of years ago. Janny lives in Canada…

“Dear Pastor Pierpont; The wind howled as it ripped across the frozen prairies on a cold Saskatchewan night. Nestled in drifts of snow in the midst of towering spruce a lone ranch house stood. Within, 3 generations of Moores enjoyed the coziness of being together. After all, it was Christmas. Huddled by the hearth a grandmother sat in the arm chair with grandchildren sprawled about her. In her hands she held one of her favorite Christmas presents, a book.

Reading aloud has been her favorite pastimes and this night was no exception. The book in her hands was none other than Sunset on Summer by our own Pastor Pierpont. One story finished with comments like, “Wow. He’s a good writer,” or “That’s so true.”

Sparkle lit in our Grandmothers eyes as the kids asked her for another… and another.

Thank you for bringing warmth to our hearts, way up in cold, old Saskatchewan through your book and sharing your lives with us. We’ve been blessed, inspired, convicted, encouraged… –Janny Moore”

Thanks, Janny. It was sweet to stumble on this today in the warmth of summer…

Ken Pierpont
Bittersweet Farm
Summit Township, Michigan
July 25, 2018

Summer Evenings

Filed Under: Current Thoughts, Faith and Family, Fireside Academy

One late spring evening my son and I fished a popular spot on the Muskegon River without success or any sign of fish. The sun was coming down the sky and we knew it would be dark in a little over an hour. We looked at each other and in wordless agreement waded toward the bank. We considered calling it a night but agreed to try another hole until sundown. We drove to a favorite spot, climbed down the bank, and eased into the water.

We had chosen to fish a wide flat where shallow water ran swiftly over smooth gravel. The water there, clean and clear was only deep in little pockets and it was usually alive with trout. We had a lot of success in the past catching rainbows with Caddis flies casting up-stream and then allowing them to drag a little after they had floated downstream before pulling them from the water. In that last moment before withdrawing the fly, the rainbows loved to hit them and the reel would sing.

We weren’t even in the water yet and we could see and hear a feeding frenzy in progress, a Caddis hatch. I made my way up river a few yards and Kyle wadded down. The evening was perfect. Sun was just over the trees and sent a shining path up the water. My line was sinking and pulling the fly into the water. I cast over and over again false casting to dry my fly, using floatant, but nothing worked. My line was cracked at the end and taking on water. The fly would not sit on top of the water and it aroused no interest.

I watched Kyle downstream. The sun was setting beyond him. He stood in the rippling path of light cast by the descending sun. His line looped beautifully above his head and settled soft on the water. Every few minutes I would see him bend and release a fish back into the river.

The sun settled on the treetops and then sank beyond them. I drank in the beauty of the on-coming night and the sight of my son’s easy confidence on the river. Fish broke the water all around some slurping flies and others coming clean out of the river tail-dancing on top. I was wet-wading and enjoying the feel of the cool water running past by legs.

As the sun set over Kyle’s shoulder the moon rose near full over mine in the south-east sky. We stayed on the river for an hour after dark. Kyle caught fish and I practiced casting every one of my senses pulling in the mellow sweetness of a perfect summer evening.

It was a perfect summer evening even though I didn’t hook a single fish. As we traced the path back to our truck I knew that we had tucked away a memory in our hearts that we would still cherish when we were old men on the porch.

I have three other sons and four daughters. I am praying the Lord will give us many mellow summer nights on the porch, or under the stars, or by the lake, or gazing into a fire, or eating watermelon and sweet corn, or catching fireflies. And I am praying that I will never forget that just being together is usually enough.

Ken Pierpont
Pine Street Parsonage
Fremont, Micghian
May 2002

This little fella’ is Kyle’s first-born, Kyle Kenneth

Fishing Off a Boulder

Filed Under: Faith and Family

For some reason my mind goes back the years, I guess a quarter-century now, to a sunny afternoon in the bend of the Kokosing River flowing through field and forest of eastern Knox County, Ohio.

A long bridge passes over a stretch of the River just east of the little berg of Millwood. If you crossed that bridge that afternoon and if you weren’t distracted by hurry you would have seen a young father and two boys about 11 and 7 fishing off the great boulder in the bend of the river.

They are not catching fish but they are burning a joyful memory into their souls.

Ken Pierpont
Bittersweet Farm
Independence Day 2018

The photo above is a photo of the boys, Kyle and Charles taken about four hears before the story written above.

Don’t Wrestle Idols Away From People

Filed Under: Circuit-Riding, Faith and Family


I’m at Camp Barakel preparing my heart to preach to young men in the woods tonight and thinking about the power of loving God to drive out of our lives illegitimate things and this thought occurred to me. Peter said that fleshly lust war against our souls. I’m at war. The young men I deeply love are at war… Fleshly lusts war against our souls. How can a man prevail against the things that war against his soul? How can I help the young men I love win the war against the things that would destroy them: Here was a thought that formed in my heart:

If you want to help someone don’t try to wrestle their idols out of their trembling hands or shame them… They will just pick up another darker idol and continue in bondage and emptiness… Show them Christ as infinitely more satisfying. Let them see how your own heart is satisfied in Him. Help them experience the love of God–fellowship with God.

Ephesians 3:14-21 “For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named, that according to the riches of his glory he may grant you to be strengthened with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith—that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God. Now to him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever. Amen.

“If you want to build a ship, don’t drum up people together to collect wood and don’t assign them tasks and work, but rather teach them to long for the endless immensity of the sea.” Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

So it is with men. We must help them see–we must show them how our souls are satisfied in the endless beauty and glory of Christ, then when they are Spirit-enlightened and the Morningstar rises in their hearts… they will willingly drop their idols and embrace Christ.

God, help me. Help me show the young men I love what that looks like.

Ken Pierpont
Camp Barakel
June 28, 2018

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