The Empty Barn That Held Everything

Martin Edsel planted his last seeds in April 1988 with borrowed money and a prayer. By August, the Iowa fields that had fed his family for three generations had turned to cracked, gray dust. The corn never came. The soybeans withered before they set a pod. When the bank called in October, Martin walked out to his empty barn, sat down in the straw, and did the only thing he could think to do.

He sang.

His wife Ruth found him there an hour later, tears running into his beard, singing an old hymn about the goodness of God. She sat down beside him in the straw and joined in.

"I don't understand it," he told her afterward. "I have nothing. The crops are gone. The loan is called. But I felt something in there — like my feet were planted on solid rock instead of dust."