What caused these two ��ݮ���� alumni to make such a move, leaving behind full-time teaching jobs in Harrisonburg, Virginia?

The couple was inspired both by a love of travel and new places, and a strong familial and spiritual link to the home. Fortress of Hope was founded in 2008 by in Hartville, Ohio. The Yoders connected with Maple Grove and the children’s home through Mitchell’s father, Dale Yoder. Dale knew a few of the members on the board of directors for the home and wanted to become involved.

Soon his church, of Pigeon, Michigan, embraced the nonprofit, and Dale joined the board of directors. That bond between Pigeon River, the church of Mitchell’s youth, and Forteleza de Esperanza is strengthened with the couple’s role as communication directors.

Now nine months after their move, “Papa Mitchell” and “Mama Lauren” have formed a new family. Although most of their job as volunteer communications directors involves administrative work and translation, the couple has enjoyed strong relationships with the children of Forteleza de Esperanza.

“I enjoy giving hugs to the little ones as I walk through the gate and having deeper conversations with the older children and staff,” Lauren said. “These are all things that take a lot of time and effort, and they are by no means quick and easy, and they give me the most joy.”

Help and stability for children in family transitions

Known as Centro Integral para la Niñez y la Adolescencia: Fortaleza de Esperanza (or more popularly CINAFE in the city of Managua), the nonprofit organization provides a home for 20 children. Some are orphans, some are waiting for a relative to adopt them, some are offered shelter after their family can no longer afford to raise them and others are offered impermanent refuge from a temporarily dangerous situation at home.

“We have been trying hard not to call Fortress of Hope an ‘orphanage,’ because the majority of our children have families of some sort,” Mitchell said.

Forteleza de Esperanza’s biggest goal is to be only an interim living situation for children. Parents can often reclaim their children after going through therapy or treatment. However, the children’s home remains a long-term home for some, and as children reach young adulthood with their 18th birthday, Forteleza de Esperanza helps them search for employment, enroll in a university and find a safe place to live.

For both Mitchell and Lauren, volunteering at the home is a way to pass on the love that nurtured them through childhood and young adulthood.

“We both feel like our lives up to this point – our friends and families, our Mennonite upbringing, our EMU college experience, our church family at [in Harrisonburg], our teaching jobs in Harrisonburg – are all things that have filled us to the brim with love. Now, we are able to give that love to the kids here,” Lauren said.

Devotions a favorite time of day

Both Yoders graduated from EMU with teaching degrees, and after a few years in Harrisonburg City Schools, they traveled to Nicaragua on spring break. Mitchell had first visited the children’s home in 2009 with family and friends to truly understand the work that his father was involved in. It wasn’t until March 2014 that he returned with Lauren.

Once there together, the couple saw that their connection to the board of directors in the U.S. could be useful in a communication role. In order to fill that role well, they took two months of intensive language classes upon arrival. Now, they speak directly with the staff at Forteleza de Esperanza to relay messages, ask and answer questions and provide an avenue for communication on behalf of the U.S. board.

Due to the voluntary nature of their work, both Yoders had to find full-time employment elsewhere. At Nicaragua Christian Academy Nejapa, Mitchell is the head of the English department, and Lauren works as a kindergarten assistant. Despite the difficult balance of a busy schedule, Lauren and Mitchell spend at least two hours a day with the children at Forteleza de Esperanza.

“The hardest part for me is knowing that there are lots of interactions and celebrations that we are not able to be a part of because they happen while we have other commitments or are unavailable,” Lauren said. However, the couple is included in many events the home hosts, whether it be dramas at church, birthday parties or devotions, which they lead twice a week.

“My favorite part of my day is devotions,” Mitchell said. “The staff gathers around with all the children, and everyone has a chance to spend time singing and talking about God. It’s a great picture of children who are loved, safe and learning about Jesus.”

‘God at the center of all we do’

Living as missionaries reflects many of the values reinforced through an EMU education. EMU taught Mitchell that “the time we spend working should also be spent seeking God and sharing His love” as well as acting as a reminder for Lauren that “this world is bigger than [us].”

Both themes still hold true in their work and their lives. “I think that EMU’s education program kept our worldview at the center of our teaching, and has helped us keep God at the center of all we do,” Mitchell said.

While mindful of their past and the community that has brought them into their current home, the couple is still grateful for present support: by Forteleza de Esperanza itself, through the donations of other churches, and their Mission Support Team in Harrisonburg comprised of friends and family, including members of , and Eastside Church.

provides health insurance benefits and has helped to promote the couple’s mission work. VMM also assists the couple through their Partners in Mission program, and a mission coach meets with them about once a month.

Maple Grove Mennonite Church provides administrative support through the board of directors. It leases the building, and is continually working to find ways to own the property that the home sits on as well as open up more green space for a playground. Future programming goals include English classes for the children and staff as well as vocational training for young adults who age out of the program.

Pastor Myron Weaver, a board member of the organization, said that when Mitchell and Lauren approached the board with the idea to move to Managua, “no convincing was necessary.”

“It takes very little to recognize the image of God in Mitch and Lauren,” said Weaver, who has known the Yoder family for more than 30 years. “They model the Kingdom of God in a powerful way.”

Close to 3,000 people attended each day of the festival, July 11-13, 2014, at Natural Chimneys Park in Mt. Solon, Virginia. First held in the summer of 2013, the Red Wing festival is hosted by The Steel Wheels, a nationally known roots music band that features three alumni: Trent Wagler ’02, Eric Brubaker ’01 and Brian Dickel, class of ’98. (The fourth band member, Jay Lapp, attended EMU’s sister Mennonite school in Indiana, Goshen College, for a time.)

After enjoying performing at other festivals across the country since they started touring seriously around 2010, members of The Steel Wheels began thinking about ways to create a new festival in the Shenandoah Valley.

“We wanted it to be rooted in community and informed by our upbringing,” said Brubaker after Red Wing ended this year. “We wanted a family-friendly event where we would be proud to bring our own children and expose them to many different kinds of authentic musical expression.”

The band partnered with Black Bear Productions, a local event production company, and began planning well over a year in advance for the first event. Their vision was realized in a multi-generational, community-focused festival that has brought dozens of performers and thousands of visitors for a long weekend of music on four stages at Natural Chimneys, about 20 miles south of EMU’s campus.

“The exciting thing is that all [our] dreams and more are already being fulfilled,” Brubaker added. “It’s amazing that so many people from our community are investing time, creativity and resources to make the festival a true success.”

Jeremiah Jenkins, a managing partner of Black Bear Productions, said the welcoming, friendly atmosphere at the festival is one of its special characteristics.

“Red Wing has fans of all ages. This sets a certain tone of respect and appreciation among the crowd, and that collective enjoyment really fuels us all weekend,” he said. “Red Wing brings out both the seasoned festivarian and the first-timers, and together we create our own festival culture. We’re proud of the Red Wing fans, volunteers and staff that treat the park and each other with such conscientiousness.”

After noticing how many EMU alums attended the first festival, the university signed on as an official sponsor in 2014. Throughout the weekend, advancement staff passed out tea and connected with hundreds of alumni, prospective students and other festival-goers.

EMU and Red Wing organizers also collaborated to minimize the amount of trash generated at the festival. The festival banned the sale of plastic water bottles and required visitors to bring or purchase a reusable steel cup to use at the free water station and in the beer garden, Jenkins said. Food vendors were also required to use renewable, recycled or compostable materials for all service items.

Aware of EMU’s commitment to sustainability, Black Bear Productions hired EMU sustainability coordinator Jonathan Lantz-Trissel ’00 to oversee trash and recycling collection during the weekend. He and his team of volunteers collected well over 1,000 pounds of recyclable materials and 500 pounds of food waste to add to EMU’s compost piles.

“When people congratulate me on the festival, I always say that it takes a village,” Jenkins said. “We’re so glad that EMU is part of ours, from the alumni office and sustainability team to the many EMU alumni that bring their families each year.”

In addition to The Steel Wheels, about 40 other bands performed this year at Red Wing, including The Walking Roots Band, first formed under another name at EMU. Six of the eight members are EMU graduates: Lauren ’09 and Mitch Yoder ’09, Jackson Maust ’09, Kristina Yoder ’09, Adam Schmid ’09 and Seth Crissman ’09, MDiv ’15. Crissman also said the welcoming feel to the festival was important to the group.

“Something we care about a lot is being able to create and share music that is fun for everyone. There was a broad range of ages at Red Wing, and music brings all these people together,” he said. “In making music in this roots-folk tradition, we draw nourishment from those who have come before and, hopefully, pass it on to those who will come after us. It was a lot fun to be able to listen to and enjoy other musicians doing the same thing at Red Wing. It was exciting to see so many people excited about roots and folk music, especially local music.”

Another band performing at Red Wing, Ragged Mountain String Band, featured Reuben Miller ’00 on fiddle.

The third Red Wing Roots Music Festival will likely be held on the second weekend in July 2015, with exact dates to be announced soon on the festival’s website and Facebook page. In the meantime, Brubaker said, The Steel Wheels will be recording a new album that will be ready in time for next year’s event.

The band formed when four friends started playing music under the name The Federation during their time at ��ݮ���� (EMU). It’s been together in some form or fashion for more than five years, but the last few months have been big for the local band.

The group now includes Seth Crissman, Greg Yoder, his wife Kristina Yoder, Jackson Maust, Mitchell Yoder and his wife Lauren Yoder, Adam Schmid and Mike Yoder. Most of the band mates are EMU graduates.

“We’re friends and we play music together,” Crissman said. “It’s sort of in that order.

“[It] just sort of naturally progressed and emerged from friendships,” he continued, adding “On a given night, we’ll get together and play bocce [ball] in someone’s backyard, we’ll get together and cook or we’ll get together and play a show.”

Sacred Space

The Walking Roots Band released its first album this month – a compilation of 11 “reclaimed hymns,” or spiritual songs that “had fallen out of the general circulation of being sung in churches,” Crissman explained.

The new album, “Shelter: A Hymn Reclamation Project,” is a patchwork of centuries-old, lesser-known sacred texts, more identifiable hymns and the band’s own unique touch.

For example, the song, “Come Down, O Love Divine” is based off text written in 1367 and arranged into a song in 1906, while the new album also includes a rendition of “It is Well With My Soul” with lyrics tweaked to reflect the Shenandoah Valley.

Crissman, 27, of Harrisonburg, wrote eight of the album’s songs, which is just the first of three albums the band hopes to produce in the upcoming months.

The next project will consist of folk songs, while other albums will be a collection of “farming songs.”

“A lot of the people in the group have connections to agriculture,” said Greg Yoder, a band member who has worked for a local farmer the past two summers.

“We think that connection to the land is really important; it’s sacred in some ways.”

Finding A Niche

Greg Yoder, 26, of Penn Laird, describes the band’s musical offerings as acoustic Americana that’s not exactly bluegrass, but rather “blue-ish grass.” It’s “folky” music with some rap intertwined, he explains.

“We’re hoping for a new category at the Grammy’s,” he said.

Bands such at The Avett Brothers, Mumford & Sons and The Steel Wheels influence the local group.

Group Effort

While the band’s style is hard to pinpoint, it’s also difficult to identify the lead singer or who plays which instrument.

The Walking Roots Band shows likely include six to eight instrument swaps, with all the members adept at some combination of the guitar, mandolin, banjo, harmonica, accordion, Cajon – and the list goes on.

For more information on the band, the new album and upcoming tour dates, visit thewalkingrootsband.com.

Article courtesy Daily News Record, July 20, 2013