[Photo Caption: Resident Mia’s muddy feet from walking around the Joy Ranch pond.]

I’ve always been fascinated by people’s stories. How did they get to this point in life? What happened in their past? Who helped mold and shape them into the person they are today? What is their story?

This is even more true of the people who live and work at Joy Ranch. Every person who lives on campus has a unique God-story of how they came to be at a small children’s home in the mountains of southwest Virginia.

Richard and Mary McHenry, the founders of Joy Ranch, A Christian Home for Children, are just two of many who were placed and positioned by God to minister to hurting children. If you read Mary McHenry’s book, Feed My Lambs, she is honest about how God moved them to the Blue Ridge Mountains for that very purpose. Although it wasn’t the McHenry’s plan to start a children’s home, it was God’s, and He led them every step of the journey. As Mary McHenry said in speaking of being obedient to God’s leading, “I knew that nothing would ever really matter to me but to follow those dear footsteps – wherever they led and whatever they cost.”

God’s plan for Joy Ranch has always been unique. It was to be a place of safety and refuge for children who needed a home where they could heal. It was to be led by God, through God, and done for God, to His glory. Although there have been times where we strived to do it in our strength and ability, God has been bringing us back to His original design for the Ranch. While we still mess up and admittedly get it wrong, we are on a journey of learning to know, hear, and be obedient to His voice because at the end of the day, that’s what it’s all about. The only way to help heal hurting children is to be a people that are Spirit-filled and Spirit-led. And the amazing thing is, the more we get out of the way and stop trying to do things the way we think it should be done, the more we see how amazing and powerful this God we serve really is.

“For from Him and through Him and to Him, are all things. To Him be the glory forever. Amen.” ~ Romans 11:36

Rev. Richard & Mrs. Mary McHenry

Erin Austin, Case Manager

Enjoy Chapter 1 from “Feed My Lambs” book!

In the year of 1937 a small group of students sat in a chapel service at the Lancaster School of the Bible in Pennsylvania watching an artist paint a picture of our Lord’s crucifixion. Admiringly we watched as with confident and dexterous strokes he pictured the two thieves, one on the right and one on the left.

Then, after a few moments of hesitation, he began to paint the middle cross. His movements came slower; our heartbeats quickened. Would he? Surely not! No one could portray the broken and bleeding body of our Lord. And then love seemed to embody the hand as carefully

he painted the blood dripping from the cross. No form, no body – only the precious blood from the head, the hands, the feet, His side, and last of all the bleeding steps that had made their way up the hill to Calvary.

Looking through tears, I saw the shimmering red footprints as they seemed to move slowly toward the cross of suffering. And it was then I knew that nothing would ever really matter to me again but to follow those dear footsteps – wherever they led and whatever the cost.

Five months after our marriage, while my husband and I were seeking the Lord’s direction, a dear invalid, Hazel Lindsey, who lived in a rural area near Hillsville, Virginia, was also beseeching the Lord for her heart’s desire. She was asking God to send a young minister and his wife to open a Sunday school and church near her home.

A minister’s wife in a nearby town wrote us about their praying invalid friend, and we left home immediately to look over the field.

We learned that this disabled lady in the past had ridden horseback over the mountainous roads, conducting services in various communities; but after contracting tuberculosis and crippling arthritis, she was confined to her home. We talked and prayed with her, and seeing the great need for workers in that area, we said,

“Lord, here we are. Do with us as seemeth good to Thee.”

It wasn’t long until we were settled in a small mountain cabin in the beautiful Blue Ridge Mountains. Surely, we said, our Lord’s footsteps have brought us to a pleasant place. There we were to work with Him, suffer with Him, and rejoice with Him.

And it is from there that we tell our story.