The Parting is Beverly Lewis’s newest release and the first book in a new series called “The Courtship of Nellie Fisher.” I enjoy Beverly Lewis’s books about the Amish, based on her grandmother’s Amish heritage, a people so industrious they put me to shame, generally gentle, yet at their harshest when someone wants to step outside their traditions.

This book has many of the same elements as Lewis’s others: focus on an Amish family and their ways and interactions, one member with hidden secrets, young people going through the rituals of courtship, descriptions of wonderful-gut food making which leaves your mouth watering, the dangers of being shunned, and someone who begins to discover that the way of salvation is not in the keeping of man-made traditions. Yet with all the similarities, each book has its uniqueness.

Nellie is a young Amish woman living at home who has not yet “joined church.” She has been secretly interested in a young man named Caleb. There is some question of the reputation of Nellie’s younger sister, Suzy, who has died in a drowning accident while out with non-Amish people, but once Caleb assures himself that whatever happened is not enough to taint the family (and cause his father’s disapproval), he makes his interest known to Nellie.

Nellie’s father, after visiting with a relative who has embraced a different belief system and who shares the Word of God with him, begins to read from portions of Scripture which are not encouraged by the brethren. His heart is overjoyed when his eyes are opened to the gospel of John and the realization that salvation is a free gift and that he can know for sure he belongs to the Lord. He begins to share his newfound knowledge and joy with his family, but Nellie is afraid this is a far bigger threat to her courtship than Suzy’s reputation, for those who profess to know they are saved are shunned and put out of Amish fellowship.

In many of the previous books, the father is the one most rooted in tradition and last to even be open to the idea of change, so it was a delight to me this time to see the father taking the lead. His joy was a rebuke to me: those of us who have known the way of salvation for years can too easily take it for granted. And the courage he and others display when they must follow the way of truth in spite of what it might mean, and the gentle and gracious way he tries to handle sharing that truth and the accompanying reactions are inspiring.

It is heartbreaking when any system denies and squelches the truth and ensnares its people in the darkness of man-made traditions and rituals. I’ve wondered what made the original Amish choose only certain portions of God’s Word and leave out the rest. When I wrote a post earlier this week about our righteousness being based on Christ’s, I had not only just read verses on the subject that morning, but I was also in the midst of reading this book and watching The Last Sin-Eater DVD about another time and place and another system of tradition that keeps its people in darkness. Would that all people would have a chance to at least hear the truth and make their own decisions.