Congratulations to the Class of 2022!

Charity Cox

Hello, my name is Charity Cox. I can’t believe I made it! I can still remember so many times sitting in the audience during many other graduations at Wellspring. I would try to imagine myself up here done with high school and making this speech. It always seemed so impossible, and like I still had endless years of school to do, but I made it and I didn’t do it alone.

First, I want to thank my mama. Thank you, mom, for your incredible patience! Without you believing in me, I never would have thought myself capable of even learning how to read and write. You gave me the little shove I desperately needed so many times, and with so many subjects in school. You encouraged me to do it even if it seemed hard, and whenever you corrected me or gave me advice you told me I would thank you later and, well Mom, here I am!

I want to thank my dad for setting an example of excellence that I needed. I learned that impressing dad was the standard to meet. Thank you, Dad, for always being an example in my life of someone who puts everything aside to seek God and get closer to him.

Pa, thank you for being such an amazing grandfather and teacher. I have learned so much from you about writing and giving excellence even when no one will notice. Thank you for all the effort you put into making this home school program work. I’m so grateful for all the time you have spent trying to make sure my siblings and I do the best we possibly can at school.

I want to thank the WCFS staff for all their effort and all that they have invested into my education. Thank you, Mr. Joel and Mrs. Donna.

I want to thank Mikaela Fischer for all that she has poured into me with music. I’m so grateful to you for your patience and how you have always tried to help me succeed in violin no matter how hard. You always believed in me and I’m so grateful to have had you as my violin teacher for the past seven years!

I want to thank my siblings who have been a massive part of my life. Thank you Jeremiah and Chastity for always raising the standard of excellence when it came to math, and pretty much any school subject. I am so grateful for all those evenings we spent jamming together with our instruments.

Thank you, Mercy, for being my sidekick, companion, and running partner, and always pushing me to new limits.

Purity, thank you for always taking interest in art with me, it's been so fun to see you and help you grow in that area.

Nathaniel, thank you for being somebody I can nerd out with about pretty much anything outdoors, and for being my sidekick when it comes to building projects.

Charis, thank you for being my cuddle buddy and for loving the beauty of nature and outdoors as much as I do.

Felicity, thank you for just being that unique person you are, your love of reading books and learning is inspiring.

Micaiah, thank you for talking to me about anything and everything, and even bringing me that random piece of cinnamon sugar toast, that you wanted to make for somebody! You have a big heart!

Alethia, you are so cute and cuddly, and I love taking you on adventures outside with me!

I'm so grateful for all these amazing years of homeschool I got to experience. I’m thankful to Mom and Dad for teaching me not only my high school education, but also many other important lessons about the beauty of hard work, and never giving up. Thomas Edison once said, in response to his missteps, “I have not failed 10,000 times, I’ve successfully found 10,000 ways that will not work.”

As for future plans, right now I’m planning on attending Bob Jones University this fall or the next and majoring in visual studies. I love art, photography and cinema. I am praying as to how God wants me to serve him through these skills.

No matter what, I have realized that God isn't here to help us live our lives to reach our goals, we are here to live our lives for Him, and to reach His goals. As long as we are doing everything for God's glory, we have no reason whatsoever to be discouraged or be fearful. God wants us to be different so that we can make a difference.

So many Christians today are eager to blend in and be invisible. Their silence has numbed and taken away the possibilities of how God could use them and has handicapped their own lives, and the future lives of their children. I have also seen how speaking up can make life harder. But in that moment of standing up and not being afraid, you become a powerful tool in the hand of God.

Jeremiah 1:6-10 says, “Then said I, Ah, Lord God! behold, I cannot speak: for I am a child. But the Lord said unto me, Say not, I am a child: for thou shalt go to all that I shall send thee, and whatsoever I command thee thou shalt speak. Be not afraid of their faces: for I am with thee to deliver thee, saith the Lord. Then the Lord put forth his hand, and touched my mouth. And the Lord said unto me, Behold, I have put my words in thy mouth. See, I have this day set thee over the nations and over the kingdoms, to root out, and to pull down, and to destroy, and to throw down, to build, and to plant.” Thank you. ____________________________________________

Emma Floyd

God is good, I’m sure we can all agree on that. Not only has He adopted me into his spiritual family but has also given me an incredible earthly family as well. Both He and my family have helped me work through all 12 grades of school and 17 years of life. I will forever be grateful for that. Thank you, Mom and Dad for always being ready to help me with anything I didn’t understand, which admittedly was a lot, and always encouraging me to do my best. You guys taught me the importance of hard work and diligence; hopefully it will stick with me for the rest of my life (no promises though 😊).

I thank my instructors for being great teachers who love the Lord and have invested so much time in teaching. I would also like to personally thank Mr. Joel Fischer for not only doing his job but doing it well as unto the Lord. Thank you, Mr. Fischer for always taking a genuine interest in whatever I was learning in school and my life in general. Thank you for not giving up on me during some rough school times. Thank you for giving an exceptional Biblical class. You always took the time to respond to my homework, explaining your thoughts, showing me how to do better, and really just caring. I appreciate that more than you know.

God truly is good. He put all these incredible people in my life who have believed in me and loved me. I wouldn’t be here without them. Starting this August, I will be studying Exercise Science at Liberty University. You all made it possible. Thank you.

____________________________________________

Natalie Macri

Well, we did it! My fellow classmates, friends, teachers and family members through all of the long hours, days and years we’ve all held our breath in preparation of this day. Now that it is here, it almost feels like it came too quick. I sat through all of my siblings’ graduations and felt as if mine would never come. But here we are so we can all take a deep breath of relief.

I want to thank all of the WCFS staff for all of the time, patience and help they’ve provided me throughout my elementary, middle and high school days. It is because of them that I’m standing up here today.

I want to thank my parents and sibling for always putting up with me through tough times, and for always pushing me to the finish line. I also want to give a big thanks to Christy Crouse for putting up with the worst side of me with the research paper. But most importantly, my mom, for never giving up on me even when I swore I was going to quit.

This journey was stressful, tiring, but most importantly, this journey was very much rewarding.

I want to share a Bible verse that got me through a lot of my high school days, and that is Jeremiah 29:11, “For I know the plans I have for you says the Lord, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.”

I will continue my education in the fall at Messiah University while also playing division 3 women’s lacrosse. Thank you all. ____________________________________________

Isaiah Miskimon

Thank you all for coming to this graduation and seeing us off into the world of greater responsibility, cheering us on, and wishing us well. I am glad to be here among my peers, finally at the finish line of a twelve-year race. However, I did not run this race alone. My mother, undoubtedly the greatest influence in my life, ran the race with me and ran it twice as hard.

I did my schooling in the literal terms of running a race. I did everything quickly, not realizing until now that this day would come no quicker. My mother warned me to slow down, but I foolishly disregarded her advice. To be perfectly honest I never really enjoyed school except maybe math. Perhaps if I had slowed down, I would have enjoyed more things and taken more from my education. However, I cannot go back in time and erase my mistakes, I will have to reap what I have sown for good or for bad and make better decisions in the future.

I can recall complaining about certain assignments and rationalizing why I should not have to do them, but now that I am here today, I can see how painless schooling really was as compared to the real world and that complaining about the inevitable only wasted the time that I could have used to do what was required of me. The thing that I didn’t realize, is that more is required in the real world then in doing simple little assignments; I guess graduating brings about reflection and puts things into focus.

I would have to say that the greatest lessons that I have learned through being homeschooled was, being diligent, learning to deal with failure, and ordering my day; 1Corinthians 14:40 says, “Let all things be done decently and in order.” These are the lessons that I will always carry with me.

At this time I would like to thank my mom for sticking to her God given convictions in keeping me homeschooled, especially when things got a little rough. I would like to thank my brothers for helping me along in my studies and I would like to thank WCFS for letting me go through their program. Most importantly I would like to thank God for giving me the grace to complete all twelve years of homeschooling.

As for future career plans, I only have one, which is to become a still-life and studio-portrait photographer. However, it will take some time to achieve this goal, so in the meantime I will be gaining all the knowledge I need through photography organizations while working in retail and at my current job. If my goals fail, I am confident in what Proverbs 19:21 says which is, “Many are the plans in a man’s heart, but it is the Lord’s purpose that prevails.”

In conclusion, I would like to thank God for giving me the family he did so that I could be at this point in my life and reach many more in the near future. Thank you.

____________________________________________

Sarah Rathert

What’s the solution?

This was the title of my first large science project in eighth grade. I researched, created an experiment to analyze how different substances dissolved, wrote an extensive lab report, and then gave a presentation to my physical science class at co-op. This past year, I tore off the papers on the “what’s the solution” presentation poster board so I could reuse the board for my year-end physics project.

As I stayed up late into the night frantically putting together the poster once more, I thought about how supportive and amazing my parents have been all these years. Whether they were patiently teaching me how to read and write, helping me with a project, bearing with me and persevering through struggles until my character grew, or being there for me at the end of soccer games, speeches, and long days at work. I have been so blessed by the way they literally and figuratively walked with me as I did things out of my comfort zone and taught me valuable life lessons along the way. However, their love is just a picture of the way Jesus has held my hand through all the ups and downs of my 6451 days so far on this earth. He constantly reminds me that no matter how badly I have messed up, his grace and love never runs out. I am grateful to God for fully equipping me for the things he has planned for me to do.

Some really awesome people who God used to help equip me were Mr. Cox, Mr. Fischer, and Ms. Becky. I am thankful for their encouragement and faithful example.

One of my favorite bible verses is Romans 12:2, which says, “Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind.” As I continue my education at Messiah University with the goal of becoming a physical therapist in the future (notice a pattern with the science thing?), I look forward to see how God continues to transform me.

____________________________________________

Sarah Regan

Good afternoon! I’m Sarah Regan. Right now, I’m in Tennessee for our Repent America Outreach. When I was younger, I remember thinking that I would never graduate. It was some distant thing in the hazy future that almost unattainable! After years of hard work, I completed high school! Now the last step was to write the graduation speech! Now, there is a tendency to want to use big words for a graduation speech in attempts to impress the audience with “my distinguished ladies and gentlemen! I desire to express my indebted appreciation for your presence here on this resplendent day! Now I may utter “my school is fait accompli and that tis melodious to my ears!” That, of course, sounded much to uppity, so I tried another approach with a “Howdy ya’ll! Just got back from that there deep south where we saw things ya’ll ain't never seen before! I’m just a ﬁxin to tell ya that I seen some people mad as a mule chewing bumblebees but down south theys just puttin’ on the dog!” Of course, that did not suit, so I settled on a compromise between the two! I would like to start by giving appreciation where it is due! First of all, to my mom, who is both an amazing teacher and my friend! We have laughed, cried, and talked through many diﬃculties. She is always there when I need her help! Her number one solution to a problem is peanut butter! I’ll explain! Many times I’ve gone to her with a problem saying “Mom,” and before I could say more she’d say “I know the answer! Peanut butter!” which would result in us both laughing, making the problem not seem so bad! Don’t ask me how that started though! Mom, you have not only taught me history, math, and science, but also how to seek knowledge without having to be spoon fed. You have taught me how to persevere, to use self-control, to have conﬁdence that I can accomplish anything I set my mind to, among many other things! Because of you I have received the blessing of homeschooling that most children never receive! Thank you, Mom! Dad, I want to thank you for the musical heritage that you have given me that is worth so much now and throughout my life! You have taught me how to boldly share the gospel and faithfully taught me about the Bible since I was young! You have pointed me to God and taught me the doctrines of our faith! I have learned many things from you. Thank you, Dad! To my siblings, you have taught me patience, long suﬀering, and provided me many opportunities to learn to serve others! We have done everything together and I know that I have eight lifelong friends! I want to thank WCF schools for helping me to graduate from high school and speciﬁcally Mr. Cox and Mr. Fischer for their sweet patience during my portfolio reviews! Finally, I want to thank God for helping me and bringing me through my school years whereby His help I have been able to overcome all the unique diﬃculties that have left me little time for school. It’s because of God’s help that I have been able to complete high school by seventeen! Now for the big question! What are my future plans? Well, my most immediate plan is to continue traveling with my family until the completion of our nation-wide tour, going to each capital to call America to turn back to God. During that time, I plan to study on-line with Tomorrows Film-Makers to learn things helpful for acting and filmmaking. Acting is something that I have been very much interested in since I was ten. For a while though, I thought it was just a useless dream, but God has shown me that there are many good, godly Christian movies and such to act in. Also, I’ve personally seen someone who’s life was changed in a way they didn’t think possible through a challenging Christian movie! While I obviously don’t know how everything will pan out, I believe that’s what I’m supposed to pursue! Next year I hope to take acting courses, though I’m still praying as where I’m supposed to do that. I have my whole life ahead of me and my prayer is that it will be a life fully lived for Jesus Christ! Matthew 6:19-21 says, “Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal: But lay up for yourself treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and where thieves do not break through and steal; For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.” I desire to live a life that lasts for eternity, that when I get to the end of this life, I will be able to look back, and see that I laid up treasure in heaven and did not live a selﬁsh life for myself. I want to always serve Him with my whole heart and choose His way, not mine or the worlds that leaves you so empty! I like Psalm 37:4 that says, “Delight thyself also in the Lord, and He shall give thee the desires of thine heart.” This verse is not saying that God will give us anything we want but rather if we delight in the Lord, our heart will desire that which is good and pleasing to the Lord; things that God wants to give us. I can truly say that I’d rather have Jesus than anything this world has to oﬀer! Jesus’ love is vast and immeasurable, greater than any others!

____________________________________________

Sarah Smalley

My name is Sarah Smalley, and I’d like to start by thanking those who have played important roles in my education and growth as a person and as a believer in Jesus Christ.

My first thank you goes to my parents, who have always been there to support and encourage me. They have sacrificed their time, talents, and treasure so that they could provide a Christian education for me. They have helped to explain tough concepts to me so I could complete my homework, quizzed me as I have been studying for tests, and reminded me that although academics are important, they do not give me value. They have taught me the gospel. They have stressed that my identity is in Christ and that doing all things for His glory is what is most important. They love and put up with me even when I am at my worst! I love you Mom and Dad!

My second thank you goes to Mr. Cox for running WCFS. I have been a student here since kindergarten. Thank you for teaching foundations of self-government where I learned a lot about how to study scripture and apply it to help me grow in personal situations. Thank you also for teaching the research paper class where I learned how to research, outline, and organize my thoughts and grow in my writing skills. These are skills that I continue to use daily.

My third thank you goes to Mr. Fischer who was also a teacher of the Foundations of Self Government class my freshman year. Since then he has kept me on track to graduate by meeting with me twice a year and reviewing my work, writing letters of recommendation, completing my transcript and sending it to my future college. Thanks also to Donna and all the other WCFS staff who have provided administrative support during my years at this school.

Most importantly I am grateful to Jesus for loving me and paying the price for my sins so that I can live with Him forever. I am thankful that Jesus is always with me, especially through the stressful moments in my life. It has meant so much to know that He is in control and that even things that seem disastrous by my standards are being used for my good and His glory.

I am so thankful that I was homeschooled. I have become a self-starter and independent learner and am able to manage my time well. In the last two years as I have taken dual enrolled classes at the local community college I have had opportunities to grow in these skills since I had to set and follow a schedule to complete my assignments. I think these skills will be useful as I plan to study Computer Science at Grove City College in the fall where I am looking forward to continuing to learn in a Christ-centered environment.

I’d like to end with Lamentations 3:21-23 “But this I call to mind, and therefore I have hope: the steadfast love of the LORD never ceases; His mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness.” This verse is important to me because it talks both about God’s faithfulness and love for us as well as the source of our hope. It is a good reminder that our hope is not dependent on our circumstances but on the love of God for us.

____________________________________________

Patrick Valdes

After all these years of being in school and trying to overcome the obstacles thrown our way, we have made it to this finish line. It has been quite a journey for all of us to make it to this day. I had thought I was not going to graduate until next year because of the rate I was going, but around Christmas last year, I received an email with the graduation release form and a letter telling me that I was approved. I felt many different emotions during that moment, but I was mostly caught off guard by it. But nonetheless, I was happy about it. Quite frankly, I feel quite undeserving of this moment because of some choices I made that only set me back further in my academics, and I regret those choices very much. But that is in the past now. I can learn from those wrong choices and change for the better. Then I can look forward and see what lies ahead in life for me as this chapter ends and a new one begins.

This past school year has been one of the better school years for me, but life has brought its bag of tricks to throw my way and has made it one of the hardest years of my life. Some of the darkest hours of my life happened this year. But through God and through people He put in my life, I have been able to heal mostly and get stronger mentally. Only by God’s grace have I been able to make it to this moment and through wisdom given to me by family, WCFS staff, and friends, I was able to try things out to help me improve my study habits and search for what works. Those things I can apply for whatever route I may take in the near future.

My favorite Bible verse is Proverbs 3:5-6, which says, “Trust in the Lord with all thine heart, and lean not unto thine own understanding. In all thy ways, acknowledge Him, and He shall direct thy paths.” I have found these verses have helped me over the years to remember that if I let God take control of my life, He will lead me in the right directions; if I recognize that He is in control of everything and that He is the source of protection in my life, He will make sure that I am always safe in His arms.

I am so grateful for the people who God has put in my life. They play many different parts in the story of my life, and each person has contributed to my getting here. Whether their contribution was a few right words when I needed them, or if they were by my side the whole way pushing me to continue, I am so grateful for the effort and the time you took to help me. I first want to thank my family for being there for me all the way.

I thank you Mom for doing all the things you have done for me over the years. You have put so much time into me and have guided me and still guide me to go down the right paths to become successful and to make sure that I make the right choices. You make sure to teach me the many different things I need to know how to do when I live outside of the house and how to make sure I do a job right the first time.

I thank you Dad for helping me to get through school and understand everything I was learning. You helped me find a way to understand math and science, and you have taught me different things from construction work to car maintenance. Both you and Mom have been so loving and have been there for me as my parents since day one. I especially thank you for trying to help me through this past year. I know that so many things have happened at home, from health issues to life being the way it is, but you both still made time to help me and talk with me about my struggles. You have always been there to help me.

I want to thank my siblings for being there for good times and the bad, and for encouraging me to keep on whenever I felt like giving up. I also thank the family on both my parents’ sides for their love and support.

I thank my pastor, his wife, my friends, and church family for their support and their encouragement, and for the things they have done for me over the years for my personal and spiritual growth. Without those things, I would not be the person I am today. All of you have been like family to me over the years.

I also want to thank Pastor Gary and Mr. Joel for everything they have done to help me get on the right track. You both have bent backwards for me to help me so many times and I cannot thank you enough for the effort you put into me. I also want to thank the other WCFS staff for your help as well.

I also want to thank some people who are not here today that have really had an impact in my life: I thank my music teachers, Mrs. Anne, Miss Bobbie, and Mrs. April for the many things they have taught me in piano and violin. Without all of you, I would literally not be the person and musician I am today. I thank you Aaron for all the music equipment and the wisdom that you gave me that I benefit greatly from. I thank my mentor who has been there for me through these past 2 years despite the long distance. You have been there for me and have been quite a big help to me through the toughest parts of my life. You have been an encouragement to me and someone I admire and respect very much.

My future plans are to go to community college for now and pick a career route such as nursing or exercise physiology. But I will not give up in pursuing my passion for music and other arts as well. But if God has a different plan for me, I will try to follow His lead.

______________________________________