Eila Hirsimaki sings “Holy Water’’ at St John’s Church June 24. Hirsimaki performed a solo during the Spoke Folk nightly program performed by participants on tour. Spoke Folk is about “learning how to use whatever skills God has given you,” Hirsimaki said. | Photo submitted by Eila Hirsimaki

50 states, two wheels, one community

High school students share how the missions program Spoke Folk has changed their lives.

Kylie Nybakken

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Published in

ROYAL REPORT

5 min readDec 16, 2021

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By Kylie Nybakken, reporter

Eila Hirsimaki pushes down hard on the pedals of her sopping wet 28-inch hybrid FX Trek bike while screaming lyrics to “Santa Clause is Coming to Town” in the middle of June. Raindrops pelt against her flushed cheeks and. drip from her ponytail, but Hirsimaki presses on. 177 miles, eight shows, countless breakdowns and this was only day seven. A quarter-sized callus on her palm splits open from gripping the handle bars too tight as she bikes on wet gravel for four miles in “who-knows-where” Michigan, in the wrong direction.

“Why am I here? What am I doing this for? I could be at home in a warm bed, not here biking in the rain,” Hirsimaki mumbles.

The counselors’ infamous wake-up call plays on repeat in her head.

“Gooood morning Spoke Folk! It’s a beautiful day filled with beautiful people…”

This rainy day seven was inarguably the most unpleasant day of the tour to date, but the counselors did get one thing right. Hirsimaki was surrounded by beautiful people who transformed from strangers in Texas to family in just one week.

Spoke Folk participants bike to a barbeque picnic during tour June 25, 2021. On tour participants are taught to hold out their arms to signal to the rest of the bikers that they are turning. “Because you’re going out on public roads, you have to know how to use a bike,” Spoke Folk participant Eila Hirmsimaki said. | Photo submitted by Alexa Nybakken.

Spoke Folk is a non-profit missions outreach program that originated in Roseville in 1979. The program is a mission trip on wheels, combining biking, performing, discipleship and community. A 12-day biking and musical tour that pedals through 50 states. Thirty participants between the ages of 15 and 20 from all over the U.S. bike to and from different churches throughout the 50 states in order to spread the gospel by performing programs made up of singing, acting, and testifying for congregations.

National director of Spoke Folk Ryan Veil explained that Spoke Folk’s mission is to “teach high school and college-age students how to be missionaries in their daily lives.”

Veil, 38, was introduced to Spoke Folk through a former participant who noticed his musical talent during Veil’s sophomore year of high school. In summer 2001, he rode on his first Spoke Folk tour of 20 and counting. He became involved in the administrative team after his wife Allie’s first tour in 2014 and now directs the program from his home in Andover. Veil still attends tours in the summer when he is not too busy running his own wedding business, Studio Veil, or looking after his four-year-old daughter and two-year-old son. Veil explains that Spoke Folk holds a dear place in his heart, and he still wants to be active in the program despite being a full-time business owner, father and husband.

“Spoke Folk is one of the few places still available in culture where you can go and instantly be loved for who you are.” — Ryan Veil, national Spoke Folk director

He recalled a specific time during the 2002 Iowa tour when the narcoleptic counselor John — nicknamed “Big John” — collapsed in the middle of the floor at 2 a.m. and announced, “Look out, here comes the Holy Spirit!”

The incident became a running joke in the Spoke Folk community and is still referenced on tours today.

“Spoke Folk is one of the few places still available in culture where you can go and instantly be loved for who you are,” Veil said.

Hirsimaki’s friend on tour, Leif Halvorson, shared a story about how the Spoke Folk community changed his life. Halvorson was originally scheduled to be a foreign exchange student in Denmark during the summer of 2021 but had to return early due to COVID-19. He was upset that his Denmark plans fell through and did not understand God’s plan for his life. June 26, 2021 — the final night of the tour — participants stood hand-in-hand in the Saint Michael Lutheran Church’s auditorium to take part in their final devotion. The room was completely dark aside from beams of moonlight trapped inside the mosaic fractiles on the stain-glass window. As Halvorson looked about the room at all the faces that went from being strangers to family in 12 days, he felt an overwhelming sense of purpose and belonging.

Leif Halvorson and his friends bond in a team huddle at St. Michael Lutheran Church in Ottawa Lake, Michigan June 26. These high schoolers had just completed their final program of tour and were taking a moment to reflect on their time together and how God was working in their lives. “I just really felt God and I felt that he wanted me here,” Halvorson said. | Photo submitted by Eila Hirsimaki.

“I made some of the strongest connections I’ve ever had,” Halvorson said. “It showed me that God was like, ‘Yeah, I know what I’m doing.’”

More than 40 years later students still return from tours sharing similar experiences.

The challenges that participants face on tour equips them to fulfill Spoke Folk’s purpose of being missionaries in everyday life.

Showering in ice-cold hose water in church parking lots.

Crawling into a sleeping bag on the church floor at 2 a.m. and being woken up at 7 a.m.. Singing the same seven songs every day on repeat while biking tireless miles.

“I am not going to lie, Spoke Folk is the most physically, emotionally and spiritually challenging thing I have ever done,” Hirsimaki said. “You are at your limit in almost all aspects of your life, and it’s great because you’re at such a vulnerable breaking point but you’re with a bunch of people who are also breaking.”

Spoke Folk pushes high school and college-age students beyond what they think they are capable of, and they do so with the support and affirmation of others.

“You get broken down and built back up together…they’re there to encourage and uplift you when you’re at your worst” Spoke Folk participant Annika Halvorson said.

Because of this, Spoke Folk has built enriching relationships that last for years after tour.

“Whether you go on Spoke Folk or are just inspired by what Spoke Folk is doing, you should always look for ways to build community. You never know how God could use it.” — Eila Hirsimaki, 16-year-old Spoke Folk participant

In fact, a group of seven Minnesotans flew to Texas in August 2021 to visit fellow Spoke Folkers from the Michigan trip in June.

“Whether you go on Spoke Folk or are just inspired by what Spoke Folk is doing, you should always look for ways to build community,” Hirsimaki said. “You never know how God could use it.”