Why We Want to Farm

We subscribe to this magazine and I'm a veteran, so we considered it quite providential that we received this specific copy while closing on the farm.  

                                                      Image courtesy of Organic Gardening

                                                       

While there are a number of reasons Bekah and I want to farm.  I’m confident we agree on a few. Hopefully…

A few reasons we desire to slow down a bit and live a more agrarian style life are that we enjoy eating food fresh from the garden, milk fresh from the cow, and meat freshly slaughtered.  While it may seem to be quite a raw viewpoint of food, not everyone understands that every bite you eat came about because something had to die.  It could be as simple as a leaf of spinach picked by hand to a thousand pound yearling bull that although now looks like a tasty burger at a Five Guys restaurant, was walking around not too long ago.  You see, we’ve become so far removed from the emotional connection once held between the land and the landowner that to think of a chicken nugget as ever being anything but that is quite foreign to children and to many adults.  In fact, one of the most visceral experiences of my life was when I helped a friend slaughter a cow about ten years ago.  There was a moment when the animal in front of me was alive and then another moment when it wasn’t.  There’s an impact of consequence provided when you are standing in the presence of something like that.  If you hunt, then you are probably very familiar with the feeling, but imagine you raised that deer from birth and then harvested it.  It brings life to the forefront of your thoughts while you are in that moment.  That is what I want for my family and me.  I don’t want to be so distanced from the realities of sacrifice that we take for granted the lives that must end so that we may continue our own. 

I’m not advocating that everyone should go out and buy a farm.  Honestly, I can’t even claim to be a farmer… at this moment, we are only remodeling what once was a farm.  The farming has yet to really begin and the test of our resolve to do so is yet to come.  I do know that what I have experienced has left an indelible impression on me.  It’s for that reason that I always tell people that they are welcome to visit anytime.  I call it our open barn door policy. This is especially true if we are working...  I want what has inspired my heart to do the same in others.  I have a vision for the farm but that vision has many untraveled roads for us within it.  Bekah consistently is helping me to be reasonable because I have such plans to do this or that and we haven’t even moved in yet!  One example that makes me laugh and I will mention later is that I want to grow our own wheat.  Not just so we can make our own low gluten bread but so that we can live out the lesson of separating the wheat from the chaff.  Well, before we've even moved in to the house, I've already invited the Sunday school class we teach over to help separate the wheat from the chaff next year.  We don't own a single wheat seed...  I just get so excited and love to involve others in what gets me going!

This brings me to probably the most important reason I want to farm and that is I want to experience the Lord through His creation.  I've learned so much from just my simple experience with helping keep bees at my grandfathers and how they will literally work themselves to death so the hive can survive.  I truly believe there are some great biblical principles there and know from experience they can be found all over the place in creation if we can just slow down to observe them.  Growing wheat to see things like separating the chaff while winnowing, keeping sheep and observing the innocence of a lamb, and planting on different types of soil to see how it grows will enable us to better understand the parables Christ so often used in His teachings.  This is why we want to farm.  We desire to understand and hopefully draw closer to the Lord and to be a blessing to our community.  We will have an open barn door policy because we want you to be involved with us so that we can, together, exhort one another unto Him, fellowship unto His glory, and ultimately grow closer to the Lord.

As always, if you have any comments you want to leave I encourage you to do so at the bottom.

Prayer: Lord, please help us to be better stewards of your creation.  Help us to slow down and consider it and the beautiful revelations you provide every day.  I pray that we will, through this farm, be a blessing to our friends, family, and community that in some way they will see you and draw closer to your heart and come to the knowledge of your salvation and redemption.