Northern Farmer

Friday evening in the country, I just got blowed into the house by a dust storm when a thunderhead skirted a few miles north of use. All we got out of that was some wind, a lot of wind, but at least the dust got relocated……somewhere. But that’s just normal life around here. Now I was thinking today when I was underneath our John Deere 2520 tractor doing a repair job on a blowed out seal under the tranny, oil leaking on the ground and with that transmission oil costing around forty dollars for a five gallon pail it had better be repaired pronto, well anyway I was thinking about some of the stuff I read on the internet about the joys of agrarian life. Now, I’ll admit that there is no other way of life for me, but then again who says I’m normal. Some folks think it’s a paradise, most of the time these folks don’t know squat about anything anyhow so I forgive them. They think of the ideal farm setting and all the peaceful times and all the times of tip toeing through the green grass and, oh life is so perfect, no more worries, no more cares. Ok, there’s plenty of times like that, I’ll admit, but it sure wouldn’t be fair to give the impression that that’s the way it is all the time. Sometimes for day or weeks at a time there’s not too many ways of life harder.

And there’s no security if you want to call it that of a steady check, believe me there’s no such thing as a steady check around here at all. Steady bills, yes, steady income, no. No one else makes decisions for a person, the blame for the mistake comes barreling right back at you, sometimes pretty hard. Every time a person thinks things are just about right a weather disaster comes and humbles you. And humbles you hard. The government is always figuring out ways to make things harder for a person, the local deadbeats vote to raise taxes for a failing school system that teaches everything against the Word. Animals die unexpectedly, crops wipe out, pastures burn off from drought. People move out here trying to force suburbia on a person, or at least their failing ways. I was listening to a preacher preaching on a CD set I got a few days ago, a country preacher, and I love what he says. “I can smell the smoke! I can smell the smoke!” The smoke he’s referring to is hellfire, wicked ways. Well, there’s getting to be no shortage of that, with everything going modern and turning away from God around here.

But to make it out here, I figure a person has to have a work ethic like in earlier days. They “WILL NOT” make it trying to live modern. Because it will eat them up alive. But, they say, I know plenty of farmers that live totally modern and it looks like they’re doing good. I know, me too, I see this too. But one has to understand, when a person lives totally modern, doing as society dictates, they’re not walking in Truth. And if a person is not walking in the Word, there’s no middle ground, they’re walking on the other side. And the other side only wants to destroy, nothing else, the family, the farm and their lives. And you can bet, when the farm family is living a totally modern lifestyle, that farm family won’t be a farm family another generation or two.

I watch what’s going on around here and can almost tell what stage a farm family is in as far as this decline goes. They can come up with government programs and countless other things to supposedly help rural America, but it don’t mean squat, heck, I think used toilet paper has more value. We at in a war, a spiritual war, and it’s tearing the heart out of the countryside. It’s not “fashionable” to have your kids get up at the crack of dawn to help out with chores, it’s not fashionable to have the whole family help working on the farm. They should be running to all the activities planned by the modern people that want bedroom communities, so the children are not with their parents, the village will take care of them. And take care of them they do, tear the Word right out of their hearts with the parents figuring that this is so good, carting them off to every worthless activity that man can figure out to glorify man. The modern churches in the area preach about supporting our school, about supporting all the activities that break up the family. God is condemned in the schools and the modern “religious” praise the system. Jockeying for social status in the government schools the religious community leaders are at every activity, showing themselves as the “world’s” greatest supporters. Instead of standing up for God, they actively participate in the destruction of our faith and families. It’s now accepted to just shove our faith into a little timeslot on Sundays, so the position held in the community can be maintained. More and more in the last couple of years the schools are coming up with Wednesday night events in direct competition to church activities. And people are like sheep accepting all of it. Man, I can smell the smoke too!

So we just have to be different out here on the farm and it warms my heart to see this attitude in the family, this attitude that’s the same as mine. More and more we look around us and we do see the culture of death on its race to hellfire destruction. Now, I’d rather it didn’t, because it does make things a little difficult to say the least. But I see it in small towns, on the farms, in so many churches, like a cancer spreading steadily. So few care, so few. But strange things do happen in this world, God’s people are waking up all over, being nudged, or maybe shoved, but whatever there is, an awakening going on. Many folks that figure that they’re experts on agrarian ways but couldn’t survive a day when it comes to really doing it. And meantime regular folks from all walks of life are hearing the calling from God to simplify, be still, and worship Him. The experts are confused and the simple folks go ahead without them, turning their backs on modern society, turning their backs on the religious, and following God in faith. These are the folks that are going to make a difference. People can study this thing called Christian Agrarianism and come up with all the wrong answers, because all it is, is pure simple faith, and following the Word. They’ll confuse the mighty, and they’ll make the religious madder than a wet hen. Don’t matter though, because they’re following the King.

Making it out here isn’t all that difficult when a person’s eyes are fixed on the Cross. That’s what it takes to live free, nothing else.

This entry was posted on Friday, June 23rd, 2006 at 6:36 pm and is filed under Northern Farmer. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.