I read a book to my eldest son, H, that makes me think about his daddy every time I read it:
Sun's up, Mornin's Here - Up and At 'Em Engineer
For the last couple of weeks, us on the Eastern Plains of Colorado have been experiencing a heat wave - for middle March at least. Talk to ANY farmer, and they will tell you that they are already behind in their plantin'. Makes little sense, I know, as planting doesn't even begin until middle April. But these ole' boys (my 31 year old hubby included), gets an itchin' they just catch scratch when it heats up. Gotta rip the ground, fill sprinkler tracks, strip-till - can't leave the tractor to use the bathroom, much less anything else. (As a side note, they don't leave the tractor to pee, they just jump out on the steps to relieve themselves. Hey, it is all fertilizer, right?) Sometimes this way of life is daunting. My honey do list grows longer and longer, my hubby's attention span to anything but farming shorter and shorter. I complain some about it, but the truth is this - I love that you cannot be country and lazy.
City dwellers, don't be offended, but there is something extra manly about the farmer. They, for one, can actually fix things. I love a man who can change my car's oil, fix a tractor, help doctor a calf and love his family all with the same hands. These hands are rough and calloused - but with these come strength rare in few men these days.
These farmers - alpha men, really - are what men should be. Men who respect the soil and all it has to offer. Men who see life as precious - especially when seeing calf after calf birthed in the Spring. Men who don't take for granted God's gifts of the sun's warmth and essential rains. Men who, at the end of the day, know that despite all of their hard work, they could still lose a crop to anything from a hail storm to insects - and rely on God for their daily provision.
I think it fitting that so many metaphor's used in Scripture refer to farming and working with the earth. "I am the vine; you are the branches. If a man remains in me and I in
him, he will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing." (John 15:5). This way of life is God's way of life - He did, after all, create every stitch of it.
