The simple silence of walking to the barn in the dark.
The soothing rhythm of milking my sweet cow Moo.
The uncomplicated routine of greeting chickens, opening barn doors, and filling water troughs.
Every dawn,
as the rising sun pours warm rays across Kirkhaven’s eastern pasture,
it feels like a fresh new miracle
that I am here.
Things feel right and good on the farm in the morning.
Two years ago, my husband and I would have never dreamed that we would be mucking stalls, chatting with UT agriculture specialists about pasture maintenance, and ordering bovine vaccinations online. Who would have ever THOUGHT that WE would be farmers? My husband is an architect. I am a teacher. What did we know about gardening and greenhouses and cows and chickens and pastures and wells and ponds?
Nothing.
We knew nothing.
But God knows everything.
He knew that we were broken and grieving.
He knew that we were afraid to move ahead . . . in any direction.
He knew that we would absolutely thrive doing the very thing that we never imagined.
And He knew that stepping into the unknown . . .
struggling with doubt and fear until hope is born . . .
depending upon Him because resources were too small and the task was too big . . .
hearing the still, small Voice of His Wisdom and His Truth above a daily din of continuous clatter . . .
studying hard . . .
working hard . . .
praying hard . . .
resting gratefully in the goodness of His wondrous, amazing grace . . .
was what we were BORN to do.
The learning curve has been very steep. There have been days when we wondered if it would work out at all. We have made mistakes. We have seen hardships. We have been disappointed. But building Kirkhaven Farm has been good.
Very good.
There is something poignant . . . something rich and life-giving and real . . . about drawing sustenance from the land. I have always understood that eggs came from chickens. I realized that milk and beef came from cows. I appreciated the fact that fruits and vegetables I bought at the store were grown in a garden or orchard somewhere. But academic facts have grown to a different kind of “knowing” as I have collected eggs from chickens I raised from hatchlings, canned jellies and jams from fruits I picked myself, eaten fresh garden vegetables that I grew from seeds, and enjoyed a cold glass of creamy goodness from my hand-milked cow Moo.
“Knowing about” is sterile and academic. It can be gained through study. Through mentoring. Through meditative revelation. It can earn you fame and fortune. It can cause others to be jealous of what you have gained. But it cannot give you the vital, real kind of life that truly knowing offers.
“Knowing” . . . instead of “knowing about” . . . is very, very precious.
The touching kind of knowing.
The dirt-on-your-hands and poop on your boots kind of knowing.
The laboring over and laboring with and laboring because-of kind of knowing.
The costly kind.
The intimate kind.
Like God knows us.
His birth in a stall.
His childhood in a small town.
His work with His father as a carpenter.
His ministry on the dusty roads and lake shores and hillsides and big cities of Israel.
His death on a cross.
The been-there-done-that-have-the-scars kind of knowing.
The real kind of knowing.
As I go about my daily chores at Kirkhaven, stewarding the bounty that lives and grows here, it is becoming very real to me how very shallow knowledge is . . . but how very deep knowing is. One of my favorite Bible verses often drifts through my heart and mind as I work:
Be still (cease striving), and know that I am God;
I will be exalted among the nations,
I will be exalted in the earth.
The Lord Almighty is with us; the God of Jacob is our fortress.
Selah
Psalms 46:10-11
I have often commented about how my quiet, farming lifestyle has helped me enter into the “be still” part of that verse. Nothing else I have ever done has helped “still” my heart more than farming. But now I am seeing that farming has helped me enter the “knowing” part of that verse too.
Be still. Cease the hand-wringing striving that is born of faithlessness.
And know. The dirt-on-your-hands-and-poop-on-your-boots kind of intimate participation in God’s Kingdom life.
I know my chickens.
I know my cows.
I know the dark, rich dirt of my vegetable garden.
But to know God . . . intimately and deeply and richly . . . to touch Him . . . and to work alongside Him . . . even when it's messy or hard . . . is the greatest treasure of all.
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