Monday

I woke up late. 7:40. I was supposed to be there at 8. I threw my clothes on and ran out the door without doing my hair or brushing my teeth. Awesome. I was about 45 minutes late and felt really bad but when I pulled into the long gravel drive way I saw two men smiling as if caring weren't worth there time. Jeff and Fred. Jeff greeted me and started explaining his philosophy to me. He said that farming, working with a flock, is like leading a church. He said that today we would learn about the slow processes of pastoring.

We walked through a field of high grass towards a mobile chicken coop. Jeff told me that he and Fred had already collected the eggs but when we got there more had been laid. We picked up the eggs, gave the chickens water and feed and moved on to the turkeys. The turkeys just needed their coop moved over a fresh patch of grass.

People started showing up slowly after that. One by one they would mosey (quite literally) onto the field; one holding a cat, the next telling jokes from afar. After a while we went and looked at the pigs while Jeff hypothesized about the best way to move the turkey fence. Fred whistled and all of the turkeys ran under a coop. They had no idea what the noise was and instinctually hid. We moved the fence so the turkeys would have new grazing grass. All of the animals were free-range. It was beautiful.

We had tea and shared a morning devotional. The pastors joked about swear words and wine (most of them were Lutheran) and we ate homemade muffins and prayed brief but wonderful prayers.

A tractor was pulled near the house and we all jumped on the trailer. We ended up at a large garden cleaning up rotten and near rotten produce, sampling the romaine and banana peppers along the way. We loaded gourds and cucumbers and tomatoes and squash onto the trailer and took it back to the pigs. They lovingly accepted our offering and feasted until it was gone.

In the afternoon we had quiet time and then met together. We discussed a Wendell Berry article about the necessity of home and farmings dependence on new and exhaustible resources. Jeff encouraged us to replace the word "farm" with the word "church" in the Berry essay. It worked quite well. We talked about what home meant to us and what it might mean to have a church home.

My favorite memory of the day was during lunch. We were eating a wonderful beef stew when one of the pastors asked, in jest, "So Jeff, who are we eating." Jeff looked off in the distance for a moment. He turned his head, smiled and said, "Bruno." He wasn't joking. He had raised Bruno. He'd given him a name, knew his identity, and was now using Bruno to sustain his own life and to share with others so that they, too, can partake in the blessing of his flesh. We thanked God for Bruno.

Tending the soul....

Sometimes I still wonder what I want to do when I grow up. Then I remember that I'm mostly considered grown up now and I'm a youth pastor. Right now, I'm where I am supposed to be.

A challenge that comes with working in a church is finding time for reflection and prayer. Paul says that people who teach within the church are held to a higher moral standard. I think that also means that people who teach within the church need to be intentional about taking opportunities to grow and learn, to find people to invest in them.

A few weeks ago my pastor put a newsletter on my desk that I didn't read. I picked it up today and started reading through it. It's from a teaching ministry in North Manchester called Hope CSA that offers a course on experiential learning and academic study through the context of a small diversified farm. They focus on both theology and ecology. Essentially, those who participate learn about God through His creation -- through farming, and gardening, and study.

They are offering a mini-session this year that meets once a month for four months and only costs $10 a month. I think I'm going to do it.

I've always wanted to learn how to garden. There is something special and meaningful about eating food you have planted and nurtured. There is something spiritual about being so intimately connected with the things that you consume. Maybe this will be an opportunity for me to learn more about that.

Here is what the back of their newsletter tells me:

The mission of HOPE CSA, Inc. is to provide a ministry of continuing education and vocational renewal to clergy and other church leaders, using the resources of the Christian faith and of Creation in the context of a small, diversified family farm.

The purpose of this ministry is to teach clergy and other church leaders new ways of thinking and function as leaders living in interlocking family, congregational, collegial and natural systems.

The goal of this hands-on teaching ministry is to promote the well-being, and leadership skills of glergy and other church leaders by promoting "holy health," which is health in all seven dimensions: physical, emotional, intellectual, social, vocational, environmental, and spiritual.

The vision of this ministry is to involve clergy and other church leaders in the natural "household" of a healthy, small, diversified family farm as a natural system that functions according to the same natural process as their family, congregation, and collegial systems. As clergy are led to function healthily in the natural system of the farm and are guided to reflect on the natural processes that work toward life and health in that setting, they are instructed and shaped to function healthily in their other systems as well.

What do you all think?