Hay Makin', Cabin Cleanin', Justice

Another beautiful week. I filled in for Amy at the Abingdon Farmers Market on Saturday while she was away taking a much needed and much deserved girls’ weekend away with some of her friends from college. Though out of my element, I really enjoyed the market. Meeting new folks and seeing faces I hadn’t seen in a while. Reminder: the market hours are from 10:00 - noon starting tomorrow until spring.

October has been a busy month for the cabins, understandably so. No place like the valley in the fall. The cabins had turnover renters on Sunday, so with Amy still away, I cleaned both cabins Sunday after church. We don’t always meet the folks who come to stay in the cabins, but we have met a lot of mighty fine folks who have visited the valley over the years. The cabins have been a huge blessing for us if only for the chance to build relationships with some great people. The cabins are a great place to come and relax. We don’t expect renters to come and work. However, in the past couple weeks, on different occasions, renters have helped load firewood and helped overseed wheat in pig paddocks. Past renters have made a day trip to the farm just to visit and stock up on ORVF meat. In a world that’s giving us plenty of reasons to be discouraged, we are continually encouraged by the prayers and kindness of people all around us. 

I got the rest of the hay fields mowed. Some of them were filled with debris from Helene, so Amy and the kids spent an afternoon removing sticks and such from the field to prevent messing up the hay equipment. 

Both my dad and brother John graciously gave much of their time to help us this week with sorting cows and making hay. On Tuesday Hallie and Hasten got to “skip school” to help round up and sort through about 150 head of cattle. We usually take cows and pigs to the processor every month, sometimes twice a month. Instead of rounding up the whole herd every month, we sort through the big herd every few months and separate the bigger end. Rounding up 30 to 40 on processing days every month is a lot more doable than trying to round up and sort through 150-200 every month. 

Not only did my dad and brother help with sorting cattle, they helped rake, bale, haul, and wrap our second cutting of hay. It felt good to add to our hay inventory. I have a feeling we’re going to need it. 

Amy and I mowed and trimmed around the barn area and the yards of both cabins, likely for the last time this year. I hope it keeps growing and needs cut 3-4 more times this year. Not because I love mowing, but if grass is growing in the yards, that means grass is growing in the fields for the cows. I think we’ve cut the grass fewer times this year than any other year since we’ve been here. 

Making hay, I finished listening to “Mere Christianity” by C.S. Lewis.

“My argument against God was that the world seemed so cruel and unjust.  But how had I got this idea of just and unjust?”

One of the many reasons I believe in God, Christianity in particular, is the idea of justice. We all believe in good and evil. We all desire justice and goodness. But who or what determines what is good and just? Living things in the wild live by the laws of nature. Survival of the fittest. Is nature just? What makes us human being different? Is justice determined by the individual? If so, that would mean there is no absolute justice. One individual’s idea of justice would be no more true or just than anyone else’s. If up to each individual, who is anyone to impose their idea of justice on anyone else? If justice is subjective, then it is not true or absolute. Why even advocate for just laws if justice is a subjective idea?

We all yearn for a just society because we believe there is something absolute about justice and goodness worth striving towards. But if true justice is not subjective to each individual, who then determines what is just? The collective? Is justice what is agreed upon by the majority? Is justice determined by the culture or society as a whole? That doesn’t work either. Was the Holocaust just? Is slavery just if it is culturally accepted? No. History is filled with examples of cultures and societies agreeing upon unjust laws. Point being, justice cannot be determined by society as a whole. Societies can as a whole move closer towards justice or further from it, but the idea of justice itself is not determined by or moved by us.

If justice is true, as we all deep down believe it is, it can’t come from us. It must come from something or someone outside of us. Something bigger than us. Without God, there is no justice. Atheists may disagree, but they still don’t have an answer as to where justice comes from. Unless they want to make themselves god and give themselves the authority to determine what is good and evil over the rest of the world.

No only is God the only one who establishes what is just, He is the only one who is just. He didn’t establish justice for sake of judging and condemning us, as he could’ve. He came to our unjust world and lived justly. And suffered unjustly. Willing to take on himself the punishment we deserve. So that we could be justly pardoned. He paid for our wrongs that he didn’t deserve. So that we could have grace and mercy that we don’t deserve. He established justice to point us towards goodness. Towards Him. In hopes of sharing that goodness with us. 

“If the universe is not governed by an absolute goodness, then all our efforts are in the long run hopeless.”

“There is nothing progressive about being pigheaded and refusing to admit a mistake. And I think if you look at the present state of the world, it is pretty plain that humanity has been making some big mistake. We are on the wrong road. And if that is so, we must go back. Going back is the quickest way on.”

“Good and evil both increase at compound interests. That is why the little decisions you and I make everyday are of such infinite importance.”

Have a good week. 

Will