Journal Entry -- October 31, 2006

Last week I began the long process of getting back on my feet in recuperating from the flu. A tenacious nagging cough still remains and my energy levels are depleted. I am told it takes about 6 weeks to fully recover from this nasty stuff. Nonetheless, I took the “Pulaski” fitness test. The Pulaski axe, which is a hoe and axe combination, was designed specifically to fight forest fires, though it is a great tool to have on hand. It was designed by the famous forest ranger Ed Pulaski who saved several men’s lives during a horrific fire in August of 1910. Overcome by towering flames and thick smoke, Pulaski ordered his men into a mine shaft at gunpoint and kept them there through the inferno by standing in the entrance to prevent escape. When a rescue party discovered the men in the shaft, one rescuer called, "Come outside, boys, the boss is dead." Pulaski rose to his feet and bellered out, "Like hell he is."

In our mule corral there was a tree that needed removing, but its base was full of fence wire, which had been absorbed by the tree over time, a real chainsaw nightmare. So Art began the hard work of digging around the thick roots and axing them. I assisted and soon discovered what exhausting work it is. The Pulaski test clearly showed that I am in need of serious physical training, which I am undertaking, though gradually. The flu doesn’t help. We eventually cut away the roots on one side and then cut the top of the tree off at about 15 feet above the ground, leaving a long stout lever for pulling it over and out. Next came the beast, our 1 ton Dodge 4x4. We fixed one end of 40 feet of logging chain to the top of the tree and the other to the ball of our gooseneck hitch. Art dropped the beast into 4 low and slowly pulled forward. After making a loud pop when the large tap root snapped, the tree came out instantly. We preferred to have done it with Sam & Sadie, but as they still reside at our Amish friend’s farm, we used diesel power. Sam & Sadie will come soon enough. We pulled the tree and several others into the field behind the coral, which leaves us plenty of work when training with our beloved mules.

I was amazed recently at a sign set up at a local bank, which was intended to draw customers through a play-on-words Halloween theme. It was covered with fake spider webs and had a few gravestones drawn on it. It read, “Let your money RIP at Bank Midwest.” The truth behind this statement is far scarier than we realize. Because a debt-based economy is inflationary by nature, fiat “money” looses its purchasing power over time. The last time the paper dollar had the same purchasing power as a silver dollar was in 1941. Today the American dollar – both the paper and virtual ones (as represented in the purchasing limit on a credit card or in the debits & credits on a bank statement) has less than 2% of the purchasing power of that 1941 dollar. There will come a time, as it has happened with every fiat currency in the history of the world, when it will utterly fail and die, that is, become worthless as a means of exchange, since it already has no intrinsic value to start with. The American people have been addicted to the witch’s brew of debt-based economics for quite some time. Their peaceful treat is about to end, however, and the trick will be upon them, as they see their paper wealth and security disappear into the night like a cackling witch on a broom.

J.R.R. Tolkien did an excellent job in describing the pagan magic of our modern banking system. In the July, 1956, edition of Candour Magazine he stated, "The true equation is ‘democracy’ = government by world financiers . . . The main mark of modern governments is that we do not know who governs, de facto any more than de jure. We see the politician and not his backer; still less the backer of the backer; or what is most important of all, the banker of the backer. Enthroned above all, in a manner without parallel in all past, is the veiled prophet of finance, swaying all men living by a sort of magic, and delivering oracles in a language not understanded [sic] of the people."

The apologia on the biblical use of mules is still coming, though this flu has really slowed me down and drained me of my mental juices, of which I need every drop. One thing I have learned in entering into the life of biblical agrarianism, it leaves little time to talk. Perhaps this is what the churches need with all of the attacks and finger pointing going in reformed circles these days. The autopilot life of credit based ease and comfort leaves too much time for pontification. I believe it would do us all an immense amount of good to relearn what it means to steward God’s good earth by the sweat of our brows in becoming once again the primary producers of the culture, rather than consumers. This alone would straiten out a lot of the bogus doctrine and antinomianism that runs rampant among the Lord’s people. It’s high time the American Christian turns from the international moneychangers, behemoth corporations, and bloated central governments that run things for them and look to the Lord to make their way. Even so, come Lord Jesus!

Journal Entry -- October 20, 2006

This whole week has been a miserable blur, for which my daughter rightly dubbed me “sunshine” because of my less then charming demeanor. There was a reason. Over the course of eight days wherein I traveled in the tight confines of a crowded passenger jet to and from California, spoke and shook many hands at a well attended conference, and then attended a crowded, outdoor festival soon after returning, I managed to protract a nasty bout of the flu. You know the type I am talking about . . . never ending waves of body chills and aches -- a pounding, dizzying headache -- a nasty, thick cough -- burning eyes -- debilitating lethargy -- all coupled with an intense mental fog and the distinct feeling that a Mack truck is parked on your back. By God’s grace I think I might have finally made it over the hump, and in this case a steep hill, though rebounds are noted with this type of influenza. Even now, I sense what little strength and mental clarity I awoke with this morning is rapidly waning into an early bedtime, which, no doubt, is the right thing to do, though I do not relish it, as I am a get-up-and-go type of guy. My problem is that I often go until the candles at both ends are small stubs. With all of the hats I wear, it’s hard to avoid. I suspect that this flu was God’s sovereign way to get me to stop and sleep, which I have considerably . . . thank the Lord. So if this post is raddled with misspeelings and grammatical hairs, you will understood why.

One thing that has really helped are the daily body rubs my wife graciously gives me using a concoction of essential oils she developed over the years. It is comprised of 50% olive oil, 25% eucalyptus oil, 25% lavender oil, mixed with several drops of oregano oil. Keeping the blend at a minimum of 50% olive oil helps prevent any irritations occurring from the other oils, which are quite potent. The Scriptures speak of healing balms (Jer. 46:11), ointments (Isa. 1:6), and oils (Mark 6:13, Luke 10:34) and I am quite sure the oil the Good Samaritan used was not Wal-mart’s generic brand of processed Canola oil. Medicinal oils were used in the time of Christ, an art form that was maintained, though in diminishing circles, until about 200 years ago when the industrial revolution first began to take the world. I believe that the Lord in His merciful foreknowledge developed within His creation various plants vital for mankind’s health and healing, provided he also fear God and keep His commandments, which if he doesn’t no magic diet, pill, or technology will save him, for it is God Who ultimately heals, and not autonomous man. “If you diligently heed the voice of the Lord your God and do what is right in His sight, give ear to His commandments and keep all His statutes, I will put none of the diseases on you which I have brought on the Egyptians. For I am the Lord who heals you” (Exo. 15:26).

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When I wobbled out into the backyard this morning to feed the dogs, as I was in need of some warm fresh air, I discovered the remaining 2 foot tip of a large tree branch impaled in the ground . . . right in the path to the dogs.



The branch measured over 15 feet and was fairly heavy, enough that it sufficiently drove in the tip that when the branch snapped, the tip remained like a vertical sentinel, a reminder that falling tree limbs can be fatal, which is why they are grimly named “widow makers” by loggers. It had fallen quite a distance from the top of one of our very large soft maple trees. I do not believe this was a mere coincidence, the chaotic result of a chance wind, but a Heaven sent reminder from the Lord that He is our protection and wisdom. As Missouri Woods gears up for winter logging, which is soon to happen, we have been looking at safety procedures and equipment quite closely. Getting hit by falling debris is a big cause of logging accidents, something we intend by God’s grace to avoid. One has to slow down and make every step of tree felling an intentionally safe one, as much as possible, with the Lord’s blessing and guidance. That said, He is ever merciful with our human weaknesses, shortcomings, and blindness.

There are a number of items we are acquiring to meet these concerns – safety helmets with ear protection and face shields, kevlar gloves, chain saw chaps and vests, and steeled toed logging boots, to name a few, which are a definite must when a group of green horns start working around heavy mules, big logs, and powerful chain saws. The boots are where I run into a real problem, however, one caused by our wonderful global economy and the fact that I wear a size 14 4E. Now the size 14 is not the problem, but the 4E width is, which translates within the shoe industry as ridiculously wide and, therefore, not “profitable.”

I realize my footprints could easily be mistaken for those of Bigfoot, but a 14 4E boot was something I could find fairly easy thirty years ago. Redwing made them in several varieties and styles, but not today. They have expanded into the brighter and bigger horizons of the global market where the average tootsy is apparently much smaller. An off the shelf product made in my size has all but disappeared, save in a few pricey dress, sport, and casual work shoes. There is a pragmatic reason for this. For the global economy to be successful the “consumer” must be continually analyzed and necessarily revised and reduced to a profit making size to insure guaranteed sales. To prevent the problem of unsold products, “oddball” shoe sizes like mine are nixed as unprofitable. It’s not quite as bad for shirts and pants, which are made in tall and big man sizes, but socks are still a nightmare. Though the package clearly states “mens extra large,” the socks within fit nothing but men with slender, Cinderella feet and toothpick legs. I have rather large calves, so finding a sock that will go over them without working as a successful tourniquet is very hard.

I found a rare deal on Ebay four years ago for a truly “large” sock – a thick, American made Merino wool/cotton blend in a true extra large, over-the-calf size for $8 a pair, “new in the package.” Without hesitation I purchased 12 pair and have been wearing them year round since then with great comfort and pleasure. They are the cat’s meow for sustained foot comfort. Now if I could only find the right size kilt, one made for a true Scotsman and not the wee ones sized for global profits.

Maybe I was spoiled thirty years ago when the economy was geared more towards Americans (imagine that!), who tend to be larger, but I am now required as an obedient global consumer to submit to the shrinking confines of a multicultural melting pot of gender blending products and sizes. With most everything, global profits take the front seat while cultural accommodation takes the back, except in cases where exploiting the “cultural ticket” means big money. The other day I borrowed a recently manufactured minivan, foreign made but supposedly for “Americans,” that was so cramped that even with the seat all the way back my legs were mashed against the dash while driving it, which is nearly identical to the cattle car seating provided by the airline industries of today’s global friendly skies. It has become a challenge to keep my peace on an expensive flight, especially a long one, when I am offered crackers and pop while painfully crammed into a profit sized seat with the safety belt “securely fastened” to the airline's liking. This, of course, is after I am thoroughly searched and frisked as a potential terrorist, because I wear suspenders that beep when I pass through the metal detectors before boarding the plane. I simply refuse to take them off, as they recommend, since they are an integral part of my clothing -- thank you! -- without which I would spend a great deal of time pulling my pants up.

Yet, with so many people subsidized these days for their “challenges” such as the economically challenged, gender challenged, mentally challenged, etc., perhaps a class action lawsuit could be started for the “foot” challenged people of the world. I can read the banners of the thousands of limping protestors marching on Washington DC, “Workers with strange size feet, unite!” Being forced by the newly enacted Bigfoot Antidiscrimination Act, stores everywhere in complying with its very costly regulations would be forced to provide every size shoe and sock under the sun, which translates into higher prices for everyone, which is only their reasonable duty as consumer patriots of the world corporate order. NAH!, the manufacturing world would just produce more junk and at much higher prices, besides creating a whole plethora of new bureaucratic agencies that would take more of our taxes to enforce "the rights of this newly designated minority."

I thank God, however, that I managed to find a boot company in Spokane that produces top of the line, custom logging boots . . . at $350 to $450 a pair, which seems reasonable to me given their high quality materials and workmanship, not to mention that they like all small businesses are beleaguered by the “unseen” inflation factor of our rapidly expanding dollar and growing regulatory demands. We all know from experience that in the Wal-mart economy of today, one gets what one pays for, which at “everyday low prices” is nearly always dispo-junk from China that falls apart, nearly as soon as one uses it. No, I have learned that true bargains come from high, lasting quality and skilled workmanship, something rare in the all-you-can-eat buffet of the global economy. I long for the local economy of the local community, where the tailor and cobbler are not antiquated storybook characters, but valuable producers in a biblically agrarian culture blessed of God. --- The Missouri Rev

Journal Entry -- October 14, 2006

I thank the Lord. With a recent record breaking 93 degrees set at the beginning of October, we are finally showing signs of a serious seasonal cool down. We had our first freeze of the year two nights ago, for which I am most grateful, as it means the end of this year’s ticks, an event quite welcomed when thrashing through the thick Missouri woods hunting the elusive turkey. This also means it’s time to undertake the annual hibernation of the three box turtles that reside in our garden. This process involves burying them about 2 ft under the ground in a deep plastic trash receptacle where they have been covered in tightly packed layers of sand and straw and then waterproofed with a lid that keeps the moisture out. We have found it to be a truly amazing event to behold each April when we dig them up and find them alive and raring to go, like witnessing a resurrection from the grave. God’s ways never cease to amaze me.

Yesterday a number of us attended the annual Living History Festival & Small Farmer’s Reunion held in Lathrop, a small Missouri town about 25 miles northwest of us (pictures are at the end). Back in the heyday of the “Missouri Mule,” Lathrop was home to Guyton-Harrington Properties, an enormous mule business spread out over 4,700 acres of land owned and rented, which included 18 barns and facilities with 150 workers, that accommodated 50,000 mules in 1918. The US Army was their biggest customer, who bivouacked their long-eared soldiers in enormous barns, some as long as a quarter mile! Today the only clue there is to this little known historical fact are the few restaurants in Lathrop that use the word mule in their name and the local high school that uses the mule as their name and mascot.

The festival is sponsored by the Antique Car, Tractor, and Steam Engine Association of Lathrop and uses their large club facilities, which includes a chow and meeting hall, numerous equipment sheds filled with antique machinery, a small arena, and several antique buildings moved on site – a train station, church, schoolhouse, and barn, to name a few. So even though the festival’s main emphasis is draft animal farming and related home & community occupations, there were several of the club’s prize exhibits being shown, largely their many working steam engine tractors and vehicles, which I greatly enjoyed, particularly the ones that run a sawmill. Every now and then they would let off a loud steam whistle, which would get some of the mules a heehawing.

There were several demonstrations in butter churning, apple butter making, quilting, corn shucking, hand log sawing, sorghum lasses’ making, rope making, candle making, printing, blacksmithing, wheelwrighting, and saw milling, not to mention several plowing demonstrations. There were the usual venders selling genuine handcrafts, fake crafts made in China of cheap plastic, hats, tools, food, and assorted sundries. One vendor was selling genuine birch beer, a refreshment akin to sarsaparilla, which we found quite delightful. There was even a vendor from India hawking his cultural trinkets, which I can only chalk up to the rampant “multiculturalism” running roughshod throughout our nation.

In the true reality of the New Covenant and New Creation there are only two types of cultures in this world, the Christian culture of the regenerate and the pagan monoculture of the unregenerate. Multiculturalism as a religious, multi-path road to peace and harmony is an age-old myth that has always led to death and destruction, for it is nothing less than the idolatry of polytheism – the worship of multiple gods and not the One True God. As interesting and varied as fallen man’s cultures may be, history is heaped with their carcasses, as well as those of apostate Christians. No matter how incredibly longsuffering He is with all, the just and the unjust, God is not mocked. Only those things that cannot be shaken remain under the righteous dominion of King Jesus. I know, I may have stepped on a few cultural toes, but whose kingdom and crown rights do we press anyway? What does it mean to be the salt of the earth and light of the world if the Lord’s church, the pillar and ground of truth, is not the final standard for all of culture for all of mankind?

We attended the festival yesterday, a school day, so there were over 50 yellow school buses filling the large parking lot, which brought in over a thousand public school students. By noon many of them were laughing and running around with a colorful teardrop (skin decal) skillfully placed exactly between their eyes. I wonder which vendor sold them this godless tattoo? How many lobotomized Christian parents were even aware their children had this pagan religious symbol put on them? Do they even care or understand the significance of this seemingly harmless fun (1Thes. 5:22)?

There were advertised several demonstrations in Native American Indian cooking, but all I could find next to a large teepee skeleton and a smaller covered teepee was a concession stand for some national association of Indian tribes that was hawking cheese nachos and other “native” food items. There was, however, one rather weight challenged “native” American Indian fellow decked out in full Indian regalia who was teaching a small group of students about Indian customs and dressing traditions. My eyes could have deceived me, but if this guy was a native American Indian than so is the queen of England! Perhaps he is one the neo-Indians of today’s blended culture since there are so many “neoites” in the virtual pagan world we live (and I am not referring to the rare neopian crystal found in the mythical land of Maraqua). Well, I’d better get back to the festival or else I will end up getting sidetracked writing a thirty page diatribe on the cultural realities of Christ’s present reign from His throne in Heaven and what happens culturally when His people obey His Gospel commission to teach the nations to obey all His commandments.

My favorite of all offerings at the festival were the many free wagon rides powered by beautiful teams of draft Missouri Mules, and Percheron and Belgian draft horses. They not only pranced around the festivities, but they gave rides out to a nearby field where draft animal teams and ancient tractors were plowing. I was thrilled, not only with the beautiful teams and their skillful drivers, but with the fact that I met a very close friend and associate of our Amish mentor who happens to successfully breed draft Missouri Mules, something we are very interested in, and he lives about thirty-five miles from us! Ah, the blessed providence of the Lord. Art and I will likely be heading up to his farm next week, Lord willing.

Before ending this lengthy post with some pictures of the festival, I’ll mention that we are working on finishing the final preparations in getting Sam & Sadie home. Our Amish friend will likely be coming down soon to help us with them, for which we are most grateful. He says he’ll be bringing some pictures of Sam & Sadie when they were young. One can’t have a proper wallet without a few a baby pictures, now can we? God bless – The Missouri Rev.

Pictures

Sam & Sadie from last spring (new pictures will be coming shortly).




Sheba & Georgia, a beautiful and well trained team of black draft mules (from the same Percheron mare). They were bred, raised, and trained by Phil Cox, a friend and associate of our Amish friend.




A team of three seasoned mules plowing the field across from the festival. The driver mentioned that he had closed in behind an old Farm-All tractor that had bogged down while plowing and had to advise the operator to speed it up.



A team of white Percherons and in the back ground a Belgian team.



A team of prancing dappled Percherons giving a wagon ride.



A large Belgian draft horse, the type we will likely breed to develop our own sorrel draft mule stock.



A medium sized mule is turning a sorghum press. You may not see it, but there is a man on his knees behind the press carefully feeding the sorghum stocks into it while keeping his head below the crank arm, a properly crooked tree branch. Normally, the draft animal turning the press does so without a human lead, but this is the first time for this young mule. His teammate in a nearby stock trailer was really heehawing up a storm because he couldn’t join him.



These fine Missouri men have been working the lasses’ cauldron since 7 am (about 5 hours). It takes about ten gallons of juice to make one gallon of syrup. Throughout the whole hot, steamy process they skim the foam off of the top, which is bitter. When the syrup is just right they cut the heat and quickly pull it aside. Then, in celebration and much deserved relief, they break out the biscuits and dip them into some of the golden ambrosia set aside, the cook’s reward and prerogative.