Journal Entry -- November 14, 2006

Thank You!

I want to thank “anonymous” for the tip on the Carolina brand boots. They do, indeed, make a true 14 4E logger’s boot. I found a dealer about 40 minutes away that carries them and had them order in a pair for me to try on. After walking around their store for an hour and finding them reasonably comfortable, I purchased them. It remains to be seen how they will hold up, but I saved hundreds of dollars over a custom made pair.

An Unnerving Experience

It’s been two weeks since I last posted, though it feels more like a month. Much has happened including a five-day severe toothache for me which culminated in the first stage of a root canal, “the extirpation of the nerves within the pulp chamber,” a whole other adventure. Two weeks ago I was making good progress in getting back on my feet from a major bout of the flu when I thought it prudent to get a tooth problem repaired, though it was not giving me any serious problems. I scheduled a visit with a local dentist and had the work done. Three days later an incredible toothache came on within the repaired tooth which pretty much took me out of commission for the remainder of the week, though I did make attempts in helping the men work towards finishing the preparations for Sam & Sadie. I tried all kinds of pain remedies, many which came through “googling” the Internet in a pain induced fog, but none abated it. Although it took the edge off of the pain, the worst by far was the prescribed pain medicine, which side effects were terrible and took more than a few days to overcome. My wife’s simple remedy did the most to temporarily diminish the pain. She had me soak my feet in hot water which caused the blood to rush to them, thus alleviating some of the pressure surrounding my raging tooth nerves. The problem with this remedy, however, is that you are stuck, as one cannot move about with one’s bare feet planted in a large tub of hot water.

The Lord is not inclined to make our way smooth and comfortable for us in obeying His calling, as I believe it is His will that we triumph, by His sustaining grace and mercy, through our difficulties and tribulations, and not in merely taking them away, as we so often wish. More so, the Lord uses these times of pain and sickness as a way to clearly show us just how frail we humans are and how easy it is to be put on the sidelines, so that we can have empathy for others who suffer. Without the Lord’s continual sustaining grace and love we can do nothing and He upholds and enables us far more than we realize. He is not only the Savior of our souls for eternity, but He saves us daily . . . blessed be the name of the Lord.

Wanted: Biblical Pioneers

With the original Christian foundations of our nation long destroyed and paganism reaching the zenith of its corrupt dominion, I believe we have reached the point in our nation where an overhauling reformation is vitally necessary, and, Lord willing, is next on the horizon for American Christendom. I am for one quite hopeful this is so, as the biblical alternative is national destruction, and rightly so, since no nation has ever survived the wickedness we have committed, not one, without a whole hearted repentance by the Lord’s people, as was frequently the case with Israel, and usually then only a remnant came through, as the rest perished in the blindness and hardness of their hearts. I know this sounds overdramatic and gloomy for Pollyanna Americans who believe that no matter how evil things get America will somehow come out on top with their personal kingdoms of paper wealth and “insured” security still in tack.

The testimony of the Scriptures speaks otherwise. For if God did not spare the angels who sinned, but cast them down to hell and delivered them into chains of darkness, to be reserved for judgment; and did not spare the ancient world, but saved Noah, one of eight people, a preacher of righteousness, bringing in the flood on the world of the ungodly; and turning the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah into ashes, condemned them to destruction, making them an example to those who afterward would live ungodly; and delivered righteous Lot, who was oppressed by the filthy conduct of the wicked (for that righteous man, dwelling among them, tormented his righteous soul from day to day by seeing and hearing their lawless deeds)— then the Lord knows how to deliver the godly out of temptations and to reserve the unjust under punishment for the day of judgment, and especially those who walk according to the flesh in the lust of uncleanness and despise authority. They are presumptuous, self-willed. They are not afraid to speak evil of dignitaries (2 Peter 2:4-10).

Things are not hopeless by any means, either. For the testimony of the Scriptures are just as sure in this matter. If My people who are called by My name will humble themselves, and pray and seek My face, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin and heal their land. This is not ancient, wishful poetry that makes good verbiage for a Christian refrigerator magnet. This is the answer to our dilemma, as it has always has been for the Lord’s people throughout history. There are no other solutions, nor should there be, as God has proven His faithfulness time and again in saving His people out of the dreadful jaws of pagan captivity and destruction through bringing them into repentance and reformation of their ways (read Nehemiah 9 very carefully). We are in dire need of true reformation and it doesn’t come through national elections, para-church lobbying, and weekend Christian retreats. It begins with you right where you stand, in the local church and community of believers, in the difficult trenches of the spiritual battle that rages in the local neighborhood, not Washington DC.

This type of culture changing, ground breaking reformation requires biblical pioneering, the type that is toilsome, often lonely, dirty, hard work and certainly not popular or pain free. The type where one must leave the shores of personal comfort, security, and ease to cross (metaphorically) the dangerous and overwhelming Atlantic Ocean by true faith, as did a small handful of Puritans in reality when by God’s grace and provision that help found our once Christian republic during an earlier reformation that took place over 400 years ago. I believe there comes a time in every true believer’s life where the Lord sets before them an insurmountable, impassable ocean that is impossible to cross by mere human means and ingenuity, so that He can deliver them from the arm of the flesh that walks by the carnal sight of human planning and outcome based guarantees of “success.” Yes, we are to plan, but by God’s sure compass and promised provision, and not by that which fallen man occupies himself with to the point of incessant worry. Therefore do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ “For after all these things the Gentiles seek. For your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. “But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you.

Either the LORD Almighty is Who He really says He is and will keep His every promise to every generation, no matter their circumstances, or He is a liar. This is what it really comes down to for every believer: But without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him. By faith Noah, being divinely warned of things not yet seen, moved with godly fear, prepared an ark for the saving of his household, by which he condemned the world and became heir of the righteousness which is according to faith.

By faith Abraham . . . by faith Sarah . . . by faith Isaac . . . by faith Joseph . . . by faith Moses . . . by faith David . . . by faith Paul . . . by faith Martin Luther . . . by faith the Pilgrim brothers and sisters aboard the Mayflower . . . by faith Patrick Henry . . . by faith T.J. Stonewall Jackson . . . none of these saints moved on with God by carnal sight and outcome based plans, but by true faith in God, alone. When the Lord bids us to step out of the “secure” boats of our carnal reasoning unto the deep waters of faith, we will either obey Him in trembling trust or we will forever make excuses as to why it is safer to stay in the boat (follow the crowd) than follow Him. “After all, are there not many enormous giants that rule the seas of the world today? We need to be prudent and protect our families and the security we have worked so hard to build for them.”

“We are not able to go up against the people, for they are stronger than we.” And they gave the children of Israel a bad report of the land which they had spied out, saying, “The land through which we have gone as spies is a land that devours its inhabitants, and all the people whom we saw in it are men of great stature. “There we saw the giants (the descendants of Anak came from the giants); and we were like grasshoppers in our own sight, and so we were in their sight.” . . . Now with whom was He angry forty years? Was it not with those who sinned, whose corpses fell in the wilderness? And to whom did He swear that they would not enter His rest, but to those who did not obey? So we see that they could not enter in because of unbelief.

And for our sakes, unless we end up living lives of fruitless unbelief as mere babes living in perpetual fear of giants, the Lord mercifully sinks our leaking boats, that is, our personal kingdoms where we are in control and set the time and place when we feel it is safe to obey Him . . . thus mercifully forcing us to utterly trust Him with our lives in the here and now. This is the cross, the school of Christ where the old man in the boat is displaced by the new man on the water, that you put off, concerning your former conduct, the old man which grows corrupt according to the deceitful lusts, and be renewed in the spirit of your mind, and that you put on the new man which was created according to God, in true righteousness and holiness.

In other words, when a true child of God is frozen on the perilous fence of pragmatism and carnal fear, the Lord mercifully torches the fence and causes him to commit to one side or the other . . . to the one side of faith and trust in Him or to the other of open unbelief, which is far better than fence walking under the treacherous delusion that one can serve two masters in being a friend of this world (James 4:4) and faithful practitioner of its “safer” ways (Ezra 9:12), while also professing Christ as one’s friend (John 15:14-15) while declaring His Word the transcendent and sole standard for faith and practice (Deu. 8:2-3).

[I recently preached a sermon entitled, Crossing the Atlantic by Faith. If you struggle with moving on with the Lord because you are frozen in the headlights of a faithless pragmatism that doubts that there is way to break out of the present dreadful circumstances of the pagan dominion which runs roughshod over us, than this sermon is for you. If you would like a copy, please let me know by sending me an e-mail with your request. Here is the address: TMcConnell@CRCRayville.org.]

History has shown that true biblical reformation comes at a great cost and sacrifice for those called by God to undertake it. In the beginning of a change the patriot is a scarce man, and brave, and hated and scorned. When his cause succeeds, the timid join him, for then it costs nothing to be a patriot (Mark Twain). The person who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal safety, is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself (John Stuart Mill).

Now is the time to sacrifice and build, not amass and consume. The days of finding established Christian communities with solid churches and a thriving local economy have long passed us, though they were the norm in the early days of the American colonies. By God’s will, because of generational covenant breaking, we have been made the working ants of a global economic colony, working cogs within a pagan community, but not in hopeless fate, but in holy anticipation of God’s ever present saving arm to deliver His people out of captivity back into the freedom of biblical covenant keeping. When the children of Israel had been put into captivity by God because of their generational rebellion and idolatry, the same as we have been today, He made this promise to them, which He fulfilled:

For thus says the Lord: After seventy years are completed at Babylon, I will visit you and perform My good word toward you, and cause you to return to this place. For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, says the Lord, thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you a future and a hope. Then you will call upon Me and go and pray to Me, and I will listen to you. And you will seek Me and find Me, when you search for Me with all your heart. I will be found by you, says the Lord, and I will bring you back from your captivity; I will gather you from all the nations and from all the places where I have driven you, says the Lord, and I will bring you to the place from which I cause you to be carried away captive (Jeremiah 29:10-14).

Has He changed that He will not do the same and even more for His people under the New Covenant?

But God, who is rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in trespasses, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), and raised us up together, and made us sit together in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, that in the ages to come He might show the exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.

If the foundations are destroyed, what can the righteous do? Enlist! Become a proactive Christian pioneer. If you desire to be a part of a biblical agrarian community of believers that is committed to reformation and building a blessed future for their children’s children then you better sign up as a ground breaking pioneer for that is where we are today. The common practice of Christian consumerism is coming to end where believers shop for designer churches and ready-made communities like they do houses. The blessing and provision of the Lord is found only when a believer truly seeks first His kingdom and righteousness.

If you truly desire the life of Christian community then you better get prepared to be an integral part in building one. Plan on working at this glorious calling the rest of your life and prepare your children for the same, as it will likely take several generations of difficult reformation to rebuild what we have lost. For many generations we have been digging a very deep pit and we are certainly trapped in the mire at its bottom. It will not be overcome in a night, like sending a package via “next day air” or any other quick solution. Those from among you shall build the old waste places; you shall raise up the foundations of many generations; and you shall be called the Repairer of the Breach, The Restorer of Streets to Dwell In (Isaiah 58:12).

Sam & Sadie Update

In giving an update on Sam & Sadie, we left off with the installation of the cattle panels. We were making great progress when we met to discuss the project, which brought up their water needs. We soon realized that it would not be particularly wise or time effective every time they needed water to drag over one hundred feet of garden hose from the nearest spigot and then have to drain and store it when finished, especially with the bitterly cold weather that comes every year starting in November. We saw that we needed to permanently bring the water to the stall . . . another delay, though vital. We had already determined to put in electricity in their stall, so both of these jobs required digging trenches, one 18 inches deep for about 120 feet and the other 30 or more inches for 150 feet. This meant removing many of the panels we had already installed. First you do it . . . then, hopefully, you do it right. The trencher rental was steep, about $130 for three hours, which we later realized was far short of what it really took. But alas, the providence of God works all things together for our good, including the ineptness of the rental company.

We had no sooner started up the trencher when it began to belch great clouds of black smoke while backfiring flames. It had very little power, so we quickly shut it down. Jeff surmised that the wrong fuel had been put in the “gas” tank by the rental company. We got them on the line. Yup, the main man had put diesel fuel in the gas tank. The designated repairman said he would soon be there and to leave it alone. Twenty minutes later he arrived and quickly revealed his fallen nature in the profanity he made concerning his employer’s blunder. One doesn’t realize just what an incredible blessing it is to work with like-mined brethren in local community until the profanity of unbelief vexes your work and fellowship. After an hour, the tank was detached, drained, reinstalled, and filled.

Since I had just preached on the Scriptures about loving one’s enemy in feeding and giving him drink, I made the facetious comment that perhaps when our enemy runs out of gas we could give him the contaminated fuel we had acquired. Jeff replied that this was not exactly what Christ meant. Just His name mentioned that one time stopped this man’s profanity dead in its tracks. That was a real relief. It appears the Lord got His attention. I believe his name is Tom; please pray for Him. Being a Vietnam vet, he bares the cynicism and hardness so typical of many of them. With our help and using some gas from his and our stocks he soon had the trencher working again We were now half way through our allotted 3 hours and since it was near their closing time, he gave us permission to bring it in the next morning. More so, he said his company would reimburse us for all the gas we used.

We commenced to dig the shallow trench first, which wasn’t too bad, though it was dark when we were finished. Because we had to go under the propane line while working around the telephone line, there were some sections that had to be dug by hand, which Art and I accomplished. After the “Pulaski test,” trench digging makes for a great locator of little used muscles and test of one’s endurance. I made it, though I didn’t realize how hard the work can be. It was now dark and we still had the deeper trench to do. As our early agrarian fathers often worked their fields under the light of the moon, so we realized if we were going to dig it we would have work under the moon’s light as well, though we found a 500 watt photography light to be a far better source of light.


Jeff has just started the deeper run with the trencher and is making good progress at about 31 inches average depth. He had to make two passes to get the desired depth. Art and I cleared the soil along the trench for the second pass.



We soon ran into rock, which Art dislodged with a trusty old digging bar. I continued to clear soil and stack rocks.



Jeff pulls one of the rocks Art has just dislodged. You can see in the upper left corner one of the cattle panels we disconnected at one end and moved aside. We soon discovered that the rock obstruction was an ancient foundation, as we moved into over 3 feet of rich, black loam soil.



After making a 90 degree turn, Jeff heads down the 100 foot homestretch with smooth digging in the wonderful, rock free soil. Things were too good to be true.



As we were heading down the home stretch, Jeff made the astute comment, based upon years of experience, that the last 10 feet will likely end up taking longer than the first 140, which we soon learned was true. We were within 5 feet of finishing when we ran into a long forgotten and well buried concrete foundation that was impassable. We made several attempts to get by it and finally succeeded by making a difficult, curving end-around. We finished at midnight, which was none too soon, as we needed to meet at 7 AM to offload the roofing metal from our flat deck trailer, so that we could leave with it to pick up our Amish friend and the load of white oak we ordered to upgrade the stall. Our moonlight trenching endeavor caused our work day to exceed 16 hours, a blessed one though, as our fellowship was wonderful, even at the end when we were getting more than a little tired. Jeff returned the trencher the next morning and told them that they really only needed to reimburse us for a few gallons of fuel, but they insisted on reimbursing it all. We not only got the job done in a real timesaving manner, but we ended up saving $80!

Lord willing, in the next journal entry I will take up our latest visit with our Amish friend who practices “chainsaw carpentry,” as he calls it. --- The Rural Missourian