Last week during the NW Vineyard conference at our church a man approached me that I had known from years before. He told me he had a vivid dream the night before. He seemed a bit uneasy and unsettled yet resolved to share what he had seen. He told me that in his dream he had seen me riding a horse at top speed holding up a lantern like Paul Revere. He said that the horse showed signs of being ridden hard as a result of carrying me from place to place as I shouted an alarm of urgent warning. That was the entirety of the dream and he wasn’t sure what it all meant. Somehow he was sure that it was very significant. I thanked him, and in the confusion of the moment returned to my responsibilities of hosting the large gathering at the conference.

 It was nearly a week later before I had a chance to sit down and quietly reflect on all that had happened at the conference as well as the significance of the dream. Nancy’s and my life had been a whirlwind for several weeks as we not only prepared for and hosted the conference of several hundred Christian leaders, but the week before we had celebrated the wedding of our son. (see entry #171.)  

 This morning as I sat in the solitude of our living room praying I was reminded of the dream I was given. Being a pastor that believes in supernatural revelation it’s not unusual for me to receive prophecies, dreams and visions from all kinds of people. Through the years I have observed that much of the prophetic revelation I hear comes to nothing, while some have been amazingly and divinely fulfilled. I’ve learned to sort out true revelation from human expectation by simply taking the words I hear before God in prayer. All this to say that as I prayed about it today, I realized this man’s dream spoke of my life’s quest over the past twelve years to sound an alarm for harder times coming. It echoed the passion I have felt for Christian believers to live more sustainable lifestyles. To be honest I didn’t even know what “sustainable living” meant or encompassed twelve years ago. It was a phrase that hadn’t been widely used before the year 2000. Yet, in 1998 I felt compelled to preach a message to our church warning any that would listen to prepare for the harder days that were to come. Y2K was first being talked about then. Although I didn’t want to be an alarmist I distinctly remember feeling preparation was somehow crucial; not just for that year, but as a new long term lifestyle. I had been afraid of being seen as a fanatic and knew that if I said anything about the potential of the harder days I saw coming many would push back and possibly even leave the church. I fought the temptation to say nothing and carry on with a less provocative and more palatable messages, yet I felt the conviction of the Lord to push through my fears. I began challenging people to get out of financial debt and learn new skills (actually old skills that had been forgotten) of becoming less dependent on commercialized food, energy and water sources. I exhorted them not to simply store food, but to learn the skills of growing and preserving food. I told them that this was not only important for the sake of having food to eat and share with others in need, but also it was about having a more healthy organic choice. Read the rest of this entry »

Recovering from near bronchial pneumonia takes a toll on the healthiest of people.  It zaps a person’s energy and drains motivation to do anything constructive.  After a week of sitting in my chair like a zombie I decided I had to force myself to do something constructive. Looking out the window at the winter landscape reminded me I needed to resist the urge to go out in the cold winter air where I would be sure to relapse.  I needed a mindless project that required little consideration yet occupy me enough to keep me inside by the fire.  That’s when I decided to construct a set of reproduction Plains Indian arrows.   Sounds crazy I know, but our home is decorated in a western motif and it needed a set of framed Indian arrows.   Besides, it was all I had the energy to do at the time.

Years ago I used to enjoy spending winter evenings sitting in front of our old open fireplace chipping obsidian into arrowheads.  It was a hobby I enjoyed to pass the time and after a while I became fairly proficient at it.   I had constructed a bow out of a branch of seasoned Mountain Mahogany and backed it with artificial sinew for both spring and strength. I back twisted hair from my horses tail into a very strong cord to be used as a bow string. It worked well enough and after some practice I became fairly proficient at constructing arrows accurate enough to shoot an occasional rabbits or other small game for the dinner table.  I wouldn’t have wanted to rely on my skills for survival, but I thought if the chips where down and all else failed I could use what I had learned to provide the basic needs for my family.  Learning survival skills such as identifying edible plants, constructing small animal snares and starting fires without modern convinces fascinated my innovative nature. 

Remembering these old skills that once brought me so much enjoyment I decided to see if I could remember how I   constructed arrows out of natural materials. In those days I collected such things as flint or obsidian, animal sinew, bird feathers (usually from road kills) and willow or Rosehip shoots for the shafts.  I even rendered down plants to produce die colors to stripe the shafts. Not having immediate access to most of those things I used what I could find around the place. I used a set of reproduction Flint points that I had bought a few years before. For sinew I resorted to frays of a nylon cord and when all was said and done I was satisfied with the authentic look of the final product.  Nancy wanted to put me in business selling my arrows on the internet of which I didn’t have the time, but after seeing the price of arrows in Indian craft stores in Scottsdale, Arizona a few weeks ago I thought it would in fact be a good way for someone living on the land to pick up a little extra money.

Isaiah 61:3 "...He will give beauty for ashes, joy instead of mourning, praise instead of despair."

Three years ago I sat up awake through the night, staring out my front window at a distant mountain burning from one end to the other. The fire raged so hot that literally hundreds of firefighters couldn’t control it and resorted to becoming bystanders. For miles around, officials evacuated people from their homes due to strong unpredictable winds. By dawn the fire had burned a devastating 25-mile swath that left nothing alive in its wake. The entire butte remained a heap of blackened ash until winter arrived and covered it with a blanket of fresh snow. By the following spring, the snows melted away and the butte transformed into a landscape of vivid colors. Wild flowers covered its slopes and the grass grew longer and greener than I had ever seen. God restored and renewed this beautiful butte with fire.

 While the balance God strikes between mercy and justice is often difficult for us to grasp, it is clear throughout the Bible that God places redemption and restoration as two of his top priorities. Through the prophet Isaiah, God detailed all that the Christ would do some eight hundred years before his arrival on earth. Isaiah 61 contains one of the most famous prophecies, the same prophecy that Jesus quoted when he began his public ministry as recorded in Luke 4. It is here that Jesus stated that he had come to heal the broken hearted, to set the captive free and to bring good news to the poor. It was also here that God explained the Messiah would come and turn ashes to beauty (see Isaiah 61:3). 

 From the ashes of devastation God would bring redemption and restoration. This is a picture of the intent and heart of God. Isaiah prophecies, “The Sovereign Lord will show his justice to the nations of the world.  Everyone will praise him!  His righteousness will be like a garden in early spring, with plants springing up everywhere” (Isaiah 61:11). Out of justice will come a new beginning and a restored garden. But not every doctrine ascribes to honor this perspective of Scripture.

 One common biblical view held by many Christians is that the unrighteous or ungodly will be destroyed by fire along with the earth at the final judgment. This is based on the scripture in 2 Peter 3 where Peter wrote, “Most importantly, I want to remind you that in the last days scoffers will come, mocking the truth and following their own desires. They will say, ‘What happened to the promise that Jesus is coming again? From before the times of our ancestors, everything has remained the same since the world was first created.’ They deliberately forget that God made the heavens by the word of his command, and he brought the earth out from the water and surrounded it with water.  Then he used the water to destroy the ancient world with a mighty flood.” Peter goes on to say, “And by the same word, the present heavens and earth have been stored up for fire. They are being kept for the day of judgment when ungodly people will be destroyed. ” A few verses later he writes, “But we are looking forward to the new heavens and new earth he has promised, a world filled with God’s righteousness. And so, dear friends, while you are waiting for these things to happen, make every effort to be found living peaceful lives that are pure and blameless in his sight.” Some have surmised that this consuming fire could be a result of nuclear holocaust—but who really knows?

 As I overlaid Jesus’ words onto Peter’s writing in 2 Peter 3, it suddenly occurred to me that God used the flood not to destroy the earth, but to renew it. Out of this devastating flood emerged righteous humanity and a restored creation. You might say that Noah, his family and all the animals with him stepped onto a new earth, but in reality it was the same earth. Noah’s flood was an Old Testament foreshadow of a New Testament reality; God’s heart is for restoration, reconciliation and renewal, and has never been for complete destruction in the form of obliteration.  In 2 Peter 3:10, Peter says, “The elements will be destroyed by fire, and the earth and everything in it will be laid bare.” The word translated “laid bare” literally means “shall be found” or “discovered.” Noah found or discovered a new world, even though it was the same physical earth. The word “destroyed” found in 2 Peter, chapter 3 verse 10 in the Greek is eurethesetai meaning “shall be found” or “to discover.” Noah found or discovered a new earth, even though it was the same physical earth. 

 This is important because if the second destruction of the earth is like the first one (only by fire instead of water), the same result will occur. Like the first time, God’s plan is not to obliterate the earth and create a new one somewhere else, but to renew and restore it by fire. Throughout the Bible water and fire have always been seen as agents of purification and refining. The Bible speaks of a baptism of water and a baptism of fire, both of which produce cleansing. Jesus provides a prime example of purification by fire when he speaks of our faith being refined by the “fire” of trials and hardships even as gold is refined by fire (see 1 Peter 1:6-7).

 In the state of Idaho, the Sawtooth Wilderness easily ranks as one of the most beautiful ranges of mountains. I have climbed the alpine peaks, fished the lakes and packed my horses in the backcountry of the Sawtooth Range since the 1960s. After our wedding in 1970, my wife Nancy and I backpacked into these breathtaking mountains on our honeymoon.

 On a recent trip to the Sawtooths, we discovered that most of the forest in the area had become infested with Bark Beetles. Thousands of mature pine trees, primarily Lodgepole pines, were dying and dropping their needles. What was once a breathtaking sight had become a landscape of devastating brown.  Due to the Idaho firefighters so diligently putting out the fires that would normally eradicate the beetles and regenerate life in Lodgepoles, the pines were dying while the Bark Beetles were thriving. At this point, the only hope for the recovery of this forest is a devastating fire that will leave the landscape charred and ugly for many years. Nevertheless, this fire is what will one day turn a sick forest into a thriving one.

God gave us an earth to love, appreciate and care for. He called us to environmental responsibility. In Genesis 9, it tells us that he gave us the resources of the earth for our provision so that we could reproduce and live. He gave us everything on the earth for our use, but not our abuse. Use turns to abuse when we express feelings of entitlement through our actions. When our use of something steps over the line of sustainability it becomes abuse. When we no longer think about the welfare of future generations but only of our own immediate wants, our actions become abusive. Stewardship requires an authentic reverence towards the Creator, something that every true Christian should have. When I hear someone say, “It’s all going to burn anyway,” it makes me think two things: first, that person has missed the heart, motive and character of God; and second, that person is denying the responsibility of creation care or environmental stewardship. The statement, “It’s all going to burn anyway” communicates an absence of Kingdom responsibility, much like the neglectful stewards that Jesus rebuked so harshly in Matthew 24 after he spoke of the characteristics of the last days.  

 The earth is a gift of God, there is none like it and it is the only one we will get. The Bible tells us that there is coming a day that it will be cleansed with fire, but like in the days of Noah it will be renewed and restored. And like in the days of Noah, two things will survive: God’s miraculous creation and righteous, faithful humanity.

Lesson #3 –Makes a smaller footprint for a bigger handprint – Entry #151

Saying goodbye to the Burmese Karen in 1981

Nancy and I chose unemployment and a downsized sustainable lifestyle for a reason.  I’ll admit, it was a joy living in the quiet seclusion of the old ranch for that season of time, but it wasn’t our intention to withdraw from society and live an inward reclusive lifestyle.  We had purposefully made the decision to downsize our life so that we could upsize our impact on the world around us.  Our experience in 1982 (see entries 149 & 150) taught and prepared us for a greater life of outward service. We had seen the broken world first hand and wanted to help make a difference with our lives.   We had also observed many with a heart to do significant things yet unable due to excessive debt load.  Many had lived beyond their means and were owned by material possessions.  We wanted to be in a position of freedom, not in the bondage of financial debt.  It was our goal to learn to make a smaller footprint with our lives by consuming less, owning less and not allowing the possessions we had to possess us. We wanted to express the viewpoint through our lifestyle that we had come into the world with nothing and would leave with nothing. We believed that it all belonged to God anyway.  We knew we were called to be stewards, not only of the land we lived on, but of all the things God cared about, especially suffering humanity.  We wanted to make a smaller footprint so we might be able to make a bigger handprint; the handprint being the imprint of God on the world around us.  It was with this thinking in mind that I eventually wrote the book, “Small Footprint / Big Handprint – How to live simply and love extravagantly”.

Nancy & the kids in a Karen village 1984

Now back to my story.  If you recall from my former blog, this whole adventure started when we felt called to Thailand to help a hill tribe people group called the Karen.  They had lived in Burma, but because of ethnic cleansing by the Burmese government, many had been forced to flee across the border into Thailand in an attempt to avoid mass murder and extreme persecution.  My exposure to the Karen was my first experience with such atrocities up close and personal. Getting the chance to know them and even live among them gave Nancy and me a kind of love that’s hard to describe.   The experience was so life-changing we knew at once that we could never live solely for ourselves again.  Our worldview had been shattered.  In the years to come we couldn’t watch the atrocities in places like Somalia or Darfur without being broken for the people involved. We desperately wanted to somehow help alleviate the suffering.  Even natural disasters such as hurricanes, tsunamis, floods or earthquakes and the pain they inflicted upon the extreme poor challenged us. We could no longer be spectators; we had to get involved.  No longer could I turn my back on things like human trafficking, world hunger, world health or

Teaching English in a Karen village - mid 80's

environmental degradation.  I knew these things where breaking the heart of God and should be breaking mine as well.  We realized that life had much more to offer than to simply withdraw and live for personal security, comfort, and survival.  We wanted to be part a greater cause.

If you want to successfully live a sustainable lifestyle you have to have a vision that is bigger than yourself.  Becoming a social dropout is tempting at times, but in the end it will lead to emptiness.   Nancy and I have tried to develop Timber Butte into a sustainable homestead not to pull back from society, but to add to it. We are striving to become more energy efficient for the sake of future generations.  We are attempting to learn better ways of organically producing food because we know how damaging mass production of factory farms can be to the environment and health.  We care about forestry practices because we have seen the effects of deforestation in the developing world where there is little or no restraints on clear cutting. We care about the preservation of water because we have seen the effects drought and pollution have had in so many parts of the world.  We want our lives to serve as an example for others to follow.

Nancy with African children years later in Zambia

 When I resigned from my job is 1982 I used the time to redesign myself.  I spent time evaluating what I thought was really important and how I wanted to spend the rest of my life.  We decided to put our financial concerns second to the pursuit of a life that had purpose and value.  I decided not to look for a job, but rather for a lifestyle that had meaning while still providing our basic financial needs.  I guess that’s how we ended up in the type of ministry we did. We didn’t want just any ministry, but a ministry that was intent on capturing the heart of God and fulfilling the commission of Jesus to love people and bring healing to broken humanity.  It was our aim to be part of a people who desired to be on the frontlines of suffering humanity, not merely to be content watching it on CNN.

 The third lesson I learned from being unemployed was that it gave me an opportune time to take a new direction and go after the things that would instill a new and lasting passion for life.

Lesson #2 – Less can sometimes give you more – Entry 150

Nancy cooked in the open fireplace

Moving back on the ranch after several months of living in the back country of the Sierra Nevada Mountains felt like luxury. (Read entry #149) Sleeping in a real bed, taking a shower without having to heat the water over a campfire, cooking on a real stove and storing food in a refrigerator that produced normal ice cubes is something that most of us take for granted. It felt good to be home with our pack gear cleaned and stored away ready for the next time.  While we lived in the back country we had not only been making money, but we were stuck in a place where we couldn’t spend it.  We had a small nest egg that could sustain us for another month or two and the relief it gave felt comforting.  The only problem was that living a normal life does cost money without even thinking about it.  Gas for the vehicles, propane for hot water and cooking (and because we lived off the grid it also powered the refrigerator and lights).  Food is always an expense no matter where you live, and of course there are clothes to buy, household goods and things like books for the kids schooling and so on.  It didn’t take me long to realize that I had to keep looking for work.

Thinking about our next move Nancy and I made a decision.  We realized how much we had enjoyed being together as a family over the past several months and decided to figure out a way for me not to go to town in search of a real job.  We knew that in order for that to happen we had to do two things; first, we needed to down size our life and live on a fraction of what we were used to, and second, to find just enough work on ranches in the area to meet our financial needs.  We felt challenged by the idea.

The wood cook stove in old ranch kitchen

Several years before I had built an addition on our small home and in order to make the plumbing work I had added a second forty gallon hot water heater to supply the master bedroom.  The first thing we did was to turn the new water heater off and share our kid’s bathroom shower. Nancy’s kitchen had two stoves in it, one ran on propane gas and the other was a wood burning cook stove.  She decided to do most of her cooking on the wood stove and sometimes in the open fireplace.  The third thing was to cut down on our driving and other gasoline consumptions.   Living and working at home cut our need for vehicles down to nearly nothing.  Previously I had been driving an hour to town six days a week which gouged a huge chunk out of our monthly budget.  I had shot a really nice buck during the reminder of the deer season which supplied us with our meat needs, and our root cellar was still fairly well stalked with canning.  It was amazing how little it took us to live on just by being deliberate in our lifestyle. Not only that, but it was rewarding to feel like you could beat the system of status quo living.   

Snaking out logs for firewood

Over the course of the next few months I got work from three different neighbors who needed things built.  I built two hay sheds for ranchers and a small addition on an older ladies home.  I never had to travel more than five miles to reach the jobs I was hired to do and the work was honestly refreshing and enjoyable. When I found myself in between the small jobs I had been hired to do I used the time to cut firewood.  I harnessed our horse Sunday and spent days on the mountain snaking out pine logs to a place where I could reach them with the old ranch truck.  I cut and split wood not only for our own use, but to sell in town.

That fall, both in the Sierras and on the old ranch was one of the most memorable times of my adult life.  Since those days I have had remarkable experiences ministering in cities and remote villages all over the world, but looking back on that season of unemployment now I realize God used it to prepare me for a radical life of faith he had predestined me to live.  He taught us that living with less in the form of material things would actually enable us to do more with our lives together.

Lesson #1 – Learning to trust God for unexpected provision & blessing – Entries 149

A family trail crew in 1982

In the summer of 1982 I made a life changing decision to quit my job.  It wasn’t easy – in fact it ranked high on the scale of the trauma events of my life.  The choice I made with Nancy’s blessing challenged every logical bone in my body because for the first time I had no plan, I was reacting to what I sensed was God’s leading for our life.  I had been a secondary school teacher for the past twelve years after having completed six years of university work which ended in a master’s degree in administrative education.  Turning in my resignation meant not only throwing away everything I had prepared for and accomplished in the past eighteen years, but the security of tenure, health insurance and a growing retirement fund.  Not only that, it was a job I loved.  It was crazy.

Pat Armstrong with Monty & Mike

I had been sent into the mountainous border between Thailand and Burma by our church to minister to the Karen Hill Tribe people the year before and the experience had changed my worldview and my priorities. I had discovered a greater cause and a passion to use my life in a more meaningful way.   I felt the call to God’s service, but had no idea how I would support my family.  I felt clearly called and had the faith to believe that God would cover our act.  He did – in amazing ways.

 After we had made the final decision I remember finding myself in a mild state of after-shock wondering what I should do next.  Unlike those who are caught in unemployment of the current day recession, my season of unemployment was my own doing and because of it I felt whatever transpired was going to be my own fault.  My emotions were all over the board; one day I would feel confident and courageous in my choice while the next I felt reckless and irresponsible.  Realizing that my resignation was a spontaneous reaction to conviction and passion rather than a well thought through long range plan I wasn’t financially prepared and knew I needed a quick means of paying the bills.   Before I continue I need to say that what we did isn’t something we would readily recommend for others to do, but for us it was the beginning of an amazing adventure I’ve never regretted.  It’s an adventure that we are still living to this day.

Grading out the new trail with Mike

 We were not planning to return to Thailand for at least another six months and I had to somehow generate the finances not only to support my family, but to get us all on an airplane to the other side of the world.  That’s when I learned how faith really works.  When things seemed darkest Nancy and I committed our dilemma to prayer and as a result of it something happened that I never expected or anticipated.  We were nearly out of money, living off our dwindling savings account when our old friend Pat Armstrong called out of the blue saying he needed help building a section of the Pacific Crest Trail near Lake Tahoe.  The Pacific Crest Trail is a hiking trail that stretches from Mexico to Canada along the crest of the Sierra Nevada Mountains of California and the Cascade Mountains of Oregon and Washington.  Pat was a trail building contractor who had been working on the Pacific Crest for years.  I had known him from our days at the College of Idaho and in summers past he had hired me during my two month break to lend him a hand.  Even when our kids were in diapers we would pack into his camps and join his small crews.  His call that summer gave me great relief.

Nancy takes the kids fishing after bringing us lunch

 We drove to the ski area at Squaw Valley just north of Lake Tahoe and unloaded our pack horse out of the back of the pickup. We traversed the ski slopes and climbed beyond the chair lifts until we crested the nine thousand foot ridge above.  Crossing through a saddle we started our descent down the other side until we spotted a meadow a thousand feet below that we figured to be the location of Pat’s summer camp.  The view of the country was breathtaking and I remember feeling a sense of God’s goodness when I realized it would be our home until the fall snows would eventually force us to leave.

Nancy cooks in the campfires smoke

For years I had been meeting up with Pat in remote mountain places, yet I never got over the feeling of relief and accomplishment after locating one of his hidden camps.  In those days there was no such thing as GPS’s, only government topographical maps and Pat’s verbal descriptions of trails, valleys, and streams.   His camps were usually located a bit off the beaten path in somewhat secluded places where there was a fresh water spring and plenty of good grass for the livestock to graze.  The camp that year was one of his best.

 During the weeks that followed we worked long hard days.  He had taken a contract with the U.S. Forest service to construct about ten miles of new trail through this high rugged country and wanted to finish it while weather permitted.  Much of the proposed trail traversed through large granite outcroppings, over a steep pass and in places through heavy stands of brush and timber.  Because we were in a designated wilderness area all the work was required to be done without the aid of motorized equipment such as chain saws.  We were however granted a special blasting permit to aid us in places that needed to be shelved out through solid rock.  Our greatest assets were Pat’s two mules, Monty and Mike who worked in harness pulling a heavy ditching plow and a spring tooth harrow.  The harrow was used to pull up smaller rocks and roots, loosening the earth so that the plow could then be used to grade the trail bed level.  I loved the work, and always felt a sense of satisfaction seeing what we had accomplished at the end of every day.

 During the days Nancy cooked for our crew and homeschooled the kids in camp.  At noon she and the kids would hike or ride down the newly built trail and deliver lunch and words of encouragement.  She would always comment on our accomplishments which was of course good for our male egos and motivated us to work all the harder the rest of the afternoon.

Katie serves pie and coffee to a tired crew

 At the end of every day we would arrive back in camp tired and filthy.  Nancy started heating large buckets of water over the fire in the late afternoons in preparation to fill the hanging canvas shower bag at the edge of camp.  It felt wonderful washing off the days dirt with a hot shower revitalizing us for another recovering evening in camp.   Sometimes Nancy and Katie would bake pies in the Dutch oven using the fires coals which added to the joy of eating together.  After dinner we lounged around the fire recalling the events of the day and retelling stories of the past adventures we had had together in other camps.  Sometimes we took turns reading out loud from books like the Tales of Narnia which sometimes lasted long into the night.  After catching the mules and horses that had been hobbled in the meadow for their evening graze and securely tying them for the night we crawled in our tents grateful for the invention of folding cots, Thermal-rest mattresses and comfortable down sleeping bags. 

Pat washes off the dirt after a hard day of trail work

That fall was the first time in my life that I had ever witnessed the Aspen trees turn to their vivid yellow and orange colors in the crisping high country air.  In previous years I had always been in the confines of classroom walls unable to experience the mountains so late in the year.  It was a small thing, but I distinctly remember getting tears in my eyes thinking of the privilege I felt.  

Brook packing his pony Dusty

 We left the mountains and returned to our ranch sometime in early October, but in the months that followed we watched God do miracle after miracle providing us with the means to pay bills and keep food on the table.  We not only survived financially, but we spent rich times together as a family. We learned to live on much less and because of it we gained much more.  My first lesson from being unemployed was that God is faithful.  When I was most fearful of not being able to meet my families needs He provided us with a very special kind of provision that money couldn’t buy; He provided us with an experience that enriched our lives with memories none of us will ever forget.

I’ve resisted writing about our latest projects here at Timber  Butte because up until now most everything we’ve done has had some sustainable purpose.  The agriculture projects, building the barn and other outbuildings, the animal projects, the energy and conservation projects have all had sustainable merit but lately we have invested a lot of energy doing things simply for the joy of satisfying the creative longings of the hearts.   

If you’ve been following our blog you may recall that we chose the sight for our home on a granite knob for primarily three reasons; one because it was central on the property and has a vantage point where we can keep our eyes on the livestock; second, because we wanted to situate the house and yard on solid ground where there was good drainage and thus no danger for flooding, and finally because it was the least fertile ground on the eighty acres allowing us to use the better ground for grazing and hay production. This was all great until it came time to do a little landscaping which we have dedicated much of this past summer to.   

Nancy loves flowers around her home and we both really like grass. Grass not only provides a wonderful fire barrier, but it keeps things cooler in the summer and cleaner in the winter.  Up until now we have been surrounded by a yard of decomposed granite which is constantly being tracked into the house.   A good deal of the summer has been given to putting in watering systems, pouring hundreds of feet of concrete curbing  to hold top soil in and building flower beds.  Our good neighbors Craig and Joan again came to the rescue by  giving us three dump truck loads of decomposed cow manure to enrich our granite soil.

Although these projects have taken up the better part of our summer vacation time it hasn’t seemed worthy enough to journal about when the point of my journaling has been primarily focused on sustainable living.  That is of course unless you consider that art projects are an essential part of sustaining the creativity that God has implanted into every human spirit.

Nancy loves the sound of running water.  She has always wanted to live near the sound of a creek or stream, something that living on top of a dry granite knob hasn’t accommodated.  There are two small seasonal creeks on the Timber Butte property but both of them babble far out of earshot from her kitchen window.  For this reason I decided to construct a small cascading waterfall that would run down the side of the root cellar into a catch pond hidden in a flowerbed below.  We gathered large flat thin slabs of lichen covered granite which I arranged in such a way that the water could fall from one to the next.  This not only looked natural, but created the soothing sound of a cascading stream that could be heard from the kitchen window. It was more of an art project than something built for utility value, but sometimes you just have to do things simply to satisfy the creative longings of the heart.

For us Y2K served as a prophetic warning for harder days ahead.  I didn’t scoff or dismiss the warning like many, but rather asked some hard questions about the complacency of our lives – questions like would we be ready if there was a collapse or even a change in the affluent American lifestyle we have taken for granted for so long?  During this time of reflection Nancy and I seriously examined our lives which brought about a  startling realization of just how dependent we have become on the systems of commerce.  For us it was a time of awakening knowing that if the economy collapsed, the market hiccupped or even if there was social calamity due to natural disaster or a terrorist attack, we would likely be in survival mode overnight.  The truth of our condition frankly shocked us into action, not only in our personal lives but in the activity of the church we pastor as well. 

As a pastor I began to teach on all the biblical examples of leaders who had prepared their people for hard times.  Men like Joseph who stored grain in Egypt in preparation for seven years of drought and famine, and Hezekiah who prepared Jerusalem with a water system and supplies to sustain itself while under siege from its enemies.   During those days we offered classes on sustainable living, teaching skills like growing and preserving food and purifying water.  These were foreign ideas to many people in the church who felt that preparation for Y2K was a fanatical reaction to a conspiracy theory (and I would agree that many of their concerns were justified due to all the voices of fanatical reactionaries who were confusing the issues.)  For many, many others the call to preparedness resonated as a responsible idea.  It was then that we started our organic vegetable garden that now produces 25,000 pounds of produce each year for the poor.  It was then that we built the Barnabas Center which operates as a food pantry and free medical clinic serving our community twice a week.  It was also then that we developed our C.A.T. team (Compassion in Action Team) that has faithfully responded to national disasters across the nation.  C.A.T. sent a team of eight to twelve people every single week for six months to serve in the disastrous aftermath of Katrina and later responded to the floods in Iowa and the hurricane clean up of Galveston, Texas in 2008. As a result of a partnership that was developed for Y2K with the Red Cross in 1999 we were able to send one of our trained staff personal to work in N.Y City after the crises of 9/11.  The preparatory work for Y2K was not in vain but ended up blessing literally thousands of people.

In our personal lives Nancy and I decided to organize ourselves for the uncertain future we felt was on the horizon.  It was then that we made plans to work towards what is now our Timber Butte farmstead.  It took nearly ten years of sacrifice, hard work and what we now know was the miraculous hand of God, but we managed to accomplish our goal to live a more sustainable life.

Y2K was a prophetic wakeup call to many who listened and chose to respond.  Because of my experience with it I was motivated to write the book Small Footprint / Big Handprint – how to live simply and love extravagantly which has served to help many others pursue a more simple and sustainable lifestyle.  Ampelon Publishing has also produced a video series for small groups who are willing to evaluate their life situation concerning these matters.

This morning I was reminded of the Proverb that says, “The path of the righteous is like the first gleam of dawn, shining ever brighter till the full light of day”. (Proverbs 4:18)  I was taking a walk right before dawn and happened to glance back at the homestead Nancy and I set out to build two years ago.  It reminded me why I felt so incredibly tired. 

Four years ago I had taught an eight week series at the Vineyard entitled “A Biblical Pursuit of a More Simplified Life” which later inspired our book “Small Footprint / Big Handprint- How to live simply and love extravagantly“. The book challenged people to simplify their lives so that they might come to a life position where they could increase their effectiveness and impact on the world around them.  At the end of the book I challenged people to make a seven year plan for their lives; a plan to get out of debt; economically, emotionally and spiritually so that they would be free to invest in more meaningful life endeavors.  I challenged people to dream and to act on their dreams.  I reminded people that they didn’t get into the encumbered situations that they found themselves overnight and they wouldn’t get out of them overnight, but with planning, prayer and diligent efforts they could experience freedom.  I also said that to achieve a life of simplicity it would take really hard work.  The simplified life isn’t a life of sitting in a rocking chair, but a life that brings satisfaction and fulfillment.  At first, a life of freedom will require really hard work.   

After teaching the series and writing the book Nancy and I decided to take our own advice and three years later everything changed, but not without some major sacrifices.  As I sat on the hillside this morning gazing back at our new home I recounted the last two or three years of challenges and accomplishments.  It helped me to realize that I was tired for a reason and that everything we had gone through both good and bad hadn’t been in vain. One thing I have learned in life is that nothing worthwhile ever comes easy. A fruitful life requires inspired vision, strategic planning, a deep conviction of faith and lot of sweat equity.

As I looked back I realized that two years before the ground that our small ranch now sat on had been nothing but a bare granite knob. During that time we had closed two escrows as a means of generating the resources needed to build Timber Butte. We had cut a road, put in fence lines, rock walls, a barn, a hay shed and chicken coop.  We had established a large vegetable garden plot, cut and baled hay for two seasons and had worked with Cliff Robbins as his construction company built our home. During much of the construction we lived in a seventeen foot travel trailer in the horse corral. We had canned and preserved food, built a root cellar, erected a windmill to aerate our fish pond, planted a small orchard and set up irrigation systems to water it all.  Having only one day off a week from my real work as a pastor of a large active church in Boise we used nearly all of our vacation days to keep things going.  I built in the heat of summer and in the snow and rain storms of winter and spring. During that time we established the ministry of RE:FORM, wrote a new book about the authentic Christian journey called  ”Rooted in Good Soil” and started the Timber Butte Homestead WEB site.  Not only that, but in the past year we had gone through some really difficult personal family crises that constantly took us to our knees asking for God’s mercy.

 This morning as I sat on the hill looking back I began thanking God for all he had taken us through and all he had done believing that his vision for a more simplified life was now within our reach. The proverb said, “The path of the righteous is like the first gleam of dawn, shining ever brighter till the full light of day”.  In faith I believe that the day is becoming brighter even to the full light of day, and that the pain and the tribulation we have experienced will allow us to be used for a greater purpose than we can now understand.

Maybe times are changing, or maybe it’s just me that’s changing.  It might be the folks I’ve been relating to lately or things I’ve been reading. I’m convinced there is change in the air – a renewed hunger and value for the reinstatement of the American small farm lifestyle. 

When I was a kid I can’t remember any of my friends saying, “When I grow up I want to be a small acreage farmer.” Everyone wanted to be a doctor, lawyer or fireman or policeman. No one esteemed the thought of working the land for their livelihood. The ideal in those days wasn’t to move to the country, but to abandon the labor intensive lifestyle of the rural farm for the suburbs and the lucrative job markets of the city. Values changed and with them the American dream of owning small productive acreages of farmable land was abandoned by many of the baby boomer generation. Thousands of family farms were discarded and sold, no longer being passed on to the next generation but merged into massive corporate farm operations or transformed into sprawling metro subdivisions. Small farms were being lost forever, rapidly becoming unavailable and out of financial reach to a second or third generation who might have recaptured the vision and the desire to naturally and organically work a 100-500 hundred acre farmstead.  Something of great value was rapidly becoming lost; a livelihood, a lifestyle and a means to life itself. 

The topsoil of America in places like the Great Plains and central California was once the richest and deepest of any in the world. For over 150 years it had been tilled, being passed from one generation to the next producing crops that were responsible for feeding much of the hungry world’s population. It was shortly after WWII that the American farmers gradually shifted from traditional organic small farm methods for technologies which incorporated the use of chemical oil-based fertilizers, pesticides, fungicides and herbicides. Chemicals increased production but robbed the land of the living organic matter that once contributed to the soil’s purity and richness. As a result the land gradually lost its ability to naturally produce crops without the continued use of synthetic additives. Something had to change; there was a need for a cultural movement to reclaim what had been lost. 

The flicker of an awakening has been sparked; a cultural craving for a simpler, more natural lifestyle is emerging. I feel it and see it in publications, food co-ops, and local farmers markets. It’s a hunger growing out of the grass roots of the American consumer, a desire for healthy food and a passion to recapture the art form of organically raising it. 

The failed promise of finding meaning through monetary gain is being exchanged for livelihoods that bring fulfillment. Just as a true teacher teaches purely for the satisfaction of influencing lives, and artists paint or musicians perform to express inner passions, the true farmer farms. Not so much for the value of the crop, but because of valuing the art form of seeing the land producing life-giving life. For the true farmer, tending the garden is a means of tending the soul. 

Though there has been a generation that skipping the passion for the land, a new generation is arising that must be equipped and allowed the chance to pick up where their grandparents and great-grandparents left off. There must be a revival of “The Future Farmers of America” where computer games are forgotten and work ethic is reintroduced. Where the land’s value is realized more in the richness of the soil rather than the money it might make.

It is the responsibility of the government, the schools and the church to not only empower these values and train the emerging generation in the skills needed to accomplish them, but to creatively provide the resources and opportunity to reclaim a lifestyle that is rapidly being forgotten.

Sometimes life gets so busy that it’s easy to forget to take time for simple pleasures.  Ever since I’ve been a young man in my 20’s I have enjoyed using my horses in harness pulling wagons or buggies.  There is a certain peacefulness and satisfaction driving a horse-drawn buggy down a quiet country lane even at a time in history when it’s no longer considered a viable means of functional mobility.  

The other night Nancy and I were eating dinner on the back porch with our son Brook when two un-muffled dirt bikes went screaming down our country road disrupting the peace and solitude of the evening.  Thankfully this doesn’t happen too often here, but the harsh noise felt out of place, obnoxious and audibly abusive in the context of an otherwise perfect summer evening.

The experience motivated me to get our buggy horse out of retirement and take a short cruse in a more aesthetically acceptable way down the country lane.  After hitching old Dusty to a spring cart I trotted past our rural neighbor’s farms and houses in an attempt to counteract and maybe even heal the nerve damage inflicted by modern technological advancement. 

Horses and buggies have a way of being an antidote to the rattled nerves of many country dwellers.  However, because of the effort it takes to train a horse to safely pull; not to mention the hassle of having to harness and hitch it every time you decide to go anywhere may seem like more of a pain than the efforts worth.  For me, driving horses has always provided a special pleasure and a feeling of tranquility, especially on cool summer evenings.

Our insurance agent of twenty years sat at our kitchen table helping us formulate a defensive plan against the threat of losing our homeowners insurance due to the remoteness of our Timber Butte Homestead and the looming danger of fire in a place where there is no fire department. We always knew that it would be up to us to defend our place against brush and grass fires at least until the Burial of Land Management (BLM) or the National Forest Service fire fighting crews managed to get here. Living in the country as we have for so many years has always provided this stress and responsibility, but this was the first time our homeowners insurance had been in jeopardy. Our agent, who has become a friend through the years, told us that after the horrendous fires in California the year before the rules for brush clearance and the costs of premiums had radically been increased in outlying regions. The thought of losing our coverage altogether was a scary proposition. For this reason we have tried to go the extra mile taking preventative measures.

One of our greatest threats is dry lightening which commonly  plagues southern Idaho at the end of every summer.  Over the past six years of living in this area we have experienced three or four narrow escapes with dangerously close summer fires. Some years the landscape gets so dry that any spark could set it ablaze. When conditions are right, especially when hot high winds are blowing through with dry lightning storms it stimulates a certain kind of tension on the residence here that many folks couldn’t fathom. This past week these dangerous storm conditions have passed to the north of us every evening. Nancy and I have sat up late watching the lightning strike the dry hills in the distance over and over again, wondering when the horizon might begin to glow with hot uncontrollable flames. So far no great damage has happened, but it is a constant reminder to do our diligence mowing grass, disking weeds and developing an emergency water delivery systems.

This year we planted a green belt of pasture on the west side of our home due to the fact that most storms move from west to east. We purchased a “brush hog” mower that runs off the power takeoff of our tractor, which has been an excellent tool for cutting weeds and brush back 200 feet from our living area. I have run our weed eater up and down our lanes and in places that can’t be reached with the tractor, and we have been developing a fire hydrant system that pumps a 2-inch head of water from our pond to the yard. In addition to that we installed a backup electrical power source for our house that is capable of running our well in the event that the power goes out during times of severe weather or fire. We still have more to do, but we have really been trying to do our diligence knowing just how devastating fire can be.

This morning we woke up to a wonderful down pour of rain which is not only refreshing, but has relieved the stress of the dangerous past  weeks of prime fire conditions.