[Faith-talk] Daily Thought for Wednesday, September 11, 2013

[Paul]

Hello and good day to you all out there in cyberspace land once again.  I hope that your day is going well, about to begin or went well, depending on where in the world you happen to reside.

As we are all too aware of, this is the anniversary of the attacks on the World Trade Center, the Pentagon and who knows where else the third plane would have gone? Try as I might, I couldn't find any article in my magazine collection to bring you today, so you'll just have to put up with what I was able to find.  However, before I begin, I'd like to share with you my recollections on that fateful day.

I was listening to radio station WOR  in New York City when, in the process of getting dressed for the day, I heard about the first plane.  Clad only in my undies, I ran out to the living room from the bedroom to tell my mom about it.  Perhaps like me, she didn't believe it, but events would prove that we were hearing the unvarnished truth.  Another observation I made was that radio stations in the Baltimore area, even those that play heavy metal music 24/7, actually broadcast (horror of horrors) the service from the National Cathedral in Washington DC as well as carrying wall-to-wall coverage and giving what seemed a million answers for the attacks.  Eventually all of this got to me and I went about doing other things.  However, one heartening event after this whole incident was that I was able to use my ham radio rig to contact a fellow ham on the Avalon Peninsula in Newfoundland, Canada, and between us, we were able to "patch" together loved ones who had to land at Gander with their stateside relatives.  His name was Addison Williams, a Grand Banks fisherman by trade, who unfortunately lost his life in Afghanistan several years later.

So much for my observations about 9/11/01.  Now to the story in question.

Rick Bernstein is a writer living in the very rural community of Freeland, Maryland, just south of the Pennsylvania state line.  He presents us today with his article entitled "A Novel Way To Serve The Hungry," and this was subtitled "Give Away the Farm," rendered as follows:

"Now what, Dad?" my daughter, Katie, asked.  She was slumped behind a table laden with corn, green beans, tomatoes and lots--I mean lots--of zucchini.  "For Sale: Fresh Garden Vegetables," read a hand-lettered sign.  She and my boys, Gregory and Daniel, had spent the day flagging down cars in front of our semi-rural house outside Baltimore.  Now the summer sun was setting, and they hadn't even made a dent in the vegetables that seemed to burst out of our quarter-acre garden.  "We can't eat all this," Katie declared.  "Do we just throw it away?"

Actually, I'd been asking myself that exact question long before my wife, Carol and I got the idea to set the kids up with a roadside produce stand.  You could say it was the question of my life.  I worked downtown as an investment analyst for a bank.  But what I really loved was farming.  Maybe it was my ancestors, Polish farmers in New England's Connecticut River Valley.  Maybe it was because I felt cooped up behind a desk.  All I really wanted to do was get outside, get dirty, and make things grow.  Problem was, I had no farm, no real experience, and I certainly didn't have the money--it it takes millions--to buy the hundreds of acres of land and equipment required to turn a profit in today's corporate food economy.  So I stuffed my dream down and indulged my farming fantasy by running a hand tiller through our garden.

Next morning, I loaded boxes of potatoes, beans and corn into the trunk and drove to work.  A few months before, my office had organized a successful volunteer day at a Catholic homeless mission called Our Daily Bread.  Maybe they'd want the vegetables.  I pulled into an alley and knocked on the mission's back door.  A man opened.  "Can I help you?" he asked.

"Um, I've got some produce in my trunk," I said, realizing how strange that sounded.  The man's face immediately brightened.  "Fresh produce?" he asked.  I nodded.  "From my garden."

He bustled past me to the trunk and ran his fingers through the green beans.  "These are beautiful," he said.  "I'm Raymond, one of the cooks here.  Usually, all we get are castoffs from supermarkets--not in the best shape.  Our guests will love these."

I helped him carry boxes into the kitchen and again sensed what I'd felt my first time there--a bustling, a pervading goodness.  Volunteers from various churches were preparing food and talking.  I heard laughter from the dining room.  I wasn't a churchgoer, but this felt nothing like any church activity I could picture.  I asked Raymond if I could come again with more.  "We'll take anything you've got," he said.

The trips became part of my routine.  Their effect on me, though, was anything but.  I had a great life--a wonderful life, terrific kids, rewarding career--but I felt something was missing.  Seeking more, I picked up the Bible.  Over the next year and a half, I read it twice through.  I knew what was missing.  God.  I became a Christian, and my life, especially the garden and my love of farming, took on a whole new meaning.  Jesus said, "For I was hungry and you gave Me something to eat... I tell you the truth, whatever you did for the least of these brothers of Mine, you did it to Me." These words blew me away.

One night, unable to sleep, I nudged Carol.  "What is it?" she mumbled.

"We're not doing enough," I said.

She sat up.  "Meaning what?"

"Meaning, I'm wondering if we should take our savings and buy a small farm."

Carol was silent a long time.  Then she looked at me.  "If you really believe this is a call from God, I'm all in."

Our real estate agent showed us a 42-acre farm in Freeland, Maryland, an expanse of rolling hills, beautiful fields, a spring-fed stream, and a two-story farmhouse.  The farm was almost 200 years old, its original owner, a man named George Hampsher, buried in a Baptis churchyard half a mile away.  Carol pulled me aside on the porch and said, "This is the place!"

Our first season was a true adventure.  We had little equipment and even less experience.  But then I learned my mentor in a work-related leadership program in Baltimore was none other than the executive director of the Maryland Food Bank.  He introduced us to the Mid-Atlantic Gleaning Network where we met people like Gloria Luster, an elderly woman of modest means who helped bring fresh produce gleaned from farmers' fields to needy people.  It turned out that the church we joined, Hereford United Methodist, was full of people--even the pastor--who'd grown up on the farms.  And there were plenty of farmers in the surrounding area--one of suburban Baltimore's last holdouts against sprawl--to tap for advice and used equipment.  One farmer joked he'd sell tickets to watch the city slickers flounder.  But folks helped anyway.  Soon we'd cobbled together equipment and a group of dedicated volunteers, including a couple named Matt and Sandy Leininger, a retired firefighter who grew up nearby named Dan Millender, and a retired trucker and farmer named Roger Thompson.

When it came time to harvest, Gloria Luster corralled cars full of West Baltimore people, and the food banks sent guests and church volunteers.  Youth groups arrived from towns we hadn't heard of.  The farm filled with scampering kids and sweating adults, everyone talking and laughing, digging potatoes, picking beans, and loading trucks bound for food banks.  Standing at the top of a rise, watching Dan Roger, Matt, Sandy, Carol, and the kids, I could hardly believe what had happened.  God had taken my farming fantasy and turned it into something so unexpected.

That first year, we planted just a couple acres.  Two acres grew to four, then eight.  This year (2008), First Fruits Farm celebrates its fifth anniversary as a nonprofit.  We've nearly doubled in size, cultivating more than 62 tillable acres.  We've grown and given away over a million pounds of fresh produce in the last four seasons.  I still commute to my investment firm for the income to support our farm.  But the suit comes off the minute I get home.  I pull on my jeans and, if it's cold, my coveralls and head out to the barn.  Maybe it's winter, and I repair equipment with Wes Krock, a commercial airline pilot who's become a fixture at the farm, often arranging his schedule around the crop cycle.  Or it's spring, and I take over planting where Dan left off that afternoon.  Or it's harvest, and I get a few rows done before Carol calls everyone to dinner.  We never know quite who's going to be there till the food's served.  We bow our heads and give thanks to God for His grace and many gifts.  For the farm.  For dreams come true.  And for the deep, solid truth that giving is the greatest gift of all.

Man, but what a story with its lesson that, as long as you follow God's leading (and really follow, not just say ou will), that unexpected things can and do happen.  Some observations about several places mentioned here.

The church mentioned in the article does exist, and not far away from there is an old-fashioned diner called the Wagon Wheel that serves breakfast, lunch and dinner at affordable prices, and is the food good! The Catholic mission called Our Daily Bread is just a few blocks from where I used to work in Baltimore, and in 1988, as part of a community service project, those from the hospital who wished could go there and do whatever they could.  It was a bitterly cold winter, but I stood outside and cheerily greeted people, telling them that there was hot food inside and that it was delicious.  It's run by the Franciscans.

And now until tomorrow when, Lord willing another daily thought article will be presented, may the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob just keep us safe, individually and collectively, in these last days in which we live.  Your Christian friend and brother, Paul