Good Friday

Good Friday evening and I just got in after a long day on the farm. Cleaned the big loafing barn out, the manure pack was around three feet deep and that’s kept me busy the last couple of days. But its clean now and the cows can come back in if need be.  The jobs are piling up, as they do every year at this time and they won’t let up for a while either. But that’s OK with me cause winter drives me half nuts!

As far as faith matters go, well I’m dwelling on some stuff for a long time now, many months. The answers are coming, sometimes in very unexpected ways. I guess I do most of my duties at church all right, but there’s always something eating at me that never goes away. The countryside is pulling me, strongly. Never was a city type person, just always wanted to farm. Still do, nothing changed in that department. In fact I think I’ve been pretty successful spending most of my life farming one way or another. Not money wise, I mean spending my life doing it. Maybe that’s one reason I like our little church so much. A person doesn’t have to put on a show and make believe that your something special. Just come as you are. Works for me!

For 18 years now I’ve received the Christian Ranchman paper from Fort Worth, Texas. I’ve wrote about it many times here, either in posts or comments. That newspaper is so very special! I just love how it has stories and testimonies of regular farm and ranch folks who love Jesus! For 18 years that ministry was my favorite. Still is!

So, I ramble on about it, all tired out from a hard days work. All this writing over the last few years about country churches, about circuit riders, about farmer/preachers, about cowboy preachers. This is a love of mine. And this is what will continue to be written about here. This is where ministry is pulling me. To the simple folks, not to fancy churches. I’m simple so I figure that must be where I belong!  Blue jeans for dress clothes. Good jacket is denim, a Wrangler in fact. Got cowboy hats everywhere, some beat up, some clean. Got cattle coming out of my ears. Got two pickup truck and ones a flatbed to boot! Don’t own a pair of shoes, just have boots, mostly western boots. Don’t own a tie, just have western bolos. In other words, I don’t fit the typical way people look at someone in ministry. Get more of a thrill going to a rodeo and listening to the opening prayer than sitting in a big city church that has supposedly arrived. Sitting in a salesbarn I get the feeling that someday I’ll preach in one. Nope, this ain’t the usual call the way I figure it.

So I’d better get myself cleaned up tonight and get into the Word of God for a bit. Between farming/ranching and faith a feller gets pretty tired sometimes. This is one of them times.