The Pastor’s Piece, Pastor Kevin Cernek, Chaplain – October 5, 2024

FCFI

October 6, 2024

With all this nice weather, my wife and I decided it was time to finish up the garden for the year. We picked the few remaining tomatoes, and the peppers, turnips, carrots, and green beans. We pulled all the plants out by the roots and loaded them in the truck for the burn pile. I got the ladder out, and climbed as high as it would take me and reached out as far out as I could possibly reach, and picked the last of the apples and dropped them one at a time to my wife, who was standing below to catch them and gently place them in the baskets. I got the roto-tiller out and discovered it was out of gas because the last person I loaned it to brought it back empty. I filled it up and tilled the garden. My fall tillage is done. My wife has dutifully been canning all the produce. The pantry is full of tomatoes, beets, beans, peaches, apple sauce, and carrots. We are blessed.  “Let us fear the Lord  our God, who gives the rain in its season, the autumn rain and the spring rain, and keeps for us the weeks appointed for the harvest,” (Jeremiah 5:24).

I’ve been chatting with a few of my farmer friends around the area and they report the harvest is going well. Yields are down a little from last year and prices are terrible. But they still go out there year after year and feed the world. One farmer told me how he was moving his equipment from one field to the next and the rim on his combine broke and he had a flat tire in the middle of the road. And there it sat while they waited for someone to come and weld the rim and then fix the tire.

That reminded me of a couple of times when we had breakdowns in the middle of the road. One night a few years ago, we were working late into the night. It was the last load of the night and as I pulled out of the field onto the road with a full grain cart, one of the axles broke and the whole load went down right in the middle of the road. The auger would still extend, but it was now so close to the ground that it wouldn’t reach over the side of the truck. We had to get an auger and set it up and unload the cart into the auger and then into the truck that way. We had to get vehicles with flashing lights, barricades, and people to direct traffic through the ditch and around the equipment. We ended up spending about three extra hours that night finishing up.

Another time, I was hauling loads into town using 500 bushel gravity wagons. Two of them in tandem makes a pretty big load. As I approached the elevator and began to turn left into their driveway, an axle on the front of the wagon gave way. The wagon crashed to the pavement and about 100 bushels of grain went over the front and side of the wagon. Again, we had to divert traffic and get a tractor and an auger and another wagon and shovels to transfer the grain and clean up the mess. One never knows what will happen next during harvest, but one thing we know for sure – something will happen. 

Last week we had an outdoor community prayer gathering in South Wayne, Wisconsin. About 70 people came out to participate in the Scripture reading and prayer time. We prayed for the upcoming election, for the people of our nation and the healing of our nation. We also prayed for peace in Jerusalem and for Israel. It was a beautiful afternoon and a wonderful time together with God’s people.

I hope you are planning to vote. Following is my voting strategy: I am voting, not for a man or a woman, but for the principles on which this country has stood since its founding. I am voting for Constitutional government. I am voting for a strong and viable military. I am voting for a vibrant economy. I am voting for the right to keep and bear arms. I am voting for the freedom to worship. I am voting for a national recognition of the founding of our nation on Biblical principles. I am voting for the ability for anyone to rise above their circumstances and become successful. I am voting for my children and grandchildren to be able to choose their own path in life, including how and where their children are educated.  I am voting for our borders to be open to everyone who enters under our law and closed to everyone who would circumvent or ignore the law. I am voting for the Electoral College to remain in place, so that a few heavily populated areas do not control the elections. I am voting for a Supreme Court that interprets the Constitution rather than rewrites it. I am voting to teach history, with all its warts, not erase it or revise it. I am voting for the sanctity of life from conception to birth and after.

Voting is the power we have. But it’s only power if we use it.

(Kevin Cernek is Lead Pastor of Martintown Community Church in Martintown, Wisconsin).