AdAgrA 2019: True Success

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AdAgrA: Adventist Agriculture Association

Morning Devotional

Darren Greenfield

Devotional

Dear Father in heaven, we are grateful to be here.

We're grateful for your work in our lives.

We're grateful that in the morning is a special time to connect with you and to be ready to face the day.

Thank you, Father, for the many blessings that you pour out on us and for your desire to teach us and instruct us and to bless us in every way.

Please, Father, this morning, I don't have the ability to communicate well, but you do.

And so I pray that through me you will communicate what you want to be said and that it will bless everyone here.

So I kind of titled this morning what I'm presenting Beyond Deist Farming.

It's kind of a strange title, but what is the definition of a deist?

We kind of are familiar with what a deist is from William Miller, who was a deist.

It's basically the belief that God has created the universe but remains apart from it and permits his creation to administer itself through natural laws.

And as I've thought about it, it's very easy for us to approach our farming endeavors as a deist, because a deist basically just works with the laws that God set in motion and created, and we are to study those laws.

In fact, in the book Education, we can't have success unless we pay attention to the laws that are involved and that compliance with the laws governing each is the condition of success.

So it's very important that we understand and we work with those, But does it just stop there?

Does God have more that he wants to do that goes beyond just the scientific realm?

There is a movement out there and I'm going to talk a little bit about it, but is there a supernatural dimension or a dynamic to agriculture that most people are not aware of?

There is out in the world, there's a practice called biodynamic farming.

How many of you have heard of that before?

I'd watched a few presentations on it and it kind of seemed like there was something strange about it.

I didn't really know what it was, but it didn't all add up to me.

So I did a little research into it and As I became knowledgeable about what it was all about, it's really amazing that I believe it's a counterfeit to what God really wants to do through his people.

Biodynamic agriculture is a form of alternative agriculture very similar to organic farming, but it includes various esoteric concepts drawn from the ideas of Rudolf Steiner.

He initially developed it in 1924, and it was the first of the organic agricultural movements.

It treats soil fertility, plant growth, and livestock care as ecologically interrelated tasks, emphasizing spiritual and mystical perspectives.

Biodynamic agriculture lacks strong scientific evidence for its efficacy and has been labelled a pseudoscience because of its over-reliance upon esoteric knowledge and mystical beliefs.

I don't know if you've heard of some of the things.

1 of the presentations that I heard from—there's a school in New Zealand that teaches agriculture and it's biodynamic-based.

Part of their pest control was to—if you have an animal that's eating on your crop, you take a male and you sacrifice it and burn it down to ashes and take those ashes and sprinkle it over your field and then the pests won't come.

You think, well, how on earth does that work?

There's a lot of real strange stuff that goes along with it and that's just a small part of it.

Where did Rudolf Steiner get his information?

By the late 1860s, Rudolf Steiner had seen his first ghost.

Many years later, he revealed that as a kindergarten age boy, a female specter appeared to him in the waiting room of a railway station.

He claimed 1 of his father's female relatives had killed herself on that very same day.

From this moment on, Steiner believed he was able to communicate with the spiritual realm, where not only external trees or external mountains speak to the human soul, but also the beings that live behind them.

Later in life, he would not surprisingly urge his followers to read to the dead.

So the biodynamic system was essentially delivered whole in 1924, and Rudolf Steiner, a self-professed clairvoyant and occult philosopher from Austria, who conceived of biodynamics during his telepathic visits to the realm of the spirits he claimed existed behind our material world.

Today if you go online and you Google biodynamics you will find that there are products available.

Notice that it says on the bottom of the bag, made from an untapped source of power and majesty.

And in California there's quite a movement into biodynamics.

Not only was Rudolf Steiner a proponent of biodynamic agriculture but he initiated a large educational system.

The first ward of school opened in 1919 in Stuttgart Germany and a century later that the number has grown to 1, 150 independent Wardorf schools, 1, 800 kindergartens and 646 centres for special education located in 75 countries.

There are also a number of Waldorf-based public schools, charter schools, and academies, and home schooling environments.

And comparing that with our Adventist movement, they claim they're the largest independent educational system in the world, but apparently we operate 8, 500 schools in over 100 countries in comparison.

So could it be that Steiner's message and system is a counterfeit of God's message about true education?

It's very fascinating to me that as you look at the very timing of when it came into existence, that what was happening in the Adventist church at that time?

The Adventist church was going through educational reform.

Our schools were starting to bring agriculture and industry and more Bible and so on.

So there was a reformation that was happening and the power of that reformation was so much that I believe the devil was trembling in his boots.

He raised up a counterfeit movement just like the Counter-Reformation back in Martin Luther's time to try to stop the influence and to divert those who would be interested in the true into something that was false.

So where might the fallen angels who Steiner communicated with have gotten their knowledge of agriculture?

In the book Patriarchs and Prophets, page 50, we're told that the angels were the husbandmen who under God educated Adam and Eve to cultivate the soil and to care for the fruit trees provided in great variety for the use of mankind.

It took place in the Garden of Eden, right?

And so they were taught, Adam and Eve were taught by angels how to cultivate the soil, how to farm.

And we're told also that Adam had themes for contemplation in the works of God in Eden, which was heaven in miniature.

So they were teaching Adam and Eve in Eden how to cultivate the soil.

They probably did it in heaven because Eden was a little miniature of heaven.

Ellen White and her visions, when she was taken to heaven and she saw the temple and so forth.

So heaven is a real place that has real soil, that has real, just like, well, better than this earth, but It's not some kind of spiritual realm where these things don't exist.

And so the knowledge, I believe, that the angels had of agriculture was from heaven.

And so these fallen angels, I believe, must have had that knowledge from their time in heaven before they were banished from that place.

So what is the difference between the counterfeit and the genuine?

Both methods have been communicated through spiritual means.

In the laws which God gave for the cultivation of the soil, we're told in the Spirit of Prophecy, he was giving the people opportunity to overcome their selfishness and become heavenly minded.

So there is a redemptive dynamic to the true that the counterfeit does not have.

So God had a dual purpose in teaching agriculture, agricultural practices.

It was part of a life-transforming experience.

And if these laws were followed, what would be the results?

Adam and Eve lost Eden and because of their sin, the land was cursed.

Yet if God's people obeyed his requirements and followed his directions in regard to tilling the soil, the land would be brought back to a prosperous and beautiful condition.

Men were to cooperate with God in restoring the diseased land to health that it might be a praise and glory to his name.

And as the land they possessed would, if managed with skill and earnestness, produce its treasures, so their hearts, if controlled by God, would reflect his character." And I believe that's the key component.

The purpose of education, the purpose of our Christian experience is to reproduce the character of God in us.

Agriculture provides a means for that to happen.

I believe that's where the genuine shines out above the counterfeit.

So what are these laws that have a dual result?

Well, time does not allow to go through all of the biblical laws, but there are some key ones that I think are very relevant as we think about our agricultural endeavors.

In Deuteronomy 24, 19-22, it says, When you reap your harvest in your field, and forget a sheaf in the field, you shall not go back to get it.

It shall be for the stranger, the fatherless, and the widow that the Lord your God may bless you in all the work of your hands." So why did the Lord say he will bless you in all the work of your handsî?

If you leave something for the poor and the stranger.

So in other words, you care for others in your work and those who are less fortunate.

And so there's 1 of the laws that would change the heart because naturally we're selfish and we want to hoard things to ourselves and God wants to change that.

In Exodus 34, 21, 6 days you shall labor, but on the seventh day you shall rest.

In plowing time and in harvest you shall rest.

And so in the Sabbath, in keeping of the Sabbath, we actually have time to spend with our Creator to get to know him so that we can reflect his character.

If we just work, and agriculture is so demanding that we would work 7 days a week like a lot of farmers do just because the work never ends.

Alan Seiler

Dear Father in heaven, we just want to thank you for this opportunity that we get to gather here.

And Lord, I just pray that the words that I speak would bring grace to the hearers, and not only to the hearers, Lord, but to my own soul that needs it.

So I want to talk about what I call, or have borrowed from another speaker, but will use it for my own purposes, the rubber band approach.

And The idea is that in order for the rubber band to fly, you gotta put pressure and strain on the bands to store up energy, and then obviously you release it.

And the farther you pull it back, obviously not to the point of breaking, the farther the rubber band, or the more energy at least, that the rubber band has to actually travel the distance.

And so I'm going to talk about 3 points where farming has either stretched me and how that's been a benefit or I've received the benefit of how it's stretched others.

So the 3 points are it helps us ask better questions.

Point number 2 is it puts us in a better place to reach out to people struggling with the same problems.

And point number 3 is it reveals to us our need of outside help.

So point number 1, This is a point from our own farm.

When we started, well when I started getting interested in growing, well no let's back up a few years there even on that.

My grandfather helped us put in our first garden.

It did well the first year, but the next year, we just didn't really know what we were doing.

The next year, it didn't do so well because we didn't know what we were doing.

After that year, it sat idle for about 8 years as a weed patch.

The only utility that it had was it was a halfway point on a Frisbee golf course that we had going around our property.

And you have to hit the fig tree in the garden, and then from there you go and hit the other tree.

And that's the utility that it had for us for about, yeah, for about probably 8 years or so.

But after that point I started getting interested in it again.

But you see, we never bought this land thinking that we were going to grow on it.

So it was about 2 acres of 6 to 12 inches of rocky topsoil with bedrock underneath.

And so over the next 8 years of actually growing there, we meticulously took rock out of about a quarter acre of land.

And then on top of that, the soil was kind of out of whack to begin with.

And I can't say that we really ever got anything balanced there, per se.

It was just a struggle, kind of all the way through.

It's kind of depressing to a degree to think back on that.

But 1 thing that it did help us with is it helped us ask the right questions.

And what I mean by that is the reality is that in farming, you have to suffer to a degree in order to even know the right questions to ask.

And knowing the right questions to ask is half the battle.

I mean usually I hear, I mean that's why you guys are here, right?

That's why you're going to classes to hear from people that have gone through these problems because they've been knocked down so many times that they're able to share their experiences so that you know, hopefully, the right questions to ask.

But regardless of whether you hear from someone else, the reality is that you're going to have to be knocked down yourself to a certain extent inherently.

And so embracing that aspect of the journey and not looking at it as a drudgery but as an opportunity to be able to ask the right questions and This kind of moves to my second point it puts us in a better place to reach out to people struggling with the same problems.

Now I'm going to kind of come at this from a receiving end of things.

My crop consultant that I work with is Whitmar and he's not here this morning, But there's another guy by the name of Bill Brush that is a water and soil consultant down in Modesto, California, that we've worked quite a bit with.

And Whitmar and I actually went to an intensive of his a few years ago in St.

Louis, he has people, there's a room of about 80 to 90 consultants from around the globe, everywhere from New Zealand to Germany to France to, you know, just all these different places.

And, you know, they're coming to listen to this guy because he's made a lot of mistakes.

He's like, you know how I knew not to do this?

It's interesting that we spend so much time, effort, and money to go to hear people that have made mistakes.

But the reality is that We know that there's something about making mistakes that eliminates the vibrato in someone and puts them in a position where we're willing to listen.

And so I think that's probably 1 of the biggest things.

I know that Imian mentioned this the other day as far as why are farmers so trusted.

I think it's because they've been knocked down so many times.

And I haven't gone through the whole experience, but just listening to this guy, Bill, he's been in the industry for 50, 60 years.

And there's just a realism about him, a genuineness that you just don't get without having that experience.

We're talking about soils here, but we're talking about life.

And I think that moves to the third point here, okay?

And the third point is it reveals to us our need of outside help.

And I think this is pivotal, is that when you're stretched, when you're stretched like the rubber band, it reveals things to you about yourself that otherwise, in the absence of that, wouldn't be revealed.

I have grown a lot, and I have to honestly say that there has been some times on the farm where you sometimes doubt if you're a Christian.

You go through things and it's like, is my religious experience only as good as my best tomato crop?

And if it's as good as my best tomato crop, it's pretty bad at this point.

Now we're learning, but the reality is that this last year we lost 80% of our production to blossom in rot because of some unforeseen, well, we're still working on that.

But I believe it's water quality issues and how that affects calcium uptake.

And anyways, we're going to go off on that.

It really makes you question your sincerity and your religious belief.

I think it's a good thing that we're put in positions where we honestly have to reevaluate because as 1 person says, the unevaluated life is not worth living.

And that is, yeah, it's really interesting how that works.

But not just to the point of where we evaluate, but that it shows us our need of outside help, and namely in a religious experience it shows us our need of outside help.

And namely, in a religious experience, it shows us our need of Christ.

And that's something that I'm not saying that you can't learn this in other industries, but farming really has brought this home to me in different ways, because there's so much outside of your control.

Sometimes you just don't feel like going out to your field because there's so many things going wrong.

Or is it because you don't want to face who you are as a person?

And this is kind of my closing thought here.

I just, It just hit me a few months ago, actually, reading in the book of Revelation, chapter 3, latter end of chapter 3.

Most of you know it's Christ is talking to the church of Laodicea.

And the thing that keeps Laodicea from being hot is not because they're not doing ministry, and it's not because they're not doing certain things.

If we want to get out of Laodicea, we have to see our need, but in order to see our need, what does Christ say?

The aspect of the ability to see our need requires rebuke, sometimes from plants, and chastening, which is not a pleasant experience, but it's needful.

And I'm not sure where to go out, because I know where it talks about, buy of me gold tried in the fire, and white raiment, and eye salve, so that you might see the idea is that, well, the righteousness of Christ is the gold tried in the fire, and the raiment is his, and the eyesalve he gives to us.

I find it interesting that even Christ, to give us those righteousness, he says gold, but he doesn't just say gold.

John Dysinger

Our dear Heavenly Father, we thank you for the Sabbaths.

We thank you for the opportunity to come and worship you, to learn from you.

Lord, I just pray that you would guard my lips.

May I not say anything that would not bring honor and glory to you.

Give me the thoughts that I should say And may those who hear, hear what they need to hear.

So I've entitled my devotional thoughts, Experimental Religion.

I don't know, some of you may have seen the book we wrote of our testimony of God's leading us into agriculture.

And what I want to share with you this morning is that the story continues.

And the story can be the same for any of you as you learn to trust God's promises.

So I just want to share a quote and let me just say, you know, to me it's neat because I feel like I've heard a similar theme through our whole time here.

I feel like the Lord has put on the hearts of different presenters something that he's trying to get across to his people.

Experience is knowledge derived from experiment.

How shall we know for ourselves God's goodness and his love?

The psalmist tells us, not hear and know, not read and know, or believe and know, but taste and see that the Lord is good.

Instead of relying upon the word of another, taste for yourself." Isn't that a beautiful definition of experimental religion?

You know, we don't have time to go into the story, but back in 1994, my wife and I felt the Lord impressing us that we needed experimental religion.

You know, it's all good in theory, But what about in reality?

And so we embarked on a journey that continues to this day.

We wanted a personal testimony of God's goodness and love.

You know, it's great to know the doctrines and theories as people have been sharing, but what is God doing for you?

And so, we said, Lord, what do you want us to do?

We will go anywhere, do anything, as long as we are confident that you're leading us.

You know, we don't want to be led by our own ambitions and desires.

And so, as we were exploring, again it's a long story, but as we were exploring what God would have us to do, we were studying the Bible, we were reading the Spirit of Prophecy, and there was just so many promises for those who worked the soil.

You know, Proverbs, he that tilleth his land shall have plenty of bread.

If you till, you will have your needs supplied.

After the flood, the Lord promised, while the earth remaineth, seed time and harvest shall not cease.

Even in climate change, seed time and harvest is not going to end.

And you know there's so many Ellen White quotes that gave so much encouragement.

If the land is cultivated, it will, with the blessing of God, supply our necessities.

We are not to be discouraged about temporal things because of apparent failures, nor should we be disheartened by delay.

We should work the soil cheerfully, hopefully, gratefully, believing that the earth holds in her bosom rich stores for the faithful worker to garner.

Have you gotten that idea through this conference?

There's a lot more than food in the soil.

With proper intelligent cultivation, the earth will yield its treasure for the benefits of man.

The mountains and hills are changing, the earth is waxing old like a garment, but the blessing of God which spreads a table for his people in the wilderness will never cease." You know, I can still remember when we first started feeling a calling to farm.

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