Rural people feel at one with the land. When it is healthy and productive, they feel contentment. When the land suffers, as the Prairies have this year, that pain touches the people.
Looking back on a summer that might have been, we remember late snow and excessive rain. Fields, roads and communities were flooded. There was little opportunity to cultivate and seed, nor heat to warm the land and enable growth.
Hay that had to be cut wouldn’t cure. Baling was repeatedly delayed.
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What about harvest, wet spots, lack of drying weather, changes that keep knocking us out of step?
Is this an economic question for producers and those who provide them with services? Of course. Is this a question of survival for those who’ve already hung in as long as they can? Yes.
Creator God, we turn to you in our times of despair and helplessness. You know our plight even before we dare give voice to what is in our hearts.
You are witness to our sleepless nights and rehearsed presentations we plan to give to potential financers. You witness the ways our dreams turn sour and sorrow overtakes us.
The promise is that you will help us look at life in new ways and find hope in the darkest places, but our skepticism overtakes us.
It helps most when we can give voice to our doubts by talking with you, with our families and with our advisers. It is true that each one sees life through a different lens.
Everyone, together, can more easily hold the vision and look forward to each new day.
May our declaration about “next year country” be a statement of faith and may we move forward with wisdom and courage.
Joyce Sasse writes for the Canadian Rural Church Network at www.canadian ruralchurch. net.
