Whether you call our obligation and calling to tend God’s earth “stewardship” or “Creation care,” it’s easy to feel like the concept is a little vague. This is especially true when it comes to producing food.
So I encourage you to watch this video of a webinar hosted by Food Animal Concerns Trust (FACT) to get a sense of what Creation stewardship looks like on a small scale. In the video, Kirsten Robertson details how she creatively found natural solutions to replace the chemical dewormers she had previously been using on her goats and sheep at her family’s 10-acre farmstead in South Carolina.
As you’ll see, Kirsten brings both an engineering background and extensive grazing experience to her situation. I believe you’ll enjoy the thoughtfulness and logic of her presentation’s structure while also appreciating her tenacity and values. Please enjoy.
There are several things that struck me about the story of Kirsten’s creative stewardship journey.
The first was how it occurred to her to study how grazing animals in nature generally avoid dying from parasites.
In my interview with John Kempf, he shared one of his favorite Bible passages – Job 12: 7-10 That passage especially resonates with Kirsten’s story.
The passage reads: But ask the animals, and they will teach you, or the birds in the sky, and they will tell you, or speak to the earth, and it will teach you, or let the fish in the sea inform you. Which of these does not know that the hand of the LORD has done this? In his hand is the life of every creature and the breath of all mankind.
How often do our systems of producing food and even living itself come out of careful learning from Creation? They should.
The second was how Kirsten learned as she went. She didn’t have all of the details of her new systems in place when she stopped using chemical dewormers. She had to make adjustments. New insights came to her as she proceeded. Her faith and persistence were rewarded. Creation stewardship is a lively, interactive endeavor. It builds our wisdom muscles.
Another thing that stood out to me was how the characteristics of specific plants, like black locust and chicory, were helpful allies to her. What a wonderful example of how knowing the “players” in Creation is valuable and fascinating. I encourage you to launch into the study of Creation as a lifelong pursuit.
You can’t help but notice that Kirsten’s approach was complex. She made the farmstead landscape more complex in terms of layout and vegetation management. This is a far different from relying on chemicals while ignoring the factors that made the parasite infections happen in the first place.
The chemicals-dependent approach that she moved away from is a microcosm of our dominant food and farming system. Our tendency is to create “simple” industrial approaches built on our chemistry and engineering prowess without caring about the impacts of those approaches on our neighbors and Creation. We need humility to learn from Creation. We need to consider its needs and patterns.
Perhaps this is why the Bible teaches us that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. When we work with Creation, we should remember that God is looking over our shoulders and observing whether reverence for God is in our hearts.
And what I ultimately responded to in Kirsten’s story was the joy and life that emerged from it.
Stopping the use of the chemical dewormers allowed dung beetles to return with benefits for the soil. Diversifying her homestead’s landscape attracted other wildlife as well.
And that changed the direction of Kirsten’s life. She was once close to giving up on their farmstead. By learning from Creation and creatively applying its lessons, she ultimately found her enjoyment of life there resurrected.
