I just listened to Jennie Allen’s podcast with Kayla Stoeklein this morning while I was working in the kitchen and I was balling my eyes out the entire episode.
No it wasn’t the onions that made me cry, it was this very hard but very real topic on suicide that was so deeply emotional to listen to.
Kayla’s husband was a pastor, and a father to three boys and despite all the help and therapy he had he suffered from death by suicide.
I realized this is a really heavy subject but it’s likely that many of you, like myself, have been touched by this terrible tragedy. There was a time in my life at such a young age, only sixteen years old, where only by the grace of God did I make it out alive. Every day on the drive home I prayed I’d have the strength to end my suffering. There was one particular tree on a deserted country road I drove by every night. I had seen a fatal accident there once before and I thought “I wish I could just crash my car into it.” But I didn’t. And thank God for that.
I have been praying for what to do with this farm. We are still building and are not yet ready to open it to the public or a mission but I know that it has a purpose to serve. I didn’t know if that was with kids, or women, or veterans, or the church, but I’ve been praying to find the right niche to set my attention to where these gardens and these animals can provide the much needed therapy the world desperately needs. I know I want this to serve our community I just don’t yet know how. Perhaps this deep emotionally realization I had this morning will help set the tone of how we move forward with serving others.
I added a picture of a milking pail to this post because we just brought a fellow farmers Alpine doe home on loan so we can milk her. She’s settling in and I am learning the process and routine of twice a day milking. So every morning and every evening, no matter the weather, I will be making the trek to the barn to be with her in the calm and the quiet and have some time to just milk. It’s a simple task but I can’t help but feel that it is exactly tasks like these, the sweetness of its simplicity, the basic nature of it, that is the best therapy for hard times. I wonder how many would be moved by feeling the wind, hearing the rain drops on the barn roof, watching the trees sway and the sun set on your way back to the house with warm, fresh milk in hand. A reliance you have on one another – basic human nature and our relationship with animals to provide sustenance and company.
Another thing that came about from my listening this morning was why God allows suffering. So many people question this and it took me 35 years and a lot of study to understand the simplicity of the answer. (These listed are taken from Jennie Allen and from a Rooted study through my church Crossroads)
First, Jesus is best known through suffering.
Second, we grow and we get stronger.
Third, it makes us long for Heaven. The more we want Heaven, the more dangerous we get on earth. The more Heaven gets real to us the less this life has to work out just right.
Fourth, our lives leave a mark.
Fifth, we cannot know true love without choice. There is no love without hate, there is no joy without anguish. We must be presented with opposition in order to have the opportunity for our hearts to choose God and choose faithfulness.
I hope this blog posts finds the right person at just the right time. They mentioned on the podcast that 90% of suicide is an impulse decision. They also said, and I think this was an extremely important takeaway, that we must say death by, or succumbed to suicide, in order to release the victim of blame. They did indeed suffer from an illness they succumbed to.
I am deeply grateful for this farm each and every day and how it removes me from the tensions of society, and how I am immersed in beauty that lends to such a healthy lifestyle. I am grateful that God spared me.
Blessings,
Lauren
