A different kind of famine

We all know how dependent farming is on the weather. I have fond memories going back to 1967 when I was working on a farm during my summer holidays from university. I was helping to draw in silage; the weather was beautiful, the sky was blue, everything was working well, and I was enjoying the break from studies.

At that time, the only ‘cloud on the horizon’ was the fact that there was a war in the Middle East, known today as the Six Day War. But the lovely weather in Northern Ireland made silage work a pleasure.

However, the sky is not always blue, and the weather can often be a problem in agriculture. Do you remember last spring? The winter had been quite wet, and so was the spring which followed, so much so that there was considerable anxiety over getting ground ploughed and crops planted. There was even talk for a while about a shortage of potatoes later in the year.

Now, I don’t know any details about how commercial potato growers have fared since then, but I do know the difficulties I had with the potatoes in my own garden! I was impatient to get going, but the seed potatoes just had to stay in their boxes in the garage, and I eventually got them into the ground a few weeks later than I would have normally. They have, however, come on well and have caught up, so we were able to enjoy a good crop of British Queens from half-way through July.

While I don’t expect a potato famine in Ireland this year, the truth is that we know very little about famine in this country now. Of course, we are all aware of the Irish Potato Famine in the mid 1800’s, and we are all grateful that nothing like that has happened since, but it is a very different story in some parts of the world. At present, severe famine already exists, or at least threatens, parts of Ethiopia, Somalia, and Kenya.

The Bible recalls times of famine in the more distant past. For example, we read of seven years of famine at the time of Joseph (Genesis 41), and three years in the time of Elijah (1 Kings 17). While we don’t experience a famine of food, there is another kind of famine in our country today.

The prophet Amos spoke in his day of “‘a famine of hearing the words of the Lord’” (8:11). Then, the people had turned away from God, and would not listen to His word through the prophets, and so they became more and more ignorant of God’s word. As a result, they starved spiritually.

Probably most homes in our land today have a Bible, but it seems that for too many, the Bible is largely an unopened and unknown book, and there is still, as Amos wrote, “‘a famine of hearing the words of the Lord.’”

But “‘there is a God in Heaven’” (Daniel 2:28) who has given us His word, and one day He will be our judge. Surely wisdom would tell us that we should seek to know Him? One way to do this is to read His word, and pray that God would help us, by His Holy Spirit, to understand what is written, so that we might come to know His son Jesus - the only one who can deal with our sin, and give us the hope of eternal life.

Rev Dr Kenneth Patterson is a former GP who was ordained for the ministry in 1990. He retired in 2013 after 19 years as Minister of Castledawson and Curran Presbyterian churches in South Derry. Having worked on farms during his student days, before coming a minister, as a hobby he now enjoys restoring vintage farm machinery.

If you would like to talk to someone about any of the issues raised in this article, please email Rev Kenny Hanna, PCI’s Rural Chaplain at [email protected] or call him on 07938 488 372.