Counting Sheep

Counting on Men

"As for you, My sheep, the sheep of My pasture, you are men, and I am your God," declares the Lord GOD. Ezekiel 34:31

My wife and I had the occasion to visit the NYS Sheep and Wool Festival in Rhinebeck NY today. I remembered to bring along my Olympus C-2040 digital, which has served me well for the better part of six years, and snapped this photo to share with those that traverse this electronic landscape.

It was a fine, cold, cloudy, windy day and after a serving of sausage & bean soup on the midway we set about to gazing as the sheep were grazing and penned, shown & shorn. A wonderful time spent with my wife as we discussed our future hopes of agrarian expansion in our lives. As a bonus, upon embarking toward the noted P.T. Barnum Egress, we found a tent selling spun wool at a fraction of the offerings throughout the grounds. The intended purchase of our visit as we seek to live simple and practice frugality in our Family Economy.
[A Topic I Will Later Revisit]

Secure in her purchase of 10 skeins of wool which she will fashion in to a couple of gifts to be given this holiday season, she’s a wise gal (Proverbs 31:13), we set our hearts toward home and headed north.

More toward the topic at hand; the title for this entry and to better address the men. I found this verse in a passage of Ezekiel that gives a glorious agrarian reference to God as Shepard over his people, filled with awareness toward the human condition it serves as both warning and wisdom for those who would ponder it’s pages. As the chapter ends it gives a declarative statement to those who would be called by His name and no other ‘You Are Men’ and inferences with that is responsibility. It is a verse that both reminds me and encourages me of my responsibility of providing spiritual leadership in my home for my family and for my children’s children when they may come, Lord willing.

In the book published in 1882 “Golden Thoughts on Mother, Home and Heaven” Theodore Cuyler writes with this spurring insight:


For one, I care little for the government, which presides at Washington, in comparison with the government, which rules the millions of American homes. No administration can seriously harm us if our home life is pure, frugal, and godly. No statesmanship or legislation can save us, if once our homes become the abode of profligacy.

The home rules the nation. If the home is demoralized, it will ruin it. The real seed corn whence our Republic sprang was the Christian households represented in the Mayflower, or the family altar of the Hollander and the Huguenot.

All the best characters, best legislation, best institutions, and best church life were cradled in those early homes. They were the taproot of the Republic, and of the American Churches.

I have read several writings in the past regarding the ideas of biblical patriarchy in contrast to our nations currrent cultural offerings of feminism, feminine men and matriarchal households. This ought not be. A greater author than I penned the definitions for Family Government long before I ever saw the light of day…
…(to be continued)