Farming Practices

Farming Practices
by Dr. J. Franklin Snook

For many years our country was plagued with agricultural surpluses. The government bought and stored them at high cost to the taxpayers in an effort to hold farm-produce prices stable. Little is now said about surplus crops, but we do read often of crop-allotment programs and payments made to farmers for limiting acreages of certain crops.

We have now also been alerted to the harmful effects of pesticides on wildlife, fish, and people. Then there is the question of the reduced nutritional value of foods raised on ground fertilized with chemicals or commercial fertilizers.

God’s law solves these problems without subsidies or bureaucratic controls. American farmers have, after many years of trial and error, adopted some of the Biblically required practices. However the nation has missed the most beneficial agricultural, health, and economic feature of the Divine farming laws—the one that requires the land to lie fallow every seventh year. (See Exodus 23:11 and Leviticus 25:4). There is a multiple purpose in this law—it maintains soil fetility and assures plentiful yield of the highest nutritional value, while eliminating insects, plant disease, and overproduction. If all farm land lay fallow every seventh year, the life cycles of crop-destroying pests would be interrupted and the need for insecticides greatly reduced. The surpluses built up in six years of farming would be used up during the sabbatb year, and as a result prices for farm products would remain stable at a fair return to the farmer.

This seventh-year fallow, as well as the seventh-year release of all debts, leads to economic stability and defeats the adverse effects of the seven-year cycles. Had we observed the sabbaths of the land, we would have no farm problems, no quotas, no land banks, and no wholesale farm bankruptcies. Neither would many farmers be fleeing to the cities. Correct the wrongs by adopting God’s agricultural laws and watch the farmers move back to the land.

Can you see that the foregoing examples are based on sound economic principles and are not just “whims of God,” or religious dogmas? Can you see the operation of the principles of cause and effect? All the laws of God are so based, assuring “life and good” as the logical effect of obedience to them. These principles operate in all Divine law—economic, health, criminal, and social.

https://covenantpeoplesministry.org/forum/content.php?1160-Farming-Practices