Places 11: Grain Fields

Grain Fields began in my head while driving South on Route 47 through North Central and Central Illinois—back when towns were small, subdivisions far away, cars were few, speed limits vague and farmlands stretched out far. It’s hard to understand if you don’t know the stories behind the images, so I’ve put  references in footnotes.

These grain fields, green and ripe,
swaying under open skies,
soaking in late summer sun,
feed my grazing eyes—
fill my soul with histories of hunger—
stories passed on down,
father to daughter, mother to son.

Joseph’s bounty poured and bagged
grain enough to build a nation;
he saved his family from starvation. 1

Ruth, in hunger, gleaned among the sheaves
gathering seed for Boaz to redeem,
she conceived eternal generations. 2

Their grandson, David, ate the holy food
set apart for priests to feed on. 3
Escaping death, he praised
and prophesied his Seed-to-come in song.   4

Centuries later, on a Sabbath afternoon,
Jesus, and his friends, in grain fields once again,
all hungry men,
broke with legalistic law to pluck and eat sustaining grain. 5

Harvesting eternal gain,
He taught His men
to feed on bread that satisfies; 6
then sowed Himself,
a Seed that would not, could not die. 7

Lastly, me, unhusked,
crying out for grain enough
—just for today—
enough to push my famine off
enough to keep my fears away—

Christ- seed of Holy Spirit—
grow in me,
this mix of metaphors and lineage,
speeding past seventy
all alone on country roads,
seeking God’s direction,
thankful for His grain.

 

1. The historical story of Joseph begins in Genesis 41.
2. Ruth’s story is written in The Book of Ruth.
3. David eating a meal of priests’ food as he flees from Saul is retold in Samuel 21.
4. Psalm 89
5. Both Mark 2:23-28 and Luke 6:1-5 tell of Jesus and His disciples walking through the grainfields on a Sabbath and plucking heads of grain to satisfy their hunger.
6. Deuteronomy 8:3 and Matthew 4:4 Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.
7. The picture/metaphor of both  Jesus body and our own bodies as grain runs throughout the New Testament. In John 6:36 Jesus says, “I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me shall not hunger.” In 1 Corinthians 15:37 Paul writes, “And what you sow is not the body that is to be, but a bare kernel, perhaps of wheat or of some other grain.”