A Lesson from the Calving Pen

Joanne had her first baby last Friday… a bouncing baby boy. Grandma Jean reports he’s healthy and happy. The only thing is that he just will not feed. According to grandma, wee Geordie is somewhat like our oldest son was; everything was perfect with the little guy but try and get him to suckle and he fell instantly to sleep.

Apparently early nursing issues are not uncommon with human babies. Besides driving new moms right ‘round the bend, it can also interfere with early development of the baby. It’s pretty hard for a newborn who isn’t nursing well to maintain weight, let alone add it. And from what I’ve been told by nurses I know, it’s not uncommon for suckling issues to go on for up to eight weeks with human babies. The complacency with regards to nutrition just seems to build as the weeks go on.

Compare this to what’s going on in the fields all around us right now. In the Cariboo Chilcotin, March is calving month. I love this hungry time of year. There are babies dropping on the calving grounds like flies. And not just calves! Sheep are lambing, horses are foaling, goats are kidding (just kidding). It’s interesting to note that with these little ones, nursing isn’t a big issue. Oh I know that occasionally it can be a problem, but generally the minute a little calf is out of the chute he is up and bunting his mom in the milk jugs, wagging his tail and expecting something nourishing to come down the tube real quick. It’s the kind of thing that brings a crinkle to the big blue bags under a cowboy’s eyes.

Maybe it’s the wannabe cowboy in me but a calving pen in spring attracts me like a manure pile attracts flies. I just can’t help myself. And the preacher in me can’t help wax lyrical about the line from 1 Peter 2:2 that says: “like newborn infants, long for the pure, spiritual milk, so that by it you may grow into salvation.” The words “long for” in the NRSV are perhaps a little too tame. The NIV has “crave,” which I think is a better rendering of the biblical Greek. In fact, the word actually can mean to “lust for.” That’s what I see in the newborn calf—a craving lust that drives it to go after the milk that it instinctively knows is the only thing that will help it grow and thrive.

I think Peter is saying be like that with the living and enduring word of God. Go after it with a lusty craving that is like a newborn calf on a feeding mission. Why? Well, if you back up a bit in 1 Peter, the author has just made the point that the believer is “born anew … through the living and enduring word of God.” Now he is saying that we grow and develop through that same word of God.

As I stare with fascination at the hungry calves in the calving pen and listen to their lusty slurping and the scripture referred to above, I find myself face to face with a Christian spiritual principle: I begin my spiritual life with the word of God and I sustain it by the word of God. And I can’t help but think, what a gift to have a mother like the word of God, virtually engorged with pure spiritual milk to nurture me, to develop me, to grow me, to sanctify me.

But here’s the thing. In the over – affluence of the Western world where the word of God written, broadcasted and proclaimed is available in every translation and medium imaginable, even on our smartphones, it seems to me that we are like the sometimes newborn human infant that is happy to be alive and warm and cuddled but really isn’t interested in nursing.

I have come to wonder if there is a crisis amongst us Christians in the Western world. In the two – thirds world, the word of God seems to be highly treasured and esteemed (even to those who proclaim it) to the point that people are willing to give everything for it, even their lives in some cases, while in the Western world we have complacency and disregard towards it that defies all reason. In the two – thirds world people are excitedly memorizing whole books of the Bible, while in the Western world we barely even read it. I wonder if we Christians in the Western world are starving to death and we don’t even know it?

Preacher and theologian John Piper calls this crisis “spiritual fatalism.” I think what he means by this is that we have come to accept that “where” we are in our relationship with God, in terms of our spiritual maturity and in our relationship with one another in Christian community, is just about where we are supposed to be and about as far as we can go. And what makes this “fatalistic” is that we have accepted this as a truth that is self – evident; there is no changing it. It is a kind of I – got – it – all – and – there – is – nothing – left – to – get, or worse, nothing – left – that – I – can – get. In Desiring God, Piper argues that this spiritual fatalism and the spiritual stagnation that ensues all relates to our attitude towards the word of God.

After a couple of our young people returned from a mission experience in Kenya and reported what they learned with regards to the word of God there, I think I agree with Piper and would want to turn up the heat a bit. Whilst we Westerners sit and wonder why we don’t experience what first – century Christians experienced, our sisters and brothers in faith in the two – thirds world seem to be latching onto the word of God and devouring it in calf – like hunger, and feeling the love and relationship of Christ as though he really is risen and among them. They seem to be personally feasting on the word and witnessing miracles at the hand of Christ whilst we listen to our pastors/theologians babble about it rather than feast on the word ourselves. It’s as though we think the word of God just describes a faith that existed 2,000 years ago rather than speaks into my faith now. So much for a “living and enduring word of God” that 1 Peter talks about in 1:23.

I think God desires so much more for us. Like a new mother with her first baby, God is offering the nipple of His word that is engorged with truth and nourishment and relationship and so much more. God help us to not complacently snuggle into His arms, stick our little thumbs into our mouths, and wonder what the fuss is all about.