Good Living in Perilous Times
We live in perilous times. Our world has shrunk so that the things that happen half way around the globe have the ability to rattle us. Between crime, nuclear accidents, economic collapse, social unrest and injustice, fire, flood and famine there is always an upsetting headline screaming at us and threatening our inner peace. We ask ourselves questions. Is our food supply safe? What if I can’t get medical care for my family? What if I can’t make the house payment? Will there be enough fuel to keep my family warm this winter? For most people I know these are valid and troublesome questions and yet, in The Bible, our God, through the mouths of prophets, angels, apostles and our Lord Jesus himself, constantly exhorts his people not to fear!
There is a spiritual side to not fearing. We walk in the light of Christ’s love. We know that the worst the world has to throw at us is just a momentary struggle that separates us from eternity with the Lord we love. If we were to starve or be persecuted or meet with some other mortal agony, it cannot even compare with the bright and precious future of eternity with Christ. Though few of us have faced these trials, we trust that like Stephen, when he was being stoned, we would be granted sufficient and miraculous grace to endure whatever trial the Lord allows in our lives. This is a truth I would stake my life on.
I am so thankful for the spiritual promises that I have as a redeemed child of God, AND I still live here, now, in this fleshly body and temporal life that I am so attached to. Practically, how can I live and care for my family while our spirits still dwell in bodies that have nutritional, health and comfort requirements? First of all clean living can go a long way toward reducing the need for medical care. In the US and other developed and prosperous countries, most of the major illnesses are because of excess. If we are careful to eat moderately and nutritiously, if we avoid alcohol, drugs (even most prescription ones) and get wholesome amounts of exercise, fresh air and sunshine, we can avoid the most common ailments that plague modern mankind. As the old adage says, “An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.”
Even people who have lived a wholesome lifestyle from their youth will sometimes become ill, get injured or have some other need for repair and restoration of their physical temple. For our family, the most reliable sources of physical R and R come in the forms of local, wild and cultivated herbs. We have lived as far south as central Alabama and as far north as Alaska. We have foraged for herbs from the sandy Gulf of Mexico to the rocky coasts of the Pacific. We have lived in apartment buildings, off grid on a floating log raft and many situations in between. In every one of these situations, from semi arid Rocky Mountains to temperate rain forest, our family has been able to find herbs and plants to help with our basic medical and nutritional needs. In each of these settings we could find yarrow and plantain. These herbs are the basis for our Meadow Magic line of products which began as our homemade first aid kit. Every place we have ever lived, there was a medicinal source of tea, from Labrador Tea in the Muskegs of S.E. Alaska to the mulleins, mints, and rose hips I have been able to find everywhere else. I challenge you to look around you. If you live in the city, check abandoned lots and neglected areas where weeds are allowed to grow. Beware of pollution and pesticides.
Clean living, herb gardens, wild foraging and even storing good herbal salves and other products that we have purchased, can all provide a buffer between us and the uncertainties of this world we live in. Regardless of the future of our economy and medical care systems, the best and most reliable sources of food, supplementation and routine medical care are the ones we can harvest ourselves or reliably purchase without need of a medical provider.
God bless you!
Lawana
For more information contact me at mcfamily@blackfoot.net or visit www.meadowmagic.net
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