To Realize A Dream

A conversation with Joel Salatan of Polyface Farm

When you get to realize what generations of your family could only dream of one day doing you find you’re in a place that only God could’ve created. It’s a calling and purpose under the influence of God’s Spirit. Joel Salatin is a farmer, author and most certainly and influencer.

My husband and I visited Polyface Farm in Swoope, Virginia to attend a God-Given Foods Conference organized by God’s Good Table. While there Joel took us to one of his favorite places on the 300 acre farm. During our conversation, recorded for the video below, I learned about who has influenced him and how.

His one of a kind perspective inspires many people who visit there every year and many more who contact him for advice. We think his insights (in our video with him below) can help you consider what gardening, farming and homesteading can be to you and how this aspect of life is profoundly shaping culture. This conversation is a call to think differently about food and so many things, #reflectGOD in your lifestyle and be the change and hope that the world needs. Below the video is:

• An overview of the farm and Joel
• A closer look at the Polyface Apprenticeship and Summer Stewardship program
• Highlights from our conversation with Joel about realizing a different kind of wealth, realizing a dream of individual relationships and the importance of realizing what we can’t see.

THE POLYFACE STORY AND THE LUNATIC FARMER

ABOUT THE FARM: In 1961, William and Lucille Salatin moved their young family to Virginia’s Shenandoah Valley, purchasing the most worn-out, eroded, abused farm in the area near Staunton. Using nature as a pattern, they and their children began the healing and innovation that now supports three generations. Today the farm represents America’s premier non-industrial food production oasis. Believing that the Creator’s design is still the best pattern for the biological world, the Salatin family invites like-minded folks to join in the farm’s mission.

ABOUT JOEL: Joel Salatin calls himself a Christian libertarian environmentalist capitalist lunatic farmer. Others who like him call him the most famous farmer in the world, the high priest of the pasture, and the most eclectic thinker from Virginia since Thomas Jefferson. Those who don’t like him call him a bio-terrorist, Typhoid Mary, charlatan, and starvation advocate.

With a room full of debate trophies from high school and college days, 15 published books, and a thriving multi-generational family farm, he draws on a lifetime of food, farming and fantasy to entertain and inspire audiences around the world. He’s as comfortable moving cows in a pasture as addressing CEOs in a Wall Street business conference.

CAN YOU BE A GOOD STEWARD OF $100/MONTH?

Want to see what a healthy and productive farm can look like? Then you should plan a visit to Polyface Farm, nestled in the beautiful Shenandoah Valley area of Virginia. There’s no entrance fee or admission charge. You just have to want to get away into the countryside and explore.

Want to learn how to be part of a healthy and productive farm? The Polyface Summer Stewardship program provides the first step into onsite training for people who want to become a farmer. Sound amazing? It is! But before you apply you should make note of the following considerations:

• Be willing to serve, full of ambition, self-starting, eager to learn and work.
• Be teachable, positive, non-complaining, grateful, rejoicing, dependable, faithful, and ready to sweat all day.
• You will be needing little to no screen time or skill.
• This is hands on, in the dirt, blood, and mud, real life stuff.
• Warning: you will be sore, ache, dead tired, and might even be sick.

That’s just some of the real aspects of this program that they want you to know before you decide to apply. If you’re accepted to fill one of the limited positions then you’ll learn a lot AND get paid a $100 stipend per month. As they say, “It’s the most education for the money you’ll ever receive.” For those who participate the Polyface learning program can evolve into opportunities like employment, subcontracting, symbiotic entrepreneurship and more. What stands out is the way Polyface leads with Bible-like admonishment: “All start with the internship. Faithfulness there creates ongoing places of ministry.”

In modern day America it’s very different to see a business present such a culture. AND – if you’re wondering who would intentionally pursue such a position of stewardship, open your heart and mind and understand how that person ultimately gains a robust and transformative outlook for his or her future.

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MY DREAM TO REALIZE

For Grace Margrave, like so many others, the Stewardship program at Polyface Farm was just the beginning. She did regenerative farming with the Polyface team for over 5 years. She is an aspiring flower farmer and herbalist. For now, she’s transitioning to her new career role at a farm in Edinburg, Virginia. In true Polyface Farm fashion the entire team gave her a send off party at a local ice cream parlor. What did she learn and gain while at Polyface Farm and was it worth it for her? Look below to read the words she shared in her social media months before her career move:

I am really passionate about “Blue Collar” Jobs. We have a saying here on the farm that Every Job is Sacred. Otherwise we wouldn’t be doing it.

Here’s to my 6th year at the Farm! So grateful for all the opportunities and friendships this community has given me so far! I’ve learned so much here- how to farm, market, run a store, interact with customers and grow a business, how to revamp and prioritize and execute visions. I’ve made lifelong friendships, endured soul-crushing heartache, found God on a deeper level than I ever imagined, watched countless lives be deeply impacted and changed. I’ve seen some of the best of humanity and some of the worst. I’ve experienced new life and loss of it. I’ve been given the opportunity to speak into peoples lives and call the best out of them. I’ve been invested in with deep mentorship and guidance. I’ve been pushed to my physical, emotional, and spiritual limits and grown through them. I’ve met so many different folks from truly every walk of life and had the chance to listen to their crazy and intriguing life stories.

Farming truly is a rollercoaster of raw emotion and requires true grit. My heart is so full of gratitude as I reflect on the years I have given to healing this land so far. I’m looking forward to what God will do next. – Grace Margrave

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HIGHLIGHTS FROM OUR CONVERSATION WITH JOEL

I stand on the shoulders of giants. There were 2 generations who lived below their means. When families live below their means, that’s how you accumulate wealth.

Now, here we are in our nation with all kinds of dysfunction and I have billionaires calling me to learn how to build agrarian bunkers because they see the handwriting on the wall. I’m see how my dad saw so far into the future – the resiliency and possibilities and security of this kind of lifestyle.

I grew up in a family that thought differently – that embraced being different. This thinking outside the box is a legacy. Embracing your own personal conviction and being OK if nobody else agrees with it, that is a priceless gift.

Jesus was revolutionary! I take great solace in that. We can all be challenged to do more.

I’m not very optimistic about where America is headed as a civilization. BUT – I’m very optimistic about what we can do as individuals to build up relationships and a community of people who share Biblical Christian values. We need to be busy about finding people who want to wrestle, want to seek, and want to live as light.

If we want to make a list of all the things we’re frustrated and angry about we can make a pretty good list. That’s ok, go ahead and make your list. But, we need to flip that list on it’s head and say, “How am I going to solve this? How am I going to be the catalyst for change so that I can be hope and help when society becomes hopeless and helpless.”

That’s our calling. We need to be vocal about it, aggressive about it and unapologetic about offering what we think are real solutions to what is a completely anchorless, moralless and floundering society.

The Bible says to pray without ceasing. My farm work here is walking and being by myself. It’s not like, “At 3 o’clock I’m going to go to the woods and pray.” I’m thinking, I’m open and I’m ready.

Then God came and stood before him exactly as before, calling out, “Samuel! Samuel!” Samuel answered, “Speak. I’m your servant, ready to listen.”

There’s a quietness here. I’m surrounded by the majesty of things I didn’t create. There’s a lot going on here and it puts me in a frame of mind to realize that the most real things in the world are things we can’t see. The most important things that are happening are invisible.

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