*****WARNING!!!!!!! CONTAINS GRAPHIC WORDS AND PICTURES!!!!!!!! *********
Working on a pig farm has taught me so many things. In three weeks I have experienced everything from life to death and everything in between. Each morning I have begun my days at 8 am, scooping out pig poop. The smell can be bad, but not enough to make me quit. After we scrape the poop, the pens are hosed down. Most of the pigs are females, many who have piglets. As I moved from pen to pen, I would greet each pig with a ” good morning beautiful.” Yes the pigs don’t care nor understand what I am saying, and yes they are filthy as they are covered in their own waste. But something about them is beautiful. It reminds me of the countless woman in the world who are figuratively sitting in crap, yearning for someone to call them beautiful, to acknowledge their presence. God is the one who looks down on us in our filthiness and yet calls us beautiful. And then he commissioned us to go out into the world, among the least of these and to speak life in them. I don’t know what God has for me on the world race, but I can almost bet that it will include encountering people who are smelly and dirty and unloved. And I know that if I can look at a disgusting pig and call them beautiful, surely I can do the same for a human being, who is worth far more.
When we are done cleaning stalls, we help as Ramazan gathers feed for the pigs. It is always fascinating to watch the pigs being fed. At first notice of feeding time, they cry out in a screeching voice, demanding that they be fed. Some even jump up on the walls so that you know they are there. There is no reason for the pigs to assume they won’t be fed. They are fed everyday, typically around the same time. But they call out as if they are starving. They eat every last bite, even when it is covered in waste. These pigs call out as if they won’t be fed. But what about those in the world who really are starving? People, who are so hungry, that they too won’t care if the food is clean. I ask myself, what can I do for those who are hungry? I know I will encounter people on the race who are in this place, as I already have. What will I do for them? Will I have time to stop and offer food? This is a tricky situation to be in, because sometimes they aren’t hungry. They are looking for money for drugs or for parents who use them to gather money so they can buy drugs. When someone is hungry, I hope to be able to feed them. In our last ministry site in Bulgaria, we met a pastor who was telling about his son, Nathaniel. Nathaniel would always carry a sandwich with him when he went out, so if he came across a person who was hungry, he would have something to give them. He once saw a mother and daughter sifting through a trash can for food. He came home and asked for money to buy food for them. This is the way I want to be. Always ready and aware to feed the hungry. I could tell that Nathaniel was kind, but never knew how much until his father shared with us the heart of his son. What an inspiration.
As we were able to experience the birth of a new piglet, we endured the sadness of the loss of life as well. We saw piglets who were still born, killed by their mama when being sat on. We even witnessed a piglet slowly dying as she had broken legs and couldn’t get up to fight to nurse. Recently we even witnessed the death of pigs by human hands. Yup, that’s right, we saw pigs being slaughtered. They hit them in the head with a sledge hammer, to kill them instantly. Then they slit their throats so they bleed to death. I’ll admit, I couldn’t be there when they did the initial killing, but I did come back around to see the carving of the body. As hard it is to see a pig I once fed the day before, being cut up before me, then eat it for dinner the next night, I also recognize that most of the world lives this way. They don’t have the luxury of going to a store to buy clean packaged meat. They raise livestock for the purpose of killing and eating it. Some of my squad mates asked me if it made me sad that the pigs died. Surprisingly the answer was “no”. We were told from the beginning that we should not get attached or even name the pigs. Even though I give them love and attention, I understood that they were being raised for slaughter.
The runts and the broken piglets are seen as useless and unworthy to live. Sometimes the mother will deliberately sit on them as a means to kill them. But I am thankful that in a world where weak ones have no worth, I serve a God that has a different perspective. The Lord looks to the weak ones and has compassion on them. in fact, he calls us to love and care for them. He says that it is in our weakness that his strength is made perfect. What a glorious God he is!
I have learned a lot working on a pig farm. Working with six other girls and one old man named Ramazan, I have found myself delighted in the work I did in Albania. Our last week we went out on the town to buy Ramazan a picture of us with him. When we gave it to him on the last day, he was trying to hold back the tears. But we knew it meant a lot to him. He is a man with so little, but with so much heart. And while we had to resort to gestures as a means of communication, we loved every moment with him.
I challenge you, my dear readers, to try something that you would never think to do, and keep an open mind. You never know what lessons you will learn, that will give you a whole new perspective for the better.
