No Till notes: 'Giving'

I’ve met a lot of really interesting and enjoyable people through my travels and involvement with conservation agriculture and continuous no till crop production. Two of my favorites are Brian and Keith Burns. Brian and Keith took it upon themselves to establish Green Cover Seed. Green Cover Seed is a cover crop/forage crop seed distribution business.

Brian and Keith decided early on with the establishment of cover crops that someone had to become a distributor of the vast variety of seed needed for these cover crops. They have built their business into a well-known cover crop/forage crop supplier of seed. With this recognition have come opportunities to meet people from all around the country and the world. One such person is Ephesians Masoka. Ephesians’s ministry in Zimbabwa is the Crusade for Christ and he has started the Farming 4 Him Project.

Here is a bit of information from Ephesians’s ministry: “Africa is a continent with so many natural resources and wealth but has been tumbling more into poverty. Poverty is the most pressing of all Africa’s depressing problems. It is at the heart of all the important problems in Africa, be they social, spiritual or moral. But, Christianity is growing faster in Africa than on any other continent yet our people are rapidly becoming poorer, and sicker and the moral and social fabrics of society are disintegrating fast. Why? The main reason is that in Africa wehave failed to apply the gospel to the whole of life, limiting it to spiritual life only.

“Poverty has also caused Islam to advance southwards penetrating poor communities by building mosques and giving food aid from within the mosques. They have a calculated 100-year plan to penetrate Sub Saharan Africa.

“One of the strategies is, they seek to buy as much land as possible in areas which are pre-dominantly Christian but poor. This penetration is becoming visible in poor communities where they are buying land and property. Their strategy is not to preach to people or convince them to follow Islam, their strategy is for the children to grow up thinking food comes from a mosque.

“The Lord has been pressing on my heart to do something about it. That is how we are starting an Initiative called Farming 4 Him. At Farming 4 Him, we are called to help extend God’s kingdom in Africa towards the north through good stewardship of resources using the Identify, Develop, Utilize and Share strategy in Zimbabwe and throughout Africa.

“IDENTIFY - We are identifying available resources like crops, vegetables, livestock, agricultural land and irrigation technologies, which can be used to grow food sustainably.

“DEVELOP - We are growing models, which will work to help alleviate poverty and help the work of the church grow in poor communities.

“SHARE - Use model projects to start new projects for multiplying churches, orphanages and help support the staff and work of Campus Crusade for Christ in southern and eastern Africa.

“Every year we always have a national food deficit and in our southern provinces children die from starvation. There is a lot of water underground, and when we get floods, we should find a way to harness the floodwaters for irrigation during dry times.

“I have designed a plan to start a farm that we will call The SEED Farm. God has already blessed us with 800 Acres of beautiful farmland for this purpose. At this farmland, mostly cash crops will be grown, like potatoes, onions and tomatoes. The profits from this farmland will then be used to start model farms in poor villages. The MODEL farm will feature a greenhouse, drip irrigation and possibly one, two or three dairy cows, growing mainly corn, soybeans and some vegetables. The MODEL farm should be able to provide food and school fees for the whole year to at least five families. The plan seeks to multiply these MODEL farms at a rate of 10 per year.”

Green Cover Seed would like to raise $10,000 to fully fund a model farm in Africa and have some extra to buy egg laying hens and cages to help fund daily operations and transform lives in poor districts. Please note that Ephesians will only start a MODEL farm in a poor district where they have planted a church using Campus Crusade for Christ Strategies. Green Cover

Seed is committing $5,000 towards this project and we would love to see our friends and customers contribute a matching $5,000 so that together we can be part of something bigger than ourselves.”

If you would like to be a part of this exciting project, please make your check out to CRU and please highlight that you would like your contribution to be used for the Ministry of ZIM Northern Region F4H Project with Ministry A/C #2865412 - also make a note that this is part of the Green Cover Seed matching challenge. Mail your contribution to CRU, 100 Lake Hart Drive, Orlando, FL, 32832. You can also give on-line using this link: https://give.cru.org/2865412

I want to thank Keith and Brian for bringing this ministry to my attention and encouraging people in agriculture to give to those in need.

I would like to encourage everyone to give to this ministry or any charity here at home. It’s easy to look around and find someone who is in need.

Giving is always a very satisfying thing to do.