jubilance.

"Neither farmer, nor field is finally eligible for sale."

Is that not the most beautiful thing you've ever read? Probably not. Let me explain.

The quote is from a religious studies professor named Ellen Davis, in a book about the connection between Old Testament spirituality, and agriculture.

Davis had been discussing Jubilee, when I wandered across the words. Jubilee was the Israelite practice stipulated in the Holiness codes to occur roughly every 49 years--a time when land leased off during hardship would return to its original owner. Davis contends that in the biblical language, there is an intimate linking of person, and land, such that the ramification of this corner of the Holiness Codes is that...

"Neither farmer, nor field is finally eligible for sale."

The implication is that both belong solely to God. Jubilee is a codified reminder of that truth. For her purposes, this means that we ought to understand agriculture, and the industry that surrounds it, with a heart that acknowledges our sole dependence on our Creator.

I'm sure you're fascinated. The academic nerdiness aside, chew on that sentence.

Neither farmer, nor field is finally eligible for sale.

We've built this incredibly complex world. I don't know about you, but I don't really understand much of it. I don't know what happens when I flip a light switch on. The stock market is endlessly confounding to me. I can't keep on top of the news. And if complexity were my only problem. I live in a present giving way constantly to newly-unknown futures. I trust God, and everything feels so uncertain.

But to know that though I have no effing idea what's coming around the bend, that no part of my life or my self is for sale...

And that God wrote this into His word so long ago! That inherent in the most seemingly unconnected laws of agriculture is something that so perfectly binds me to Him.

There's such intricacy in His design.