The Sifford Sojournal

Our journal of what we pray is our sojourn of life along the narrow way, even the old paths, submitting to the Bible as a light unto both.

Author: David & Susan Sifford (Page 11 of 93)

2022 Goat Kids

Providence’s Perpetuation Provisions: 2022’s Goat Kids

July 25, 2022 / / 0 Comments

Well, the results of last year’s goat breeding time are in! 🙂 God graciously granted 4 bucklings and 2 doelings, although there was another doeling, but she was still-born.

Here are some pictures when they were going to the kind gentleman who buys our goats:

Goat Kids 2022
Goat Kids 2022
Goat Kids 2022

Very sadly though, the Lord, as owner of the goats, decided to reclaim Annie, whose two bucklings are these last two pictures. Thankfully they were 7 weeks old when she died, so we didn’t have to bottle feed them.

Annie was also our little orphan from way back. Here’s a video of her and her brother Spot drinking off the bottles!

This is Hassie’s (Annie’s daughter) daughter (in front), which we’re keeping to replace Annie. We’re calling her Annalita, in honor of grandma. 🙂

Goat Kids 2022

Goodbye Annie…we’ll miss you…

Annie and Her Kids 2021

Lastly, here’s the video of 2022’s kids:

We always thank the Lord for His gracious provisions, and for the milk, and we pray the kids do well for the new owner!

— David

3rd Round of 2022 Turkey Chicks

Providence’s Perpetuation Provisions: 3rd Round of 2022 Turkey Chicks & Surrogate Chicken Mommy

July 12, 2022 / / 0 Comments

With the surrogate chicken mommy with turkey chicks working so well, and with chicken hens again being much more easy to handle, and with another turkey/chicken mommies set sitting on turkey eggs in the barn, if they hatched, we’d thought we’d try to grab them and a chicken mommy and put them in the brooder barn to hopefully grow.

Here is the turkey mommy and the two chicken mommies in the barn on the eggs, and I believe even at least one hatched-out:

Mommies on Turkey Eggs in Barn

And thanks to God’s graces, they did hatch out several over a couple of days, and we moved one of the chicken hens and the youngins into the brooder barn, and along with the picture at the top, here they are, 5 in total!

3rd 2022 Turkey Hatching

And here’s their video:

As always, we thank the Lord for these continued provisions, and may He always glorify Himself in these things!

— David

Godly Patience

David’s Digest: Of Christian Patience

July 5, 2022 / / 0 Comments 
James 5:7 - "Be patient therefore, brethren, unto the coming of the Lord. Behold, the husbandman waiteth for the precious fruit of the earth, and hath long patience for it, until he receive the early and latter rain."

What does godly patience look like?

In Puritan Thomas Manton’s work “A Practical Commentary, or an Exposition with Notes, on the Epistle of James”, he examines this closer in looking at the beginning of the above verse.

You can listen to all of verse 15 here:

or download it:

Download

The entire book is available here: https://ia800904.us.archive.org/2/items/apracticalcomme01mantgoog/apracticalcomme01mantgoog.pdf#page=405, and this section starts on PDF page 405 (in the print, page 3860), or you can get it in other formats here…

…or you can listen to the entire book on this page:

Thomas Manton – James Commentary

From Thomas Manton:

Verse 7. — Be patient, therefore, brethren, unto the coming of the Lord: behold, the husbandman waiteth for the precious fruit of the earth, and hath long patience for it, until he receive the early and the latter rain.

He now diverts from the rich oppressors, unto the poor faithful brethren that were oppressed. By the illative particle “therefore” we may see the former paragraph was for their sakes. The rich men shall be punished for their wickedness and oppression ; therefore, be you patient.

Be patient, therefore, brethren, [Greek word]. The word is put for long-suffering, and so usually translated, which is a further degree of patience; for patience is a sense of afflictions without murmuring, and of injuries without revenge. Now, long-suffering is patience extended, and lengthened out to that which our apostle calls its perfect work. Observe:

Obs. It is the duty of the children of God to be patient under their sufferings, though they be long and sharp. It is easier in a calm and sedate condition to discourse of patience, than to exercise it in time of trial. Philosophers have discoursed of it, and commended it ; but Christians themselves have staggered, when they have been exercised with a sharp sense of evils.

When God gives up his people to the lust [generally, any corrupt desire of the heart] of adversaries, then it is sad, and we are apt to murmur; and yet the apostle says, we should suffer with a long patience. I shall spare motives, and a little show you what Christian patience is.

It differs from security and stoical insensibleness [just ignoring it, burying the emotions, etc.]; there can be no patience where there is no sense of evil [of our own sin, temptations to sin under difficulties, etc.]. Christianity does not abrogate affections, but regulate them. Carnal men put off [for later] that which they cannot put away, and are not patient but stupid [like being in a stupor] and careless. There are other remedies in Christianity than quenching our sorrows in the wine [literal and metaphorical] of pleasures.

Again, it differs from moral patience, which is nothing but a yielding to necessity [they go with it because they cannot do anything about it], and is usually accompanied with vain [useless] thoughts (Jer. iv. 14), and carnal workings of spirit. When God lays on crosses, men please themselves with suppositions of worldly profit, and how their present condition may conduce to secular advancement; as when God takes away wife or children, men do not think of submission to the hand of God, but the capacity of augmenting their worldly estate, &c.

In short. Christian patience supposes a sense of evil, and then in the formality of it, it is a submission of the whole soul to the will of God. Wherein observe,

(1.) The nature; it is a submission of the whole soul. The judgment subscribes, “Good is the word of the Lord,” &c. (Isa. xxxix. 9.) Though it were to him a terrible word, yet the submission of a sanctified judgment can call it good. Then the will accepts, “If they shall accept the punishment” (Lev. xxvi. 4) ; that is, take it kindly from God that it is no worse. Then the affections are restrained, and anger and sorrow brought under the commands of the word. Then the tongue is bridled, lest discontent plash [splash] over; Aaron held his peace, (Lev. x. 3).

(2.) Consider the grounds and proper considerations upon which all this is carried on. Usually there is such a progress as this in the spiritual discourse:

(1st.) The soul sees God in it : “I was dumb, and opened not my mouth, because thou didst it” (Psa. xxxix. 9).

(2nd.) It sees God acting with sovereignty : “None can say unto him; What dost thou?” (Job. ix. 12.) And elsewhere, “He giveth no account of his matters.”

(3rd.) Lest this should make the heart storm [with fury], it sees sovereignty modified and mitigated in the dispensation of it with several attributes:

  • With justice:

    (Deut. xxvii. 26), When every curse was pronounced, they were to say Amen that if it come to pass ; Amen is but a righteous dispensation.

  • With mercy:

    “Thou hast punished us less than we deserved” (Esra. ix. 13). They were afflicted, they might have been destroyed; they were in Babylon, they might have been in hell.

  • With faithfulness:

    They look upon afflictions as federal dispensations, as appendages of the covenant of grace; “It is good for me that I have been afflicted, that I might keep thy statutes” (Psa. cxix. 71). When they are threshed, it is but to lose their stalks and husks ; God’s faithfulness would not suffer [allow] them to want [lack] such a sweet help.

  • With wisdom:

    God is a God of judgment (Isa, xxx. 18) ; it is meant in his dispensations. Let God alone, he is too just to do us wrong, and too kind and wise to do us harm.

May God grant us a desire for this patience, may we seek Him daily for it, and may He graciously grant us it so we can live properly as unto Him!

— David

2nd Round of 2022 Turkey Chicks

Providence’s Perpetuation Provisions: Surrogate Chicken Mommy to 2nd Round of Turkey Chicks

June 28, 2022 / / 0 Comments

After we had a turkey mommy accidentally hatch out a chicken chick, we discovered in the barn next to the north footer in the middle a set of turkey eggs being sat on by both a turkey and a chicken. Since the turkey mommy worked well as a surrogate to the chicken chick, I started to wonder if maybe a chicken mommy might make a good surrogate for turkey chicks, especially because a chicken hen is much easier to work with than the larger and stronger turkey hen.

Well, the little things started to hatch, and eventually the chicken mommy ended up near the big door across the barn to the east with the chicks under her, and the turkey mommy kind of hanging out behind her. So, it was round up the youngin’s and the chicken mommy and get them into the summer kitchen (now basically what is a brooder barn).

There were 6 of them, and we initially started them in a cage on the table, which you can see in the video below.

Then not long after, another turkey/chicken mommy group in the barn hatched out 1, and it was walking around on the hay stack next to them, and so we grabbed it and put it in with the brooder barn mommy, hoping she would accept it, and she did!

And then, another 1 from that same 2 mommies in the barn, and so it was off to the brooder barn.

And so now, there are 8 turkey chicks with their chicken mommy in the brooder barn all still doing great! That last one is a little tiny, and I wasn’t sure if it was going to make it, but it’s still going!

And, along with the picture above, here is another picture of them. However, the chicken mommy at this point seems to be losing interest in attending to them as a mommy, and has been jumping out of the caged run area, so we may just let her go soon, although we do like the idea that these mommies being there might protect the young from snakes:

2nd Round of 2022 Turkey Chicks

And here is their video:

We thank the Lord for granting these new little provisions, and for the idea and gracious success of a chicken hen taking care of the young turkey chicks!

— David

West Tank Overflowing

Storing Rain VI – West Tank (Pond) – Update I

June 20, 2022 / / 0 Comments

Initially, when we had our west tank (that’s Texas for “pond”) dug last year, the Lord saw fit to stop the process before we had planned to finish by filling it up quite full — too full to continue.

Since then though, we’ve been in one of our worst droughts since we’ve been here. Since it was dug and filled as it was, there had been very little substantial rainfall. The tank lasted very well though, although it was getting lower, and was the only ground water available at the time for the cows.

But, God in His mercies and graces, saw fit to drop a decent amount of rain here, runoff rain, back in early June. It wasn’t a whole lot, but it was enough to put a lot of water in the other tanks on the land, and, for the first time, cause our west tank to overflow!

Since it was dug, I wasn’t sure if the water would make it around the bend without having to flood the entire area, but the expert diggers felt it would, and sure enough, it worked great!

Here’s looking back at the pond from the overflow side:

West Pond Full

And then it overflowing (the top image shows it too):

And we recorded a video of it too:

The Lord granted a decent amount of grass to grow as a result also, which has taken some of the burden off having to feed the cows manually, and we have been thankful, although there hasn’t been any more rain since, and we are around 100 (give or take several degrees) every day.

We do pray God might have mercy on us again and bring rain soon, as we look to Him as our Provider, but until then, we wait, hopefully patiently, knowing He is good and faithful regardless of what we might see around us.

— David

2nd Chicken Hatching of 2022

Providence’s Perpetuation Provisions: 2nd, 3rd & 4th Chicken Hatchings of 2022

June 10, 2022 / / 0 Comments

After our first chicken hatching this 2022 came from a turkey mommy accidentally sitting on a chicken egg and hatching one out, the Lord has graciously continued to grant more chicken chicks!

This is group 2 for 2022. We usually put 12 eggs under the broody mommies, and she either hatched out them all, or close to it…I haven’t done a count yet, but there are quite a few! They are in the image above, and this one:

More of 2nd Chicken Hatching of 2022

And here’s group 3. She actually hatched out 5 more, but I think she ended up killing them as she tore apart her nest after she lost her broodiness. Sigh. But, she still has these 4 going strong!

3rd Chicken Hatching of 2022

And here is group 4. Originally, these eggs were under a mommy under our house. We grabbed her and her eggs and put them in the mini-chicken tractor shown here. However, about 5-6 days short of the 21 required, she lost her broodiness, and tore apart the nest, and sent eggs somewhat scattering. We even found one dead not-quite-complete chick, I guess perhaps just broken out of the shell by her maybe?

Anyway, we gathered up the rest of the eggs and re-set them in the nest, and tried putting on them other broody hens we had that weren’t sitting on eggs (we pull their eggs if we don’t have a safe place to let them hatch out chicks). Well, finally, I believe it was the 3rd mommy attempt which stuck, and she did bring it home, hatching out these 2 little ones! She’s still acting quite broody, but I have a feeling the other eggs are not going to hatch. And at least, her little ones are apparently figuring out how to drink and eat regardless:

4th Chicken Hatching of 2022

And lastly, here’s the video of all 3 groups:

As always, we are grateful to God for granting these new provisions, and we pray He glorify Himself through them, and that they might benefit others as well!

— David

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