Growing up in rural northwest Missouri, I witnessed the harvest cycle from beginning to end for over two decades before I married and moved away. In our community, family and succeeding generations were strongly emphasized. Knowing how many generations of a particular family resided on a parcel of land and worked the same soil was a great source of pride.

My parents built their house in 1978 on a corner of a former cornfield, and we came to live there when I was 10. My backyard was literally 40 acres of farmland. This 40 acres, was originally purchased by my Great-Great-Grandpa Bayha shortly after the Civil War. So I grew up hearing stories of how he worked his half-section (320 acres) with a horse and plow. He planted 40 acres of woodlot to have enough wood to burn throughout the bitter Missouri winters. And he raised 15 children on the land.

I knew one of his grandchildren very well. She was my Grandma Cecile. Thankfully, before she died, I talked to her about some of her relatives from the Bayha side. She talked about her aunts and uncles and how hard they worked. (Grandma still owned 200 of the original acres.) Although my Grandma has been gone for 15 years, I still remember our conversations about how she helped, as a young girl and young woman, with the chores and how hard the family worked. The work ethic carried down through my mother (one of the hardest-working women I’ve ever known) and my father, who is still working after taking retirement two times.

This ethic of hard work and honesty was passed down through our ancestors on both sides of my family. I began to think about how hard they worked and how their trials and successes have helped me to become the person I am today. And I wondered what they think about what has happened to farming, especially in this part of Missouri.

After working their land for many, many years, even decades, I’m certain they felt an attachment to the soil they worked. They toiled, sweat and bled over each year’s planting, cultivating and harvesting. They spent a great deal of each day, for a large portion of the year, sinking their lives into the land. They did it to ensure their family’s survival through another year.

I know how much of an attachment I feel towards the land, so I can’t imagine how much they would have come to love the area they lived in and wanted it preserved for the generations to come. It was with sadness last year, that my cousins finally quit farming and started leasing the land out to others to work. For over 130 years, the land had been worked by a member from the same lineage as my Grandpa Bayha. After hearing the news, I truly struggled with the fact that the land was now not in the family, as such, even though it belongs to a family member, my uncle.

Then, one evening, I was watching the Hallmark channel and saw a movie based on Janette Oke’s novel Love’s Long Journey. One of the characters was moving a long distance from her family after being married. Her father talked to her about passing down a “legacy of character.” He believed in God and wanted her to live her life according to what God wanted of her, not men. It was a moving scene, which was very poignant to me due to my inner struggle.

I began thinking of what legacy I was to leave my two children. And I realized I had focused on the temporary, not the permanent. This tends to be a human characteristic, but we are told to focus on the permanent—building godly character and passing it on to our kids. My husband and I take seriously our directive of teaching our children when we get up, when we go to bed, as we walk with them and spend time with them.

In Deuteronomy 11:19-20 we read, “You shall teach them to your children, speaking of them when you sit in your house, when you walk by the way, when you lie down, and when you rise up. And you shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.” We try to take every opportunity to pass on what we’ve been given by God. The calling we’ve been given is a precious gift not to be squandered or whiled away (2 Peter 1:3-4).

When we’ve discussed character with our children, we express delight with them when we know they’ve made the right decision, based on God’s law, even when it was not the easiest thing to do. We tell them, “God just put a little more of His character inside you, and He’s very proud of what you’ve done.”

I can’t state enough how important I believe it is to encourage godly behavior in children, even when they are very young. Children are so open to God’s love. They forgive easily and don’t bear grudges very long. I think they’re here to humble us with their behavior and attitude so we’ll become more like God and Christ. Christ Himself told us we needed the attitude of a child to enter the Kingdom of God (Mark 10:15).

Our spiritual inheritance

I feel as if I’ve had the best of both worlds. All those ancestors of mine were hard-working and, by most accounts, honest people. Although not perfect, they did strive to live an honorable life, passing on to their children life’s hard lessons. They believed if they worked diligently, they would persevere.

In the same manner, we are admonished to do the same thing. We are to learn about God, follow His directions and our Heavenly Father, and live our lives accordingly. We are to obey God’s spiritual laws. “And it shall be that if you earnestly obey My commandments which I command you today, to love the LORD your God and serve Him with all your heart and with all your soul,” then God promised blessings innumerable (Deuteronomy 11:13).

We strive each day, investing our sweat, blood and tears, physically and spiritually, in our battle to develop the character of God. God promises if we obey and follow Him, He will bless us and help us to develop His character.

Even though God provided the earth for us to live upon, He gave an even greater gift of an eternal inheritance, His Kingdom (Ephesians 1:11-14). God chose us from before the beginning of the earth to provide this most precious gift. Our life now is supposed to reflect our obedience to Him. He sees how diligent we are in this life, and it shows Him whether or not we will be willing to follow Him in the future. We make decisions whether or not to obey. God has given us the opportunity to receive His gift of eternal life; we must be open to receive it (John 3:15-16).

Just as my ancestors worked and toiled over the land, we must work our spiritual inheritance. We must be willing every day to invest our time, sweat and tears in the spiritual battles we face. We must be willing to follow Christ’s example in investing ourselves in producing the spiritual crop of character. In the end, God will reap His crop of firstfruits—those who are called during this age to be a part of His Church and who will lead others into God’s family and His Kingdom (James 1:17-18).

I still wonder at the reason God called me at a young age to follow Him. He truly does use the “weak and base things” to confound the mighty (1 Corinthians 1:26-29), but I am humbled at what He has given me and I hope to be worthy of Him when the day comes.

It comforts me now to know that all those people, all my ancestors who worked and toiled most of their lives to pass on an inheritance for me, will in turn receive an inheritance from God one day. God has allowed me the opportunity to be one of His firstfruits; and in a way, I am paving a path for them to follow when they awake from their sleep. I look forward to meeting all the Bayhas, Roops, Colberts and Rays who settled the land I still feel such an affinity for. I do not want to waste the opportunity to be a part of the ultimate inheritance—God’s Kingdom.

Further reading

Our spiritual inheritance is such a true gift from God. To find out more about your spiritual heritage, please subscribe to The Good News magazine.