Are You My Neighbor

Remember Bob the tomato? How about Larry the cucumber or Junior the asparagus? Yes, Veggie Tales are a world of talking vegetables. In their cartoons the characters learn about honesty, kindness, and forgiveness. And of course Larry always has a silly song to sing.

Since many of the cartoons on TV now days are about flying dinosaurs and bad guys we sometimes bring up the older more wholesome content on YouTube.

 On one particular 1995 Veggie Tale episode titled "Who is my Neighbor" everyone in the hometown of Flibberue wear shoes for hats including Larry the cucumber. As Larry is walking home a couple of broccoli characters rob him and stick him headfirst in a hole where he is stuck. 

Larry's hometown mayor comes by and sees him stuck however the mayor is too busy to stop and help. Flibberue's town doctor also sees Larry stuck upside down however she has many appointments and is late.

Finally a little guy wearing a pan on his head from Jibbertynot comes by. Flibberue folks who have shoes for hats don't like Jibbertynot folks who wear pans. However the little guy played by Junior Asparagus stops and helps Larry the cucumber get unstuck.

The episode ends with Larry singing a silly song about loving your neighbor and when you make your neighbor feel better you feel better yourself.

Mike and Cody went to Winter Jam at Wells Fargo in Des Moines Friday night. Winter Jam started in the mid 1990s by the group NewSong. It is a Christian concert consisting of ten top Christian artists. 

Mark and Stacy and their family headed up to northern Minnesota yesterday to race motorcycles on a still frozen lake up there.

I went with our helper Andy this past week to look at a farm he has been asked to rent. One of my most favorite jobs is to help folks make their opportunities happen.

Kurt, Kasey, and I headed out early one morning with three loads of Brent's soybeans. In the picture below we are crossing the Mississippi River into Quincy, Ill.

Next years seed is coming in and with three more loads coming Monday Matt, Ryan, and Jackson helped me organize.

We found more room in the machine shed for a couple of tractors at BJ's farm where Pablo and Paula live. Ryan also moved some older equipment inside the machine shed across the road.

Getting the construction equipment ready for spring is coming along. One of Mike's dozers need new bushings and pins in the hard nose (front end). The dozer nose pins wear as the lift cylinders raise and lower all day on the job. Irv and Chance also brought over their trencher and had Chuck look at why it was underpowered. Chuck found the injector pump timing off.

Karl has been selling fat hogs about every day this past week.

Yesterday Jackson helped Grandpa all day. In the warm nice afternoon he helped Matt, Ryan, Mike, and myself bring firewood to the house for Grandma's woodstove.

 Tuesday Ezra didn't have school and helped as well. Teaching young folks to help and giving them responsibility and jobs helps their confidence, encourages them, and prepares them to care about their neighbor.

Our purpose is to honor God and love our neighbor. One day a lawyer wanted to justify himself and asked Jesus who his neighbor was. Jesus told him the story about the Good Samaritan. A guy got beaten, robbed, and left for dead. Both a preacher and a teacher came buy and had excuses not to stop and help. Finally an outsider from another community stopped, picked up the hurting guy, took him to town, and paid to get him fixed up.

Jesus's story and the question of who our neighbor is really isn't about the neighbor. It's about us. Who we think our neighbor is actually comes down to who we are and not who they are. As most of you already know there are folks every day that are put in our path that need help. Don't be too busy or miss the opportunity. Thanks for taking the time to visit. Let's do it again next week.