“‘I will say to my soul,’ says the rich man in today’s gospel reading, ‘Soul, you have ample goods laid up for many years; Relax, eat, drink and be merry.’

But God said to him, ’You fool! This very night your life is being demanded of you…’ So it is with those who store up treasures for themselves but are not rich towards God.”

• Luke 12. 19 7 20

My grandmother had an expression that she used when she considered someone to be sensible, reliable, and with an earthy wisdom that comes from experience of life rather than the study of books. She said: ‘He knows his spuds’; or was it, ‘She knows her onions.’

Sadly, in Britain today it is getting harder and harder to find anyone who knows their spuds. A brief Internet search tells you that an alamring number of children growing up in the UK today are not able to recognise basic vegetables such as carrots or cauliflowers and do not know that chips are made out of potatoes and that bacon comes from pigs.

The newspapers usually report all this with gleeful delight, citing it as evidence that we’re all a bit thick; that schools and families aren’t what they used to be; and that we all eat too much fast food. Some of this is probably correct – we certainly eat too much junk – but the reason a child cannot recognise a carrot is deeper still. It is essentially a spiritual issue.

Let me explain what I mean.

By ‘spiritual’, I do not mean a private, inner realm of consciousness, which is separate from things earthly and physical – though I’m well aware that this is precisely what most people mean when they use the word.

Christianity is a very earthy and physical religion.

It doesn’t observe a division between physical, mental or spiritual things.

It sees human beings, and for that matter, the whole of creation, as a totality – physical and spiritual woven together.

We are, after all in the season of Epiphany, part of our ongoing celebration of Christmas, where we remember not only God hallowing the created world by entering into it, but actually becoming part of it.

At Christmas, God does not come as a visitor but as a participant, bringing the human drama to completion and showing us what being human is meant to be like. God’s word, God’s very essence and being, is made flesh. In Jesus, things earthly and heavenly come together as one.

So, when Christians use the word ‘spiritual’ we are speaking about the whole of life viewed from the perspective of God and therefore to be understood and lived out in the way that God intends. This is not only right and true; it is the only way of happiness, sustainability and prosperity.

It is, therefore, not far-fetched to say that all our problems begin when we break the connections between ourselves and our neighbour and our environment, that is the earth itself.

What’s this got to do with children failing to recognise vegetables?

Well, everything, actually. It is a sign that life has become disjointed; that we have allowed a separation to get so wide that we have even drifted from that which is most basic: the food we eat, the ground we toil, and the seed we sow.

If you don’t know what a carrot looks like, how you will you possibly know what a plough is for? And how will you ever really love the earth or care about the well-being of your neighbour in another land?

We are all becoming more and more like the complacent rich man in today’s story, taking the food on their plates and the water in our taps (and of course the money in  our banks) for granted.

This is the bind we are in: children grow up not knowing where their food comes from; yet at the same time we demand an ever ready supply  of any meat and veg we fancy regardless of the season or of the environmental damage that is done by flying strawberries around the world so that we can eat them on Christmas Day; or sweeping away vast tracts of rain forest so that cattle can graze and we can eat cheap burgers.

Let me tell you a story – sadly, a true one – that illustrates this miserable predicament perfectly.

A few years ago, I was shopping in a Waitrose in Wallingford on the Thames. It was late August. They were selling punnets of blackberries at £5.50 a throw.

And people were buying them. They were billed as a ‘luxury seasonal item’. But from the actual window of the store itself as I queued at the checkout, I could see blackberries growing.

The brambles on the lane that led down to the river outside the supermarket were full of them. You would pass them as you returned to your car brandishing your £.5.50 punnet. You could pick a whole bucket load for free. But you didn’t. 

It is the same as the person who returns from work, puts their ready meal chicken tikka masala in the microwave for three minutes and then sits down to watch MasterChef for an hour.

We have forgotten who we are and where we came from. We think everything will be fine. But it won’t. We don’t know our onions.

We are spiritual beings; which means we are people called to live as God intended and to be good stewards of the earth, the very earth – it is what the word Adam means – that we are made from, just like the food we eat.

As our first reading from Deuteronomy put it –

‘If you will only obey the Lord your God, by diligently observing all his commandments… blessings will come upon you… Blessed shall you be in the city, and Blessed shall you be in the field… Blessed shall be your basket and your kneading bowl.’

And we might add today, ‘Blessed shall be your plough.’

And so, farmers of North Yorkshire, we need you.

Farmers of North Yorkshire, we thank you.

Farmers of North Yorkshire, we pray for you.

Join us and let us work with you to restore connectivity and balance to our world.

Those of us who eat and shop – i.e. everyone! – let us make a renewed effort to support our farmers, to buy local food and to look out for the Red Tractor designation which tells us the food is traceable, safe to eat and been farmed and produced responsibly in this country.

And when we are buying tea and coffee, bananas or other foods that do not grow here, let us make sure we buy fairly traded products so that we know that farming communities in other, often impoverished, parts of the world are supported and enabled to flourish fairly.

Food is a spiritual issue. Farming is a spiritual activity. It is about living our lives and inhabiting the world in a way that is sustainable, beautiful, respectful of the environment, and fruitful not just for us, but for generations to come.

Let us also find ways of joining together to educate people – especially children – about the food on their plates and where it comes from; how to cook, and how to notice and enjoy the rhythm of the seasons, so that we can look forward to brussel sprouts at Christmas and free supplies of blackberries in September, and not expect to have them every day.

In all this we will need patience, courage and perseverance.  The human race itself has drifted from our roots. It is therefore unsurprising that we are bearing little fruit, and that the world around us is confused and conflicted.

Let me speak plainly. We need the patience, forbearance, ingenuity and wisdom of the countryside and of farming, to help the whole of our culture reconnect with the soil. We need to move towards a position where as a nation we are better able to supply the food we need. Therefore we need more farms and we need government policies that support farming. We need to be aware of the global and political issues that affect our environment and communities in other parts of the world who suffer because of our greed and complacency. We need to remember the poor. And we need a church that takes a lead; a church that is for the countryside just as much as it is for the town. In fact the church may be uniquely placed to bring the two together since we serve both.

Our God is a God of unity and peace; a God of town and country, earth and heaven, mind and spirit, the UK and Europe and all the world; and when we catch hold of the all-encompassing generosity and inclusivity of the Spirit of God then we will work well together to build a sustainable and prosperous future; we will plough the fields and scatter the good seed on the land, and God will bless our labours and bring them to fruition. But when we get it wrong, we need to repent and we need to re-connect with God so that we will all know our spuds.

The feast of the Epiphany that we celebrated last week remembers the visit of the wise men to the infant Christ. The direction of their lives was changed by this encounter. May the same be true of us today. May we see Christ and his purposes for this world, and may our lives be changed.