With all this nice weather, my wife and I decided it was time to finish up the garden for the year. We picked the few remaining tomatoes, and the peppers, turnips, carrots, and green beans. We pulled all the plants out by the roots and loaded them in the truck for the burn pile. I got the ladder out, and climbed as high as it would take me and picked the last of the apples and dropped them one at a time to my wife, who was standing below to catch them and gently place them in the baskets. I got the roto-tiller out and discovered it was out of gas because the last person I loaned it to brought it back empty. I filled it up and tilled the garden. My wife has dutifully been canning all the produce. The pantry is full of tomatoes, beets, beans, peaches, apple sauce, and carrots. We are blessed. “Let us fear the Lord our God, who gives the rain in its season, the autumn rain and the spring rain, and keeps for us the weeks appointed for the harvest,” (Jeremiah 5:24).

I’ve been chatting with a few of my farmer friends around the area and they report the harvest is going well. Yields are down a little from last year and prices are terrible. One farmer told me how he was moving his equipment from one field to the next and the rim on his combine broke and he had a flat tire in the middle of the road. And there it sat while they waited for someone to come and weld the rim and then fix the tire. Other farmers have told me similar stories. One never knows what will happen next during harvest, but one thing we know for sure — something will happen.

Last week about 70 people came out to participate in a prayer gathering we had in South Wayne, Wisconsin. We prayed for the healing of our nation, for the upcoming election, and for peace in Jerusalem. It was an outdoor event on a beautiful afternoon and a wonderful time together with God’s people.

I hope you are planning to vote. Following is my voting strategy: I am voting, not for a man or a woman, but for the principles on which this country has stood since its founding. I am voting for Constitutional government. I am voting for a strong and viable military. I am voting for a vibrant economy. I am voting for the right to keep and bear arms. I am voting for the freedom to worship. I am voting for a national recognition of the founding of our nation on Biblical principles.

I am voting for the ability for anyone to rise above their circumstances and become successful. I am voting for my children and grandchildren to be able to choose their own path in life, including how and where their children are educated. I am voting for our borders to be open to everyone who enters under our law and closed to everyone who would circumvent or ignore the law. I am voting for the Electoral College to remain in place, so that a few heavily populated areas do not control the elections. I am voting for a Supreme Court that interprets the Constitution rather than rewrites it. I am voting to teach history, with all its warts, not erase it or revise it. I am voting for the sanctity of life from conception to birth and after.

Voting is the power we have. But it’s only power if we use it.

— Reflections appears regularly on the religion page. The column features a variety of local writers, coordinated through the Monroe Area Clergy Group. Kevin Cernek is senior pastor of Martintown Community Church.