Yes… This is an AI generated image and the cow does potentially have 5 legs. lol
Modern agriculture has created a strange moral narrative.
If a farm is small, it’s virtuous.
If a farm is large, it’s corporate.
And if it’s corporate, it must be bad.
In the public imagination, agriculture has been divided into two categories. On one side sits the romantic picture: a small family farm, a red barn, a few animals on pasture, and a farmer who personally knows every acre of land he works. On the other side sits the “villain”: The large operation. Thousands of acres, large equipment, and a business structure that many people assume must be driven only by profit.
The conclusion many people draw is simple: small farms are good, large farms are bad.
But reality on the ground is far more complicated.
Small farms can fail to care for the land and livestock just as easily as large ones. Large farms can be responsible stewards of land just as easily as small ones. The size of an operation does not automatically determine the character of the people running it. Yet the public conversation around agriculture continues to treat the size of an operation as the dividing line between Moral and Immoral.
This raises a deeper question:
Is the real problem in agriculture scale… or stewardship?
Stewardship is the responsible care and management of something entrusted to you that ultimately belongs to someone else.
The Bible has a lot to say about land, responsibility, and provision. Many farmers understand something that many folks in the urban sector have forgotten: land isn’t something we truly own. It’s something we manage for a period of time. Unfortunately, I occasionally see farmers who have forgotten this as well.
Scripture consistently frames people as stewards of what ultimately belongs to God.
Psalm 24:1
“The earth is the Lord’s and the fullness thereof, the world and those who dwell therein, for he has founded it upon the seas and established it upon the rivers.”
That verse changes the entire conversation around agriculture. If the earth and everything on the earth belongs to God, then farmers are not the ultimate owners, we are the stewards. The size of the operation becomes secondary to how faithfully it is cared for.
The real question becomes:
How is the land being managed?
A 50-acre farm can degrade soil just as easily as a 5,000-acre operation. Livestock can be managed well, or poorly, on farms of ANY size and greed can drive a small family farm just as easily as it can drive a large corporation.
The scale of a business doesn’t automatically mean that it is bad, but unfortunately the public perception surrounding agriculture generally assumes that growth itself is the problem. Large farms and ranches are frequently viewed with suspicion, as though expansion means that they have “sold out” or abandoned their values.
Part of this public perception comes from legitimate frustrations. Over the past several decades the agricultural sector has seen significant consolidation.
For example:
Beef Packing
80-85%
controlled by JBS, Tyson, Cargill, National Beef
Poultry Packing
55-60%
controlled by Tyson, Pilgrim’s Pride (JBS), Perdue, Wayne-Sanderson
Pork Packing
65-70%
controlled by Smithfield, Tyson, JBS, Seaboard
Egg Packing
45-50%
controlled by Cal-Maine, Rose Acre, Hillandale, Versova
Sheep/Lamb Packing
~60%
Controlled by Superior Farms & JBS
Seed
60-70%
controlled by Bayer, Corteva, Syngenta, BASF
Fertilizer
50-60%
controlled by Nutrien, The Mosaic Company, CF Industries
Its no wonder why farmers feel squeezed between rising input costs and commodity markets they cannot control.
These realities have fueled distrust, not only toward those corporations, but also toward larger farms and ranches in general. But it is worth asking whether the public has misunderstood where the real problem lies.
Just because a farm is considered “Large” does not mean that it is corporate agriculture. Many large operations are still family-run farms that have expanded over generations. The equipment may be bigger and the acreage larger, but the same responsibilities remain: care for the land, care for the animals, and produce food for others.
In fact, the Bible never frames stewardship as something that must remain small.
Jesus gives a principle that applies remarkably well to agriculture:
Luke 12:48
“But the one who does not know and does things deserving punishment will be beaten with few blows. From everyone who has been given much, much will be demanded; and from the one who has been entrusted with much, much more will be asked.”
That applies to land just as much as it applies to financial wealth or public influence.
If a farmer has been entrusted with thousands of acres, the responsibility to manage it well is greater, not smaller.
At the same time, there is another side of the conversation that too often goes unspoken.
In agriculture, there can also be pressure to remain small, not because it is economically wise, but because it fits a cultural expectation. The image of the small family farm carries a great deal of emotional weight in our society today. For many farmers, it represents their heritage, independence, and identity.
Land payments must be made. Equipment must be maintained. Families must be supported. Markets rise and fall, weather changes without warning, and the cost of operating continues to increase.
Sometimes the pressure to maintain the perfect image of the small family farm can lead farmers into dangerous financial territory. Refusing to grow, adapt, or change business models simply to preserve the label “Small Family Farm” can place enormous strain on family operations and ultimately can destroy them.
History is filled with farms that disappeared not because they grew too large, but because they refused to adapt when economic realities demanded it.
Growth, when handled responsibly, is not a betrayal of agriculture. In many cases it is the only way a farm can remain viable across generations.
For those who view farming through a Christian lens, this responsibility goes even deeper than economics. The Bible repeatedly ties the care of land and animals to the duty of provision and stewardship.
The book of Genesis gives one of the earliest descriptions of humanity’s role in creation:
Genesis 2:15
“The Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to work it and keep it.”
The language used in that passage carries two ideas: to work/serve and to watch over/guard.
Agriculture has always required both.
Farmers are called to produce food from the land, yes. I don’t believe anyone would argue that. But they are also called to protect the land. To guard what has been entrusted to them so that it remains productive long after they are gone.
Stewardship also requires farmers to ask a question that seems to not be asked enough today.
Who will care for the land after I am gone?
Land outlives every farmer who works it. The fields we plant today were once managed by someone before us, and one day they will be managed by someone else. The decisions we make today shape what that next steward will inherit. Biblical stewardship has always carried this view.
Proverbs 13:22
“A good man leaves an inheritance to his children’s children, but the sinner’s wealth is laid up for the righteous.”
For farmers, that inheritance is not just financial. It includes the condition of the soil, the health of the pastures, the water quality that flows through the land, and the viability of the farm business itself. In other words, don’t pass on a crap sandwich to the next generation for them to attempt to fix.
But stewardship also forces another uncomfortable question:
Who should receive the inheritance?
Not every generation is equally prepared to steward land well. Sometimes the greatest threat to a farm’s future is not weather, markets, or government policy, but instead poor leadership in the next generation. Farms that took decades to build can be destroyed in only a few years if stewardship is replaced with short-term thinkers and ill-equipped leaders.
This is a tough reality that forces farmers to wrestle with very difficult decisions.
Should land always remain within a family if the next generation has little interest in stewarding it well?
Is preserving a family name on the deed more important than ensuring the land is responsibly cared for?
What responsibility does a farmer have to the land itself when making those decisions?
If the land ultimately belongs to God, those questions are not simply personal ones. They are part of stewardship as well.
Caring for the land means more than just managing it today. It means thinking carefully about who will be entrusted with it in the future. Sometimes, the person or family who would be the best choice to take over the land is the largest operation in their county. Other times, it may be someone who just started.
Agriculture is one of the few professions where the consequences of poor stewardship cannot be hidden for long. Soil eventually erodes. Pastures eventually start to fail and require more inputs. Animals eventually reflect the conditions in which they are raised. In that sense, the land itself becomes a kind of witness.
Every farmer or rancher, whether managing fifty acres or fifty thousand, will eventually leave the land behind for someone else to manage. Long before that happens, the land will already tell the story of how it was treated. THE LAND WILL NOT LIE
Did it grow healthier over time? Did its productivity improve? Did it support families and communities? Or was it simply extracted from until it was exhausted?
Modern agriculture often debates technology, efficiency, and scale. Those discussions matter, but underneath them all sits a deeper question that Christian farmers have fought with for centuries:
What does it mean to faithfully manage something that ultimately belongs to God?
