Covenant Stories: Clearing the Land

Story #20 in the Covenant series

There is something magical and exciting when a church building project moves from the cerebral world of ideas to the physical world of dirt and work and sweat. The marking of that special moment is often a ceremonial ground-breaking with painted gold shovels. The pastor and some of the deacons heft a small amount of loose dirt in their shovels and smile for the cameras. That’s as close to the land as most of them will get in their construction project. After the ceremony, the people in suits leave, and the construction team begins the actual work. Something about that scenario didn’t set right with our church. A number of us had been walking this land for close to a decade, dreaming of someday seeing a building there. We felt a passionate connection to our land. The plants, while hostile and thorny, were familiar to us and loved for their wildness. We wanted to be a part of the construction. We wanted to get dirty. The suggestion was made that we clear the building site ourselves instead of hiring someone with a bulldozer. I don’t remember who suggested this, but I don’t recall a single dissenting voice.

Bob Parker, our contractor, thought we were a little crazy, but he showed us what had to be done. A number of us went to the land with him. Standing on the old road down the right side of the property, we were facing a solid wall of vegetation. We could barely make out the first three orange flags that marked the edges of the future foundation. Bob gave us our instructions, which were simply stated:

“What you’re going to have to do is clear a wide path from this road into the construction site, so that we can get trucks and things in there. Then you’ll need to clear everything off the foundation site. There can’t be anything left on it, not a bush or even a small plant. Level it to the ground. And you need to clear about 10 feet around the perimeter as well so that we’ll have room to do our work. If there are some particularly nice trees within that ten foot area, you can leave them and we’ll try to work around them.”

It was the Spring of 1999. The weather was mild, at least for South Texas. We decided that we would work on the land every Saturday until the job was done. Michael Main and I came out the week before we began with a couple of shovels and cleared a large patch of cactus, making the first small inroad into the brush. We worked all morning on that cactus patch. The enormity of our task became apparent to me. This was going to be a lot of work.

We began in earnest the next Saturday and continued for five Saturdays after. When possible, smaller groups worked during the week. On Saturdays we had between 15 and 25 people there at all times. We had three chainsaws, several bow saws, numerous loppers and cutting tools, along with several axes and, of course, my machete. We had a lot of energy, but not a lot of organization or experience. The men tended to snatch up the tools and march straight into the brush, cutting and swinging away. The women, I noticed, hung back a bit, whispered gravely to each other, and began gathering materials for bandages and first aid. They were wise to be worried. The men with the cutting tools were a preacher, a lawyer, a pilot, a radio news editor, a therapist, a band director, a computer technician, and men with other “indoor” professions. There was not a construction man among us, nor was there anyone with any real experience with chainsaws and clearing land.

The miracle was that no one was seriously injured, though Mark - the therapist - received a hard blow to the back when the top of a small tree fell on him. It was cut down by Chuck - the pilot - who had not yet mastered the finer points of cutting down trees or of making sure that people were not in the way when they fell. Thankfully, most of the trees were small and those with the equipment were, if not experienced, at least fast learners. By the end of the first Saturday we had developed a nice system of teamwork. Four distinct jobs emerged from the chaos: the Cutters, the Haulers, the Binders, and the Drag Queens.

And yes, those were the actual names we used.

The process worked like this: The Cutters, wielding chainsaws, axes, and other sharp tools, cut down the limbs of trees first and then the trunks. Smaller vegetation was cut with bow saws, axes, and loppers. The Haulers pulled the debris back into the growing clearing we were leaving behind us. The Binders gathered everything up and attached the bundles to the trailer hitch of a battered brown pickup truck. The Drag Queens, a group of energetic and enthusiastic women, dragged the bundles down the road to the clearing at the back of the property, where they were piled up to be burned later.

It was a big, sweaty, laughing, lumberjack party every Saturday. People who were unable to work for reasons of age or health often showed up with drinks or food, prompting spontaneous cheers and hallelujahs from the work force. I remember in particular that JoAnn Chappell showed up most Saturday mornings with doughnuts and breakfast tacos. Others appeared with Gatorade or hamburgers later on. We worked, we laughed, we poked fun at each other, we ate, we got tired, and we went home. It was a wonderful time. A row of beautiful Oaks were uncovered running along what would become the back of the building. A massive Mountain Laurel was found in what would become a little courtyard near the porch. At the end of each day we would wander through the clearing, trying to imagine what it would be like when there was a building there. Old friendships were renewed, and those who didn’t know each other well were friends by the end of the job. There was a very special, and I think sacred, bond among those of us who cleared the land.

After six weeks there was a building-shaped clearing in the woods. We did it. More importantly, we did it ourselves.

Years later a man told Michael Main and I that he would have cleared the entire foundation in one day for $300 with his Bobcat bulldozer. We thought about that for a moment, then I said, “I’m really glad we didn’t know you back then because we might have been tempted to let you do the work for us.”

And wouldn’t that have been a shame?

Gordon Atkinson

The first Saturday

Me, Chris K., and Lyle C.

The brown truck

The oaks that now stand near our building

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