This past weekend we, as Christians, celebrated Easter. Easter is the perfect time where we can reflect on exactly what Christ did for us back on calvery. Easter is also a time where eggs are dyed, hunted and at our house, the eggs are thown!
Easter weekend also gives us a lot of family time. This past Saturday, my family ended up spending most of the day at my parents' home. My mom was excited to show us this bird's nest in the tree beside their back porch. This was not just any ol' bird's nest but this nest was housing three baby birds. This is where my story begins. Throughout the weekend and through these baby birds, God gave me an Easter Revelation.
The baby birds had been there in the nest for a little while. I'm not sure what all happens during the first days of a bird's life, but these baby birds already had feathers and were quite large. Throughout the day on Saturday, I would go check on the birds to see if they were doing anything interesting. Most of the time they seemed to be frozen -- because they were sitting real still with their beaks wide open. I commented about the frozen "beak-open" look, and my mother explained that the momma bird would come periodically to feed them and then she'd flutter off again. These baby birds wanted to be ready when their momma arrived with their food. Once, on one of my trips by the nest, I counted four birds. My mom, --who is not an expert in birds by no means, but had been "bird" watching the past few days --said the fourth bird in the nest was daddy bird. Apparently, he hung out in the nest a good bit while mom was off finding food for her babies.
Sidenote, I have to admit that I got a little upset about ol' daddy bird just hanging out in the nest while momma was out hunting food. I said out loud more than once to daddy bird in the nest "Get a job!" By the way, this was not my Easter Revelation! Hang on --- Sunday's coming.
So late Saturday evening, my family headed back to our home. When we left, there were 4 birds in a nest, and momma bird must have been still out doing what she does.
On Sunday, after a wonderful church service, the entire family returned to my parents' home. Lunch was served and afterwards, I walked over to check on the birds. Honestly, I expected to see the same scenario that I had seen the day before, but I was surprised. I saw birds! Not just beaks poking out of the nest, but full body birds. Three birds standing up on the edge of the nest. Daddy bird was not present -- maybe he had taken my advice! Today was their day to leave their nest. They were made for this day. They were made to fly. As I stood there watching them, each one would hop on the branches and flutter their wings. At that moment, God spoke to me. Isn't that crazy how he does that?
He said, "These birds were made to fly, yet they are sitting there afraid to move, afraid to fly, afraid to do the one thing I made them to do." And then I realized that we are so much like these birds. God made us for a purpose, and we (like the baby birds) are often afraid to move, we are afraid to step out and do the one thing we are made to do.
Okay, back to the birds. They each would hop to the edge of a branch and then they'd hop back to the middle of the branch. All three were out of the nest. Thinking to myself that they needed my help, I suggested to my husband that he go help them fly. I honestly didn't think he would actually get up from his chair, and walk outside to help them, because if I really thought he would have, I would have came up with a better plan. Nonetheless, the next thing I knew, my man is beside the tree and before I knew it, he had a limb and was shaking the tree. The Result?? The birds were shook from the tree. Two took flight and flew to a "non-shaking" structure. One bird, however, flew or should I saw fell, to the ground below. Once on the ground, he hopped to the edge of the fence. This turned out not to be his wisest choice -- for the neighbor's dog was on the other side of the fence thinking it was his lucky day because he was fixing to get a snack!
Guess who saw all of this transpire??? You know it -- MOMMA bird. Yep, she was watching the whole thing. She immediately came swooping down, squawking at my man in disgust, but also chirping for her babies. I will give credit where credit is due, I do believe that I also saw daddy bird also making a mad dash to check on the situation as well.
The two that took flight, found shelter in the grill out back. (Yes, I know, the grill may not be the safest location --but that's another story for another day!) The one that refuse to fly and hid in the grass, finally started hopping toward the momma bird's chirp. I'm not sure how this story ended yesterday after I left, but I did go check the nest today, and it's empty.
Later last night, as I recalled the Easter Day events, God continued to use these birds to show me some truths. Sometimes we (like these baby birds) are sitting in our "comfee" (sp?) nests, knowing we were made for a purpose, yet we are afraid and refuse to operate in our purpose. Then, suddenly, without warning, our tree gets shooked. Something happens in our little world that knocks us out of our comfee nest. At that point we have two choices:
1) to fly --- to do the thing we are made to do; or
2) to hide -- hiding puts us in harms way (remember the neighbor's dog) and we can be destroyed (or eaten alive!)
At first, we may not be good at our purpose, (these baby birds were a little shakey on their first flight -- but at least they did it) but each day, we will get better at fulfilling our purpose and at least when we are flying, we have God's protection with us. God (just like this momma bird) is always watching us, and he knows when our tree is being shook. He knows when we fly, and he knows when we hide. Good news, -- even when we hide, he is still wooing (or chirping) us back to him.
What did God make you for? What is your purpose? Discover it, and then GO FLY.
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