We watched a couple of wrens build a nest on our carport. We keep a push broom there, hanging upside down near the ceiling, and they decided those stiff bristles would make a nice base for a home. Back and forth those small pudgy brown birds flew all evening, sometimes carrying twigs twice their own length and clumps of moss over half their girth.
The next morning we went out to see the finished product. We two judgmental humans stood their bemused. It was the ugliest, rattiest, messiest nest we had ever seen. It was way too big for wrens. Because it lay on top of a narrow broom, it had to lean up against the side wall to keep from falling off, and that put the hole on the side instead of the top of the nest. Didn’t those silly birds know the eggs would roll out? And besides that, it’s July, far too late for birds to be building nests and laying eggs. We said all these things, looking at one another and shaking our heads.
“But,” said, Keith, “they are the birds and I assume they know what they are doing.”
Of course they do. Birds have been building nests and laying eggs from Genesis 1 until now and they do just fine. In fact, it is a rare morning I don’t step outside and hear half a dozen wrens singing back and forth to one another. They are not in danger of extinction.
I wonder why we don’t trust God that way. If anyone knows what he is doing, He does. He has been doing it far longer than wrens have been building nests, and the earth still turns, the sun still shines, and the seasons continue to revolve one into the other. I could not do any of these things, and if any one of them suddenly stopped, so would we.
Yet I second guess and complain because things don’t go the way I think they should. Like a child who thinks he should have everything his own way, I forget that there is a larger purpose at work here, one far more important than my own selfish wants and desires. And, like a child, I don’t always realize what is in my own best interests. It takes a mature outlook to see beyond the moment, to understand the complexities of circumstance that transcend my own time and place.
God knows what He is doing. If I can trust a couple of little brown birds, surely I can trust Him.
Then the Lord answered Job out of the whirlwind and said, Who is this that darkens counsel by words without knowledge? Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth? Tell me if you have understanding. Who determined its measurements—surely you know!...Who provides for the raven its prey, when its young ones cry to God for help, and wander about for lack of food? Is it by your understanding that the hawk soars and spreads its wings toward the south? Is it at your command that the eagle mounts up and makes his nest on high? Shall a faultfinder contend with the Almighty? He who argues with God, let him answer it, Job 38:1,2,4,5,41; 39:26,27; 40:2.
Dene Ward
The next morning we went out to see the finished product. We two judgmental humans stood their bemused. It was the ugliest, rattiest, messiest nest we had ever seen. It was way too big for wrens. Because it lay on top of a narrow broom, it had to lean up against the side wall to keep from falling off, and that put the hole on the side instead of the top of the nest. Didn’t those silly birds know the eggs would roll out? And besides that, it’s July, far too late for birds to be building nests and laying eggs. We said all these things, looking at one another and shaking our heads.
“But,” said, Keith, “they are the birds and I assume they know what they are doing.”
Of course they do. Birds have been building nests and laying eggs from Genesis 1 until now and they do just fine. In fact, it is a rare morning I don’t step outside and hear half a dozen wrens singing back and forth to one another. They are not in danger of extinction.
I wonder why we don’t trust God that way. If anyone knows what he is doing, He does. He has been doing it far longer than wrens have been building nests, and the earth still turns, the sun still shines, and the seasons continue to revolve one into the other. I could not do any of these things, and if any one of them suddenly stopped, so would we.
Yet I second guess and complain because things don’t go the way I think they should. Like a child who thinks he should have everything his own way, I forget that there is a larger purpose at work here, one far more important than my own selfish wants and desires. And, like a child, I don’t always realize what is in my own best interests. It takes a mature outlook to see beyond the moment, to understand the complexities of circumstance that transcend my own time and place.
God knows what He is doing. If I can trust a couple of little brown birds, surely I can trust Him.
Then the Lord answered Job out of the whirlwind and said, Who is this that darkens counsel by words without knowledge? Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth? Tell me if you have understanding. Who determined its measurements—surely you know!...Who provides for the raven its prey, when its young ones cry to God for help, and wander about for lack of food? Is it by your understanding that the hawk soars and spreads its wings toward the south? Is it at your command that the eagle mounts up and makes his nest on high? Shall a faultfinder contend with the Almighty? He who argues with God, let him answer it, Job 38:1,2,4,5,41; 39:26,27; 40:2.
Dene Ward
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