It's not quite winter yet, but here in Northwest Arkansas, we've already had a fairly cold, and wet November. The first week of December hasn't been much better. The trees have dropped their leaves, the grass is dry, and yellow, and the sparrows aren't hanging around in my front yard. It feels like winter, but it isn't. It used to be a time of wonder, and mystery to me. With the Nativity, the choirs, the lights on houses and downtown, all we need is a snow for the season to be special. We haven't had a snow at Christmas time since 2012. We've had snow in early December, mid-December, and after Christmas, but somehow we've escaped a white Christmas. The older you get the more you hope it doesn't happen. As I sit at my computer writing this, it is a nice sunny day and 48 degrees. I have the front door open and the sunshine is pouring in through the glass storm door, making my home office nice and toasty warm. All is good, except...there aren't any sparrows. My little buddies seem to have found better places to be. Next year, I'm going to put up a bird bath in the front yard so I can watch them from my office doorway. I'd put up a bird feeder, but the squirrels would hog it all. I haven't seen a bird feeder yet that could keep out squirrels. Still, I know God cares for the little sparrows, and as ironic as it may seem, we are part of His love and care.
Yesterday, I went to Sonic for lunch, and watched as a bunch of sparrows fought over a bunch of spilled french fries, and a bun from a dropped hamburger. It was quite comical as one particularly large sparrow tried to heft the bun. I'm sure the bun weighed more than he did, but he was determined to make a getaway with it. The more he worked at it, the more attention he drew from his companions. Soon there were about five or six sparrows tearing chunks from the bun and flying off in victory.
Not far from the bun was one sparrow who'd discovered a french fry. He grabbed it up in his beak and made off like a bandit. It is just like God to use us messy humans to provide food for a group of sparrows. It made me wonder if the sparrows got together and decided to go to Sonic for a holiday feast, knowing full well that there would be 'droppings' for them to eat.
I've said it before in this blog and I'll say it again, the knowledge that God cares for us more than He does the sparrows, makes this season special to me. In that statement made by Christ, is a truth that should encourage every sparrow. Jesus didn't say that God didn't care about sparrows, He said that he cares more about us. It is knowing that God loved...me, and everyone enough to give us His Son as a way to have eternal life, that makes Christmas a mystery. Perhaps, the sparrows are smarter than we are. I don't think sparrows wonder if we love them, or that we deliberately drop food for them. They just enjoy the feast we provide. If only our faith was that simple. If only we could jealously guard the salvation given to us by our loving heavenly Father. No questions, no worries, no moments of doubt. Somewhere within the angelic choir singing praise to God in the highest, is an angel who's duty it is to make sure that someone drops a bun, or spills some fries. That angel will make sure that a Tyson feed truck hits a bump and drops scoops of chicken feed along the road. What's good for the chicken is even better for the sparrow. If He does this for Sparrows, think of what He does for us. Somewhere, someplace will do an act of kindness and wonder why they did it. Someone will be given a thought to give a blanket to the homeless shelter, or work in a soup kitchen, or even give coins in a Salvation Army kettle. It may seem like only a french fry or a scrap to the one giving it, but to the one receiving, it is love.
I know my sparrows will be back. I know they will have somehow made it through the winter with or without my help because they have a God who cares for them.
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