Wednesday, July 1, 2020

“Look at the birds, free and unfettered, not tied down to a job description, free of care in the care of God. And you count far more to him than birds.” (Matthew 6:26, The Message Bible, with a minor alteration of my own.)

                Happy Canada Day everyone! Stay True North, strong and free!

                I sat there, outside, on a beautiful, warm summer Sunday,

                                thinking and praying about the world we live in.

                The robins’ sweet, joyful warble interrupts my worries and concerns.

                I stop yammering at and hectoring God.

                I listen to her song,

breaking through the rustle of the breeze in the trees

                                and I marvel at her unbridled enthusiasm for the day.

                Why, I ask myself, is she so happy and  ecstatic about her life?

                                She eats worms, for heaven’s sake!

                But she sings for all her worth, uninterested in my questions or opinions,

                                careless of my mood and my thoughts.

                She does not even know I am eavesdropping on her serenade.

                                Nor does she care one whit.

                She is not singing for me anyway.

                                How typically presumptuous of humankind to think everything is about us.

                                Even birdsong.

                She is whistling a happy tune because all is right with her world at the moment.

                                Life is good.

                                She has food and water.

                                The sun is warm.

                                There is a comfortable breeze.

                She has no words but simply expresses herself in song.

                For it is we, humans, who need long-winded reasons and explanations

 to sing and play and worship.

This small red-breasted maestro simply sings

 because that is what she was created to do by the Creator.

She is very good at it!    

                She has no need to be an ego-centred existentialist         

                        who needs to dissect, analyze, parse, explain, examine

and demand rational answers to figure out this world.

                This robin is of the world and about in the world.

                It is enough!

Today, it fills her with a joyful, singing embrace of what she is experiencing.

                She has found her place and it is good.

It overflows with sacred blessing and the Creator’s charm.

She puts her day into trills and melody.

The robin sings because this is uniquely her song,

her Psalm for a Sunday morning,

rising up above the world so sweet.

Dale