Day 11 - The Visitor
I regretted being away from home when the call came.
My daughter called laughing, "There's a bird in our house. What do I
do?" After instructions were given for shooing the feathered friend back
to his habitat, I called back a few minutes later to check the status and
inquired, "What kind of bird was it?"
She said, "It was a cardinal, Mom." Stunned, I hung up the
phone. Stunned and pleased that this shy, quiet red bird came close enough to
my door to enter, sit on the arm of my sofa, circle the room and exit
gracefully.
For sixteen months I observed the movement of
cardinals. I watched the rhythm of life outside my window move through the
seasons while inside life stood still. Always, there would be a cardinal to
cheer me, to offer solace and hope. Each time they would visit a tree branch or
the feeder, some message would come forth and I would write my thoughts:
November
2007
There
is a canvas outside our living room window that Fall has painted. The river
birch leaves are the color of mustard and closer to the window a holly loaded
with red berries. As Megan and I view our “painting” it comes to life with a
bright red cardinal, working among the berries in the holly tree. I wish I knew
more about birds, but I do know that the cardinal spends the winters here in
Atlanta. Yesterday, there must have been 1000 birds overhead, fleeing for the
winter. Other birds, like robins, sort of stay around, but hide themselves. I
always felt bad for the robin, remembering the child’s verse, “The North Wind
will blow, and we shall have snow, and what will the Robin do then – poor
thing? He’ll sit in the barn, to keep himself warm, and hide his head under his
wing – poor thing!”
Could the
winter habits of birds be teaching me something about suffering? Warren Wiersbe says that in suffering we tend
to fall into three categories of coping. We can escape – flee when the cold
winds come. We can endure – hide ourselves under our wings – poor things! Or we
can enlist – find an evergreen loaded with nourishment to shelter us from the
storm. We, unlike birds, have a choice.
I will choose
the cardinal this winter. Escaping is out of the question, enduring is
drudgery, but enlisting is taking the winter on, finding the bright, red
berries in the cold, singing when the wind blows cold, and trusting that Spring
will certainly come. I am not surprised at wonderful and amazing God – He not
only gives the wintering cardinal the instinct to nest in the protected denseness
of the holly, but also provides food right outside the door of his nest and
places it all for us to view. How much more does he provide for us? As the song
says, “His eye is on the sparrow, and I know He watches me."
For a cardinal to actually come into my house was, for
me, a visit out of the ordinary. Maybe you have had such a visit. Others had
those visits. Isaiah was visited by God's counsel 700 years before the birth of
Jesus. He must have been so profoundly moved by his vision he wrote in Isaiah
9:6, "For a child has been born for us." Mary, Joseph,
the shepherds, and wise men all had visits out of the ordinary. But the
smallest visit to earth was Jesus himself - a tiny, out-of-the-ordinary child
who came for us. And He still calls us today, saying, "Listen! I am
standing at the door, knocking; if you hear my voice and open the door, I will
come in to you and eat with you, and you with me." Revelation 3:20
I open my door today with hope - even in the cold -
and invite Him in.
