Foyer Bird

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There's this lifeguard axiom that when a swimmer is drowning they need to calm themselves down or risk drowning and taking the lifeguard down with them. Once they stop panicking and flailing around violently they can be rescued.

Sometimes when the thing we need or want most is within our grasp, we actually push it away from us because we're gun-shy due to past disappointments......or fear-stricken by some kind of insecurity. Like a wounded animal snapping at the hand of it's caregiver our fear blinds us to someone who really is only offering help and love, and we do ourselves a grave disservice while hurting the other person. Like the panicking drowning swimmer we're our own worst enemy.

Last spring i had an experience that at the time i knew would come to mean something somehow. I'm walking in the basement of my apartment building with laundry in my arm, and see a sparrow flying back and forth like they do when they're trapped in place they didnt mean to be in. For a second i was unconcerned but then i decided to be a boyscout, so i went about to help the birdy out. I would follow it to guild it to the stairwell, closing doors behind me till i got her up stairs to the entry hall area. Then i wasnt sure how to escort her to the door, so i walked back and forth after her whilst she slammed herself into the glass windows on either side. she was on the top floor area and the door was at the bottom , so i didnt know how to guide her back down. Back and forth whomp, flutter flutter whomp,...then .....she landed on the sill and was still. still on the sill.

Only then was i able to approach and grasp her. as i reached out to get her i was surprised at her response. She stood still . On the sill. She didnt flinch. The finch didnt flinch.I fully expected some last minute fluttering and resistance. But nothing. Then once she was in my hand i was again surprised. I was expecting a racing heartbeat. Nothing. She was calm. There's something i feel whenever i hold a live bird. For one thing i feel like its not natural,..that the bird is meant to be free and i'm an obstruction. For another thing i feel the power i have over it. It's helpless.....it's usually very frightened and at my mercy.....and i always wish i could comunnicate to it that i'm not going to harm it, that i'm on it's side.
I was thinking about it as it was happening, as i carried her to the door to set her free, gently pulling off the cob webs from her wings that she gathered during the ordeal, still a little astonished at how she calmly went along with it all.

The reason that bird suddenly and completely surrendered, is God had told her to be still. I firmly believe now that the whole thing was to be a personal illustration for me. I feel in my walk with God that i spend a lot of time crashing into windows. And i ask the Lord in prayer why. Why can i not seem to get whatever it is you're trying to teach me through my skull?
It's not so much a revelation to me to know that I'm a frightened bird that doesn't understand I'm being pursued for my own good and welfare and not for harm,......what i think i need to know is that God is a faithful and patient deliverer.....allowing me to spend all my energy resisting him until i'm finally ready to be still and know that He is God. To remain calm enough to allow Him to help me, to stop flailing my arms around in fear that i might be rescued.

( Mat 6:26 "Behold the fowls of the air: for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are ye not much better than they?" )



"I wanna be locked in a cage
I wanna be strapped in a chair
I wanna be where you are If my insanity comes Wrapped up inside you
I wanna break my legs In case of thought to escape
Keep the hammer out of my reach
If my pounding impulse comes Wrapped up inside Your arms.... Locked up inside You

Hold me down 'cause I want to know You You bring calm to my rage
You are life and I'm thristing for You Hold me, hold me, locked in a cage"

( "Locked In A Cage" - Skillet )

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