The activity in our backyard picked up considerably this summer. Last spring, I hung a bird feeder from a tree branch outside our sunroom. It took a few weeks, but the feeder began attracting a variety of birds. I was refilling it every day.
So I decided to buy a larger feeder. Before long, both of them needed refilling daily as the number of birds visiting them increased. For Father’s Day, Martha got me a peanut feeder to attract woodpeckers, and I purchased another feeder so I could experiment with different blends of birdseed.
The result is a mesmerizing and sometimes comic display. Wrens, sparrows, cardinals, goldfinches, purple finches, grosbeaks, chickadees, nuthatches, titmice and woodpeckers flock to this part of our yard, flittering between the feeders, the birdbath, the birdhouse, and a thick bush just over the fence in our neighbors’ yard. It is not unusual to see a dozen birds at the feeders, another dozen or so perched on the chain-link fence awaiting their turns, and morning doves, squirrels, chipmunks, and rabbits all foraging on the ground below the feeders where seeds and shells have fallen. At one point this summer, we decided that multiple sparrow families had declared “learn how to feed yourself” week. Dozens of tiny sparrows would fly from the birdhouse or the bush at the same time, some perching at the feeder, some landing on the ground, others not ready to go any further than the fence. In addition to all of this, monarch butterflies and hummingbirds have frequented the butterfly bush and the flowers planted in the garden box on the ground. Martha calls this area the “open table” with “enough for everyone.” I call it our “peaceable kingdom.” It is a constant source of total delight.
It might be hard for us to imagine, but surely God experiences such moments of delight watching us. Some of us grew up being taught that God was always looking down on us with severity, watching for any mistakes we made. Others have imagined God as a benevolent but mostly absent grandparent in the sky whose attention we seek through prayer. These days, a lot of us are justifiably feeling righteous indignation about what’s going wrong in the world, and we can’t imagine God having any joy about anything. In fact, we may be offended that anyone – up to and including God – should allow themselves to enjoy life, because there’s so much wrong to be corrected! Or, we may feel deep sadness over tragedies that have swept away innocent lives, and choose to focus on how God is weeping with and embracing the world’s victims.
But Christ revealed a God who is endlessly empathetic, identifying with all our pain andjoy. Just as Jesus, who bore the weight of the world’s sin, laughed with others and fully entered into celebrative parties, so God’s capacity for joy is not diminished by the pain and suffering in creation.
God enjoys whatever brings true joy to us. Yes, we all have important work to do. We are all equipped to serve God’s reign with our skills, abilities, and talents. But even with the demands of our Christian discipleship, God never wants us to lose our joy. In fact, God works to “complete” our joy (John 15:11). So don’t ever reject the gift of those moments that bring delight, and remember that your joy also brings joy to God.
©2018 by J. Mark Lawson
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