Marshallah

What a nice day today was. Sure, I had to spend time at the mall Christmas shopping and it was rather dismal outside, but I also added a new bird to the list of those I've seen in Brimfield. The bird was a juvenile Red-headed Woodpecker. That makes 161 species I've seen in Brimfield and it means that I've seen seven species of woodpecker in town. As a matter of fact, the first bird of each of these species that I saw in Massachusetts this year was in Brimfield. All pretty fun facts, making me enjoy all the more the simple beauty of a single one of God's wondrous creatures.

One of the first things that I've done most days of Advent this year is to watch an on-line video devotion sponsored by the United Church of Christ. Today's devotion was bird related. You can watch it here. Rev. Panagore shares some interesting facts about birds and then shares an interesting word that he learned in Turkey marshallah which means "behold the marvelous works of God." That's exactly what watching birds is all about.

December Ticks

Nothing like a good double-entendre for a title; yes, I actually had a tick crawling on me after a traipse through a wooded area on the second day of December! There is something very wrong with that picture! And that is the theme of this post. On the left you will see something wrong with a picture. What is wrong is that I should have taken the real camera with me today instead of relying on my cell phone camera. In any case, that smaller goose in the center of the picture is a Cackling Goose. Yes, the bird that claimed me by its naming is now officially a tick on my life list. Unfortunately, this very obliging bird was in Branford, Connecticut, some 80 miles too far south to make my Massachusetts list. I did, however, check out the report of the same species in Southwick on my way home, but to no avail. Something is wrong with this picture! Of my 391 life birds, I have only gotten 275 of them in Massachusetts, although my Massachusetts life list is 363. That's right, there are nearly a hundred species of birds that I've seen in my lifetime that I saw in some other state before seeing them in my home state.

Another thing wrong with the picture today was the reason I went to Connecticut to begin with, that being what turned out to be life bird number 390, a Calliope Hummingbird. How this tiny visitor from the west has survived these cold temperatures, let alone getting all the way to the east coast is a great mystery. It was a beautiful creature and I wish it well, but I don't have great hopes for its long-term survival unless it figures out very quickly which way is south.

These out of the ordinary opportunities are what drives much of the obsessive joy of birdwatching. If everything were always normal, never changing, never surprising, then we would never have any reason to have hope. While I don't have high hopes for the lost vagrant hummingbird, I have to remind myself that it survived getting here, so it has an outside chance of surviving to get somewhere else where it can safely remain. God always gives us a slightly out of focus picture, showing us that some things just aren't right. BUT, there always remains the hope that if God can make things the way they are, God can also make things better. I don't pretend to know why God works the way God does, but I do choose to believe that part of the way God works is to use me to make the changes necessary. I witnessed one of those changes today. A couple of people watching the hummingbird struggle to get to the feeder that was swaying due to the wind decided to tie it to a stake. This had an immediate impact on the birds ability to feed. Who knows, that simple, inspired act may be the very thing that saves this bird's life. Often it isn't the extraordinary effort that is needed, just simple works of kindness.

One Lucky Guy

Of all the big obvious things to be thankful for, I'm thankful for all them: family, friends, health, employment... I am truly one lucky guy when it comes to all these things. At the community Thanksgiving Service last Sunday, when I asked the congregation to name those things for which they are thankful, my teenage son was the first to shoot up his hand and he said, "family." I'm thankful for him too, as well as the rest of my children, and most especially my wife, who could find plenty of reasons not to put up with me but does anyway!

When I named my items of gratitude, I decided to add to the obvious with a more subtle list of small joys that make life so very rich. In the days preceding the service, I had first seen the David Grisman Quintet in concert, then held a saw-whet owl while volunteering at a banding station, then spent a gorgeous day on Nantucket Sound seeing thousands of birds all around the boat (the photo above doesn't do justice to the vast numbers, but it does include a Lesser Black-backed Gull, a Black-legged Kittiwake or two, and few Greater Shearwaters).

Isn't always those simple joys that stand out from the routine of our lives that make us recognize the full extent of the rich blessings that come from God? Of course the birds of the air (and sea in this case) do that for me. How about you? I think that it is the smaller blessings that help us to develop a complete and genuine attitude of gratitude.

Named and Claimed

Recently, I preached about naming and claiming. In that sermon I suggested that it is suspect theology to think that we can boss God around by naming promises that God has made and then claiming them for ourselves. Likewise, the blessing often promised by those holding this view is material gain. My point about claiming possessions is that the possessions ultimately claim you. In fact, one who is too concerned about possessions might rightly be called possessed.

Since that sermon, on one of my birding expeditions I saw a life bird (i.e. one I had never seen before). It actually was a species that didn't used to be a species. When I started birding there were Sharp-tailed Sparrows. I've seen a lot of Sharp-tailed Sparrows over the years. But a number of years ago, the species was divided into Salt-marsh Sharp-tailed Sparrows and Nelson's Sharp-tailed Sparrow. The sharp-taileds I regularly see are of the Salt Marsh variety. Had I seen what later became Nelson's? Perhaps, but even so, I needed to see one after the split to make it "official." So I have been hunting this species for a number of year's now. It occurred to me, that although there are subtle differences between these species, the power lay in the name itself. I was "claimed by the name!" More to the point is my current obsession with trying to find a Cackling Goose (you can see more pictures here) This species used to be considered a sub-species of the Canada Goose and was called a Richardson's Goose. I've actually seen a Richardson Goose, but it was years ago when it wasn't its own species, so officially it was a Canada Goose. A few show up in the area every fall, so I'm constantly flustered by reports that leave me a day late and a dollar short. If the powers that be ever decide to do the same sort of splitting to make Oregon Junco a separate species I'll face the same silly dilemma.

Is all of this just a bit obsessive and not particularly important? You bet it is, but it is important to me. We all can be possessed and controlled by worries that are far less important than life and death. I will wander into fields full of thorns and burrs to chase a sparrow, but in the end I walk away when the chase is over, even if the bird remains "in the bush" and not "in my hand," that is, on my list. Are their topics and issues that burn in you that possess and control you? What names claim you and your attention, liberal? conservative? Democrat? Republican? Pro-life? Pro-choice? The list could go on. If there are topics on which you always take the bait, then maybe you owe yourself the gift of an exorcism. Sometimes we all need to just walk away from a chase that is over. Tomorrow is another day and why ruin the wonderful gift known as the present?

A Present

I received these words of Wendell Berry in an email from Sojourners today. I pass along the gift to you:

The sense of it may come with watching a flock of cedar waxwings eating wild grapes in the top of the woods on a November afternoon. Everything they do is leisurely. They pick the grapes with a curious deliberation, comb their feathers, converse in high windy whistles. Now and then one will fly out and back in a sort of dancing flight full of whimsical flutters and turns. They are like farmers loafing in their own fields on Sunday. Though they have no Sundays, their days are full of sabbaths.

- Wendell Berry

Living Up to Your Name

I was doing the most mundane of tasks this morning, taking out the trash, when I was called upon to live up to my name as a birder. Well, that makes it sound like the demand for my skills was some matter of importance. Naturally, it was simply the fact that I noticed birds in the tree top and wanted to investigate. Still, the fact remains that I needed to “transform” into a birder in an instant, which, of course was no transformation at all since I’m never not a birder.

The reward of being prepared (my binoculars were practically at my fingertips to begin with) was adding two more species to the list of birds I’ve seen in or from the parsonage yard. For those keeping score at home, I had heard a Red-shouldered Hawk being harassed by crows prior to taking out the trash, then Nashville and Tennessee Warbler joined the hawk on the yard list bringing the total in four years to 66 species. This was an event typical in the practice of my birding in that I never know where or when I will be called upon to live up to the name of birder.

If “living up to my name as a birder” sounds a bit forced, that is because it is. I intentionally want you to think about living up to your name as a Christian, a much more important consideration! The name Christian literally means little Christ. Some children are named after famous and important people and may feel a bit of a burden in living up to their name. How much greater is our burden in living up the name of Christ. Part of our worship each Sunday is glorifying and honoring the name of Christ.

In her book, How Shall We Worship?, Marva Dawn asks these important questions:

Does the character we exhibit in our daily lives bless [Christ’s] name or blacken it? Do we honor God’s name or malign it by the way we worship? If we engage in our supposed “worship” only to make ourselves feel good, are we exalting the Holy Spirit’s name or denigrating it?....Do we sing to God with all our being? Do our practices of public, corporate worship and private, personal devotion form us to be people who live praise?

When we engage in the rituals of our worship it is clear that we are Christians because of the form and content of the worship. But what happens when we leave the sanctuary? First of all, do we continue to worship during the week? Second, do we engage in any practices that identify us as Christians? Would anyone see in our lives the living of worship and the living up to the name of “little Christ”?

Mt. Auburn Cemetery Memorial Service

“Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds of the air; they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? And can any of you by worrying add a single hour to your span of life?" - Matthew 6:25-27

Perhaps when Jesus said “Look at the birds of the air,” he didn’t mean it as an imperative describing how one should behave all the time. But I have to believe that since Jesus did say it that I at least have some cover for my bird-watching obsession. For nearly twenty years now I have been a serious bird-watcher. It is no exaggeration to say that it is something I do 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Now you might say that I’m not birding when I’m inside, but I am as long as there is a window (especially if it is open so I can hear birds singing). Not to mention that my family has grown accustomed to my identifying bird sounds on the sound tracks of television shows and movies. They hear more than they care to when the location of the movie and the range of the bird don’t match, or as is often the case, the sound doesn’t match the bird shown (Turkey Vultures do not screech like Red-tailed Hawks)!

Looking at the birds of the air compels me to get up, get out and chase those winged creatures that are carefree in the care of God. And the more I let go of the concerns that might stop me, and the more that I marvel at the beauty of these flying artworks, the more I learn about not worrying…well at least not worrying about non-birding issues. I do tend to get a bit worked up about my birding. Like most birders, I can be very intense when chasing a bird I’ve never seen before (a life bird, or lifer). I also keep multiple lists, which can shape my time and come close to running my life (particularly during migration).

And then there are the birding competitions. Yes, I know, competitive birding sounds like an oxymoron. The competitions are opportunities to maximize the birding experience in one 24-hour period on a limited playing field that birders call Big Days. I’ve been a Big Day birder for over a decade now. I recently returned from my 11th time competing in the World Series of Birding in New Jersey, where my team had a personal best 193 species, finishing in the top ten for the second straight year. Along with some of these same teammates, I was on the winning team at the Third Annual Super Bowl of Birding this past January on the North Shore. These are about the furthest thing from a casual stroll along the paths of this cemetery admiring the avian parade passing by. There are rules to abide by and little time for abiding.

I use the word abide advisedly, since we tend not to use it often in its original, etymological meaning. Instead, we more commonly think of the word in terms of toleration; “I can’t abide rude drivers,” or in the sense of the idiom I just used, to abide by the rules. But on this day when we might well remember the hymn Abide With Me, my focus in on the sense of the word meaning to stay put, to remain steadfastly in one place.

Swift to its close ebbs out life’s little day;
Earth’s joys grow dim; its glories pass away;
Change and decay in all around I see;
O Thou who changest not, abide with me.

At the opposite end of the scale from frenetic pace of a birding Big Day as I’ve described it, there is a newly emerging way of doing a Big Day called a Big Sit. Instead of going to the birds, a team remains steadfastly in one limited space and lets the birds come to them. This sort of abiding is one of the more sublime joys that birders experience.

There is something mysterious, almost mystical about birding at times. Birds are wise enough to know that concealment is a valuable defense against predators, so whether it is the dense cover of a thicket, the remote reaches of a marsh, the thick canopy of leafy trees, or just the other side of a tree trunk, birds know how to hide from sight. So very often, if a birder wants to encounter a sought after species, he or she is required to remain steadfastly still. Sometimes the waiting one must do is completely passive, given that there is nothing you can do to entice the bird to arrive, appear or otherwise make its presence known; you simply wait. Waiting in silence, and sometimes in darkness as well, is an act of faith. There is never a time when I venture out into creation that I don’t expect to encounter birds (and other surprises). I have certain expectations, but almost every intentional birding expedition has at least one disappointment and one surprise. One only has these types of experience by first having the faith that they will happen.

I have this type of faith in God. I never know what to expect from God. If anything, I expect the unexpected, I anticipate being surprised by God because I believe that God is still speaking. I take seriously the advice of that “great” theologian, Gracie Allen; “Never place a period where God has placed a comma.” This still-speaking God is clearly unpredictable, often surprising and sometimes even dangerous, but one thing that is steadfastly true is that God is good.

Sure, there are many things that we don’t like in this life and it is easy to be angry at God because that is whom we blame. At this moment of remembrance, we gather at a chapel (and abide the ramblings of clergy) because we acknowledge that ultimately God is responsible for all life; both giving and taking. So we have the classic glass half-full/half-empty dilemma. I would argue that the evidence for a half-full glass is all around us. Look at the beauty of this place; a place set aside both for the preservation of the beauty of memory and beauty of nature. It is no coincidence that refuges set aside for wildlife and holy property set aside for sacred use share the same name: sanctuary. Pessimists don’t expend energy maintaining sanctuaries.

Or to bring the message full circle, look at the birds of the air. We have every reason to be filled with hope when we see the care and attention that God gives even to the birds and the flowers. This is the same hope to which we cling when we face and remember the loss of loved ones from this life. The reason for our hope is that we are known and loved by a God who abides with us. At the heart of my faith is the story of a God who is steadfast; stubbornly sticking to a plan of loving humanity and all of creation. In addition, the great love of this God compelled the very creator of the universe to enter into creation itself, in order to abide with the creatures. Not only have we received the promise that God, and God’s holy love will always abide with us, we are welcomed to make that our home, our abode if you will. We have the comfort, if we choose, of abiding in God’s love. That is our hope this day. We may choose to worry and fret and go it alone. Or we can be like the bird who sings in the darkness sensing the dawn to come and in hope be carefree in the care of our God who loves us madly.