Last evening, Chappy and I took our big kids to see the group "Down Here" in concert. Are you scratching your head? If you don't recognize the band name, I bet you will recognize their biggest hit (if you love Christmas music, I know you will): "How Many Kings". It is a GREAT song with POWERFUL words!
Before the concert, we went out to grab a quick bite to eat. Just as we were finishing up, an old friend walked in and exclaimed that she got married last year. I was so happy for her, because she has been a single mom for many years. Her first husband left her when their daughter was a baby. She chattered on and on about her new husband: "He is so wonderful". "We have everything in common". "Can you believe we met on E-Harmony?" "He fasted and prayed for 21 days before contacting me once we were matched on E-Harmony". "He is such a Godly man". "I have never been happier". And it is true.....she was glowing!
As the conversation began to come to a close, a woman who had been sitting all alone in a small booth beside our table eating a salad stood up to clear her plate. She stopped for a moment and said: "I don't mean to be listening in on your conversation, but you sound so happy. Your happiness gives me hope. I just finished five months of chemotherapy and my husband left me. I'm all alone now."
How does God manage it? We are all His children, and He loves us dearly. One moment, He shares in the excitement of one and the next moment in the sorrow of another. He laughs with the one laughing and holds the other who is crying in His arms.
Recently, I picked up a book called: "All God's Creatures" by Gary Richmond. In the book, I found something very interesting about the eagle:
"The eagle provokes or stirs up its young every time it lands on the nest. Landing on the nest is the biological signal given to baby birds that it is time to eat. The hungrier they are, the more stirred they are. By landing and leaving time and time again, the eagle is modeling important behaviors and hoping its young are motivated to follow. It becomes a matter of life and death for all concerned that the young learn to fly and hunt, for at a certain point, the parent eagles can no longer keep up with the demands of feeding their young."
"Teaching occurs when the mother hovers over the nest. The young, who have been beating their wings furiously for days, practicing flight, imitate what they have seen demonstrated repeatedly---how to fly, hover, take off, and land. The hunger of the babies finally causes them to rise above their fear of falling. It becomes a do-or-die situation, for everyone has to leave the nest sometime."
"When this mother catches her babies on her wings, she is demonstrating protection. When she carries them, that is support. It is what parent's do. If we didn't support our children and believe in them, they wouldn't do nearly as well."
"An eagle's parenting techniques are an integral part of its complex nature, but one of the most notable quality of eagles is their extraordinary ability to fly. When eagles soar, it is not by their own strength. They merely extend their mighty wings and are lifted by the rising currents of air. They make themselves available to the wind in much the same way that God wishes us to make ourselves available to His strength and His Spirit, so we may "soar on wings like eagles."
"God wants us to place our trust in Him, and He will strengthen us. His strength is made perfect because of our weakness. He never meant for us to live life on our own. He meant that we should be willing and trusting, like the eagle whose ability to fly is only as great as the wind that carries it. Our strength is in God."
We serve an amazing God, don't we? He is always on course...completely dependable and capable. All He asks us to do is to trust Him, in our joy and our sorrow, because He is able to carry us through it all.
"Do you not know? Have you not heard? The Lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He will not grow tired or weary, and His understanding no one can fathom. He gives strength to the weary and increases the power of the weak. Even youths grow tired and weary, and young men stumble and fall; but those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint." Isaiah 40:28-31
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