"Don't you know?
Your Father in heaven knows just what you need and
Seek him first
And everything else that you need will be given.
Don't you see?
He loves you much more than lilies and sparrows.
Come and rest.
Don't waste today being scared of tomorrow."
- Lillies & Sparrows, Jess Ray
I see him as I near my house. "Oh no!" The words leave my mouth though there's no-one around to hear them.
He's lying on his side on the concrete, bright green wings shockingly vibrant considering that all breath has left his body.
I kneel to pay my respects. Ants have begun to circle his head.
I search around for something to pick him up with; I can't leave him on the footpath. I'm crying as I locate a piece of bark.
I walk back and bend down towards him again, trying to angle the bark just-so to scoop him up. My first attempt doesn't work because his skull has stuck slightly to the concrete. I cry a little more.
My second attempt is better; I use the bark to lift his head and my hand to cradle the rest of his body.
His wings are the softest things I've ever felt. How strange that only his death would allow me to touch them.
I lay him under a bush and dig my fingers into the surrounding soil. Sprinkle it over his body. Stand.
I have to get ready for Bible Study.
The gentlest whisper floats through my mind as I walk back inside, accompanied by a holy shiver: this is how I feel, too.
***
Jess Ray's 'Lilies and Sparrows' has been the song of much of my January and February. It immediately stuck out to me on a first listen of MATIN: Rest and pulled me out of black holes on hard days.
My Father in heaven cares more for me than these little sparrows I so love, I thought. I can get through the day.
As February dragged on, requiring more of me than even last year, I began to doubt my God who cares for lilies and sparrows. Where is God in the midst of this drudgery? Could my class be any more challenging? Was I ever going to feel like I was on top of things?
Lilies and sparrows ceased to flit through my mind. I dreamt only of emails and parents and principals.
Towards the end of February, I began to find my footing in the new school year. I found strategies that worked for (some) tricky students; I committed to always observing a full day of Sabbath on Saturdays; I closed my laptop at 8. I began to feel more human.
On Wednesday, when I embarked on my walk, I had been paying particular attention to the birds. Lines of swallows perched on the phone lines; a rosella glanced cautiously up at me as he flitted across the path. And then, at the end, there was my little green friend lying motionless on the pavement.
True, he wasn't a sparrow. I flicked through the pages of my New Zealand bird book as I re-heated noodles and discovered he was a Rifleman. A juvenile.
Riflemen are plentiful in New Zealand, particularly in Auckland. One could say they are as ordinary as sparrows.
And yet, his death showed how extraordinary he really was. There was nothing ordinary about his death. It was right for me to kneel and cry and look at this beautiful bird that had, only some hours before, been puffed with life. Our Father in heaven cares for him.
***
March has begun and I'm looking ahead at one of my fullest weeks. Work continues to haunt my dreams; I'm reluctant to leave the house for church this morning.
But the God of lilies and sparrows is still my God, even on this, a hard day, looking ahead at what I know in many ways will be challenging week.
"Consider the birds," says Jesus, gently. Today, and each day this week, I will.
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