The God who watches sparrows
A reach for greatness is fine, but it's not creating our worth
The fact that the bible says God watches the sparrows should surprise me more than it does. Folks who call themselves birders often don’t care much about sparrows.
When someone sees me carrying my camera, the first assumption is that I’m bird watching. (Second, that I’m paparazzi lol) I will often get stories about them seeing a bald eagle. It’s fine, but can I tell you I’ve never gotten a sparrow story? Not once. Lol
Here are a few sparrows I’ve seen. There might be as many as 13 near where you live. Take notice, and when you do, join the God of the universe who prizes sparrows as much as eagles.
What does that mean to you in your life?
I think we all would prefer to have the consideration, attention, or reputation of eagles. Reaching to be an eagle is fine, but even if you make it, God’s care for you doesn’t increase. It’s set for all time in the sparrows as much as the eagles.
I think that with our careers, there are private moments of plotting and hoping for greatness, notice, or esteem. In all of these moments, there can lie an unspoken desire to separate ourselves from the garden variety of the world—a harmless ambition to make a mark and do something special. The challenge for us is to delineate that desire from our value. Whether we succeed or not, our worth is set. We are considered. More than that, we are valued, looked after, and loved by the God of the universe. Much of our life, and the voices within it, try to convince us otherwise. A steady drumbeat reminder that we, in our most common and ignorable, overlooked ordinariness, are intrinsically loved and watched should buoy our hearts as we reach for heights.
A magazine we hadn’t ordered, subscribed to, or requested arrived in our mailbox a few weeks ago. It sat on our kitchen table a few days with an array of other discardable pieces of advertising disguised as personal mail. The main article featured on the front was titled In Pursuit of Awe. I both recognized the sentiment and judged it to be deeply flawed.
I have pursued awe. I’ve tried to instigate awe in others by something in myself. What I’ve learned is that if I sit still, awe tends to show up. God’s interest in sparrows is encouraging and a point of correction in all our pursuits. Awe is uncovered in the everyday as much as the faraway. This can be encouraging for the adventure seekers and the aspirational. The highest judge of beauty has rapt attention on what we ignore. I want to sit with that and let it guide my pursuits for moments of eagle soaring.
There’s nothing wrong with maximizing our efforts for greatness, but let this be a helpful reminder that at the end of all those efforts, as we stand in our often normal, unremarkable outcomes, the attention of the Creator is still cheering for us, noting His handiwork in what is overlooked, even by us.
Be well, friends.