I came to my desk to write and stopped to stare a moment out the bedroom window this afternoon.
I was sipping on a little jar of kombucha. The chimes clanged and clonged with the wind knocking them together. We are probably going to get an early spring and the juniper tree that offers it limbs to hold the three bird feeders is already starting to produce more juniper berries.
Down below from the second story a variety of wild feathered friends were quite busy scratching their little claws into the bark dust and cleaning out the bird feeders. The little birds in the feeders flush out the seed to the dirt below as they stab their little beaks into the pile of grub. The heavier ones that can?t hoist themselves as quickly onto the food racks count on the little ones to throw it down for them. The big and small are all busy cleaning up the dirt floor.
I?m not really great at recognizing the types of birds, yet. I say yet because I might take that little hobby up someday. I did see a few doves with their smooth looking forms and tons of little brown, spry sparrows. My personal favorite is the quail with their chubby little chicken like bodies and their little feathered top hats bobbling as they speed across the grass.
Thinking about all the different varieties of birds there are, I got to wondering if the Lord ever makes any two the exact same.
I decided he does not. I have come to the conclusion that he must love variety and uniqueness. There are no two snowflakes, raindrops, flowers, blades of grass or thumbprints ever precisely the same.
Nothing is exactly the same that the Lord creates.
So, if the Lord loves variety and unique things… I can take comfort in the fact that I am not the same as someone else, and I don?t have to try and be. I can be free of trying to fit into a mold that wasn?t made for me.
I can wear bold colored, flowered scarves around my head and don peach colored lipstick in the midst of women who don?t, with confidence. I can teach and raise my children differently than others without fear of human judgment because the Lord?s opinion is the only one that really matters.
I don?t have to be down on myself because I can?t remember what an adverbial clause is when it seems the rest of the homeschool mom?s understand.
I do not have to feel less than I should because when I open the car door, something falls out every single time.
Yes. EVERY. SINGLE. TIME.
We are all different than all the rest of us and were made that way on purpose. We all should be proud of our diverse gifts, skills and abilities to develop and create in this fantastic canvas we call earth. We need each other no matter how insignificant we think we are.
The architect needs the man who makes the bricks. The baker needs the wheat grower. The concert pianist needs the piano tuner. Models need the designers, and the designers need the photographers. The school teacher needs the janitors, and the artist needs your appreciation. You can come up with tons of these examples, they just never end.
The birds also need each other. They depend on and listen when one says there is a danger. They nest together and eat together. They do community with each other in all their different colors, shapes and sizes. In their tiny little brains, they understand they need each other. Now, shouldn?t we take a little lesson from these feathered creatures and know that we need each other to fill in where we weren?t gifted?
You’re unique, just like me.
Alone, we don?t have it all, but together we complete the job. I need you, and you need me.
~ Prudence O’Hair
