After installing several new feeders recently, along with some new bluebird houses and a couple of small birdbaths, both the numbers of birds visiting us, as well as the varieties, increased proportionately.  The very first day we spied a new one.  It didn’t take long to find him in the bird books I have—a brown-headed cowbird.
            The cowbird is a member of the blackbird family, and it is easy to think him some sort of blackbird.  That brown head is not obvious at a distance.  He stretches 7 to 8 inches from head to tail, glossy black with a chocolate brown head and a pointed gray bill.  Cowbirds do, however, have a negative trait—they lay their eggs in the nests of other birds, then go off and expect that bird to raise their young.  Sometimes the host bird will destroy the unfamiliar eggs, but far more often, they will raise the cowbird nestlings, often neglecting their own.  Cowbird chicks are so much larger than the hosts’ chicks that they take most of the food and leave the others hungry.
            Do you know what they call birds that steal nests and abandon their young to others?  Parasite birds.  I had never thought of it that way, but it is a legitimate biological classification.  Cuckoos do it.  Wood ducks do it.  In fact, about 750 species of bird do it.
            Humans wouldn’t do that, would they?  We wouldn’t ignore the sanctity of marriage between one man and one woman, breaking up a home at will just because “I want him now,” or “I don’t love her any more.”  Why can’t I steal someone else’s nest if I want it?
            I have things I want to do, a career that makes me important.  I’m not made for taking care of children--I shouldn’t be saddled with these kids.  Why can’t the government raise them for me?  Why can’t I hire someone to do the dirty work?  Why can’t I lay my eggs in someone else’s nest and expect them to be responsible for my children?
            Why do I have to work to support my family?  Why should I have to control my physical hungers?  Why can’t I live as I want and not have to bear the responsibility of what follows?  Why can’t I deposit my burdens in someone else’s lap to pay for and tend to?
            I wonder if biologists have a class of human called “parasitic.”  “Entitlement” comes to mind; “selfishness” as well, not to mention “irresponsibility.”  God holds us accountable for our lives, for our health, for our families, for all the privileges we claim, especially in the most blessed society in the world.  He expects us to exercise self-control.  He expects us to be mature in our choices and responsible for them.  He expects us to be considerate of others in those choices too.
            Now that I have about 95% of you agreeing with me, let’s take it one step farther.  What about Christians who deposit their children in Bible classes and expect the church to teach them?  Sometimes parents will see that the child does his lesson, but sometimes the teachers are lucky if a workbook accompanies a child at all, much less one that has been well-studied and filled out.  The Bible tells us that parents are to teach their children, not the church.  It is certainly commendable to take them to Bible classes, but the example they see many, many more hours a week at home is the one that they learn from.
            The brown headed cowbird is one of the most disapproved of birds in the avian world.  Why is that we think the same sort of behavior, in any of its manifestations, should be acceptable, even applauded, in ours?
 
But understand this, that in the last days there will come times of difficulty. For people will be lovers of self, lovers of money, proud, arrogant, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, without natural affection, unappeasable, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not loving good, treacherous, reckless, swollen with conceit, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, having the appearance of godliness, but denying its power. Avoid such people. 2 Timothy 3:1-5

Just like in our old place, my elliptical machine sits on the back porch.  So, as I trudge off to nowhere for 45 minutes, I take in my surroundings in probably more detail than I ever would just walking through it.  Unfortunately, there is not much to take in.  The yard is postage stamp small. The back porch and patio take up most of the backyard.  Around the edges we have a wood pile for the portable fire pit and grill which sit on the patio, narrow strips of ground to store garbage cans and watering cans, and a raised bed for flowers eventually—once we find some that can survive both the almost perpetual shade and the morning sun reflecting off the white back fence for the few minutes a day that it does.  So far, no luck.
            The fence comes thanks to our neighbors on each side and the HOA which has one surrounding the outer edge of the neighborhood, against which we sit.  And that is where we see most of the activity.  Squirrels run across it, jumping into the oaks on the other side of the wall or scampering across accessible rooftops.  Cardinals, wrens, mockingbirds, blue jays, and a few bug eaters we have yet to identify perch along the top.  The neighbor's cat walks it like a tightrope.  Then there are the lizards.
            I had a bad encounter with a lizard as a child, so these are not my favorite creatures.    So far, only one has stealthily crept into the house and I hope it is the last.  I am not certain of all the varieties we have.  The ones we see the most are called anoles.  They were brought into southern Florida from the Caribbean and have spread into the southeastern United States.  The anole is a "redneck."  What looks like his throat is actually a dewlap which he can inflate into a red balloon larger than his own girth.  I know because, as I march along on the elliptical, one of them lies on the fence just opposite me and inflates his.  With my vision, it's the throat I see, not the rest of him, but it's not that difficult to figure out.
            Why does he do this, you ask?  Two reasons, I have read.  First, he is trying to scare away competitors for his territory, and/or his enemies.  Second, he is trying to attract a lady anole.  I have often wondered what would happen if I cared enough to get close and punctured his balloon with a needle.  Turns out that has happened to many an anole from things like thorns on bushes or splinters on pieces of wood.  So, will he be less able to defend his territorial rights?  Will he be less attractive to females?  Will he become sterile altogether?  No one really knows because no one has set up the experiment to find out.  It is too difficult to set up a closed system, evidently.
            But that big red balloon of a throat always makes me think.  It seems that anole comes looking for me every day because I never see that big balloon of a throat, relatively speaking, until he creeps just opposite me.  Then he moves up and down doing mini-push-ups, just as if he were pumping up a bicycle tire, and gradually that red balloon grows to a size I am certain he is proud of, and he will not leave.  He stays there as long as I do.  Yet he never manages to scare me off.  So why not go another way?  The very idea that something so small and virtually harmless could scare away something thousands of times its size and weight is ridiculous.
            And when it all boils down, isn't the Devil nothing more than a redneck lizard?  Do not get me wrong; I understand that he can be dangerous to anyone's soul.  But the truth is, he has already been defeated.  The moment Jesus wakened from the dead and left the tomb, his end was decided.  When the seventy returned, having performed miracles, including the casting out of demons, Jesus said, I saw Satan falling like lightning from heaven, Luke 10:18.  Already, he meant to be saying, he is losing the battle for men's souls.  If we don't finish the course, it is not because we couldn't, but because we wouldn't.
            Not a big red dragon, but a tiny little lizard compared to the power of Jesus and his resurrection, pumping up his tiny balloon of a throat, trying to scare us into submission.  That's all Satan is compared to the power of Christ in us.  When I get off the elliptical machine and walk outside, that little lizard runs for all he's worth.  Make Satan do the same as you wield all that mighty armor against him.  Don't let him stake his territory on your soul.
 
Put on the whole armor of God, that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil… withal taking up the shield of faith, wherewith ye shall be able to quench all the fiery darts of the evil one (Eph 6:11,16).
Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you (Jas 4:7).
 
Dene Ward
           

My daughter-in-law saw it on her back porch—a dust bunny walking, instead of blowing, along.  She took a picture and let the internet identify it.  "A junk bug."  "A trash bug."  "A garbage bug." "An aphid lion." And perhaps most colorful of all, "a masked hunter."
            I was surprised to find that it is common everywhere.  Surprised because I have never seen one and I am a native of Florida, the land of bugs.  The junk bug is actually the larva of the green lacewing, considered to be a beneficial insect because, like ladybugs, it eats many garden pests, especially aphids, hence the name "aphid lion."  It is a voracious predator, stabbing soft-bodied prey with sharp hollow horns and sucking their insides out.  Besides in your garden, you are most likely to see a lacewing around your porch light at night.
            But the lacewing larvae have a unique trait.  They carry on their backs the carcasses of their dead prey, which acts as camouflage against birds and predatory ants.  Check the pictures online.  The camouflage works well indeed.
            But don't we act like these bugs ourselves?  We go through life picking up baggage, piece after piece, until we are weighed down with it, practically unable to move.  At least the bug doesn't go that far.  God has given us a place for all that luggage and it is not on our backs.  Cast your burden on the LORD, and he will sustain you…(Ps 55:22).  None of the things we carry with us help us live our lives.  None of them is necessary for survival.  Only God fills that role.  Give him the junk on your back and you might be surprised at what you can accomplish.  Blessed be the Lord, who daily bears our burden, Even the God who is our salvation. (Ps 68:19).  We don't even have to worry about our salvation—He takes care of that too.
            Or do we cling to it as an excuse for our lack of motivation, for getting nothing done for the Lord because we have all this excess baggage from our lives?  That can happen as well, hanging on to the burdens of life like a security blanket because it's all we know.  Well, it's time to unload.  Whatever burden you carry with you today, drop it off at the door as you go out to live your life.  God considers our failure to do so as evidence that we don't trust Him, and as arrogance that we don't need Him.  Show Him otherwise this morning.
 
Commit your way to the LORD; trust in him, and he will act (Ps 37:5).

Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God so that at the proper time he may exalt you, casting all your anxieties on him, because he cares for you (1Pet 5:6-7).
 
Dene Ward

Every dog we have ever had has loved a good belly rub, but Chloe seems to have taken it to another level.  It isn’t just that she begs for a belly rub, it’s that she thinks God put her here to have her belly scratched, and that scratching her belly may be the only reason He put us here.
            A few people seem to have the same opinion about themselves and the church.  The only reason God instituted a church is to pander to their every need.  It seldom seems to cross their minds that other people have needs as well, and that those needs may be even more critical than theirs.  Chloe wouldn’t care if the house were on fire if she saw us running outside.  She would still scamper up, plop herself on the ground and roll over—isn’t that why we came outside, to scratch her belly?  A Christian who thinks he is the center of the universe is behaving the same way.
            Others think the only reason God put them in the church was for the church to listen to them.  They never ask a question in a Bible class, or offer a comment to stimulate discussion and deep thinking.  Instead they have all the answers and are happy to tell you exactly how things ought to be done, even things that are not specifically spelled out in the scriptures.  They know best.  It amazes me when these are people new to a congregation, who don’t yet know the background and experiences of the people they are trying to advise, often including elders, or who are in their mid-twenties with little life experience behind them.  Kind of reminds me of Chloe who thinks a belly rub is appropriate any time of day, any place, even while you are trying to shoot a rattlesnake that she obviously has not seen.  But she knows best, Boss!
            Then there are the ones who think their feelings, or the feelings of a family member, are all that count.  The church is supposed to pussyfoot around and never offer exhortation or criticism that might “offend” by our definition of the word.  They think they are put here to be stroked and petted and “have their belly rubbed” regardless of what might be happening to their souls.  Reminds me of that passage about people “whose god is their belly”—nothing matters at the moment but how they feel.  I am not about to let Chloe roll over on her back in the middle of a garden row I have just planted that is supposed to help feed us this year, no matter how much it hurts her feelings for me to tell her, “No!”  Some things are more important than her feelings, and if she were my child instead of my dog, I would explain that to her rather than let her do as she pleased and cost us a few hundred dollars worth of groceries. 
            So what do you do about people like that?  You do the same thing the Lord did for you when you were still that immature and selfish.  You tolerate, you teach, you show them a better way with the example of your own service and willingness to accept abuse or take on responsibilities that are not yours but that you do because they need doing and you are there.  You love them in a way they don’t deserve and yes, you rebuke when necessary and hope they won’t act childishly and run off to play somewhere else, where everyone will scratch the belly they offer, and let them be the only ones who matter and the only ones worth listening to.
            The Lord did all that for us, and he expects us to do it for them.  Some day maybe they will learn to be better than a silly little dog who thinks the world is here to scratch her belly.  Didn’t you?
 
And we exhort you, brethren, admonish the disorderly, encourage the fainthearted, support the weak, be longsuffering toward all. 1Thes 5:14
 
Dene Ward
 

Wrens are known for building nests in odd places and we have a couple who have proven the point.  They can’t seem to help themselves when it comes to building nests.  And fast?  In less than an hour they are ready to set up housekeeping.   Anything that is left open and alone for that amount of time is fair game.
            We’ve found nests in boxes of empty mason jars in the shed, and on the lawn mower seat under its protective tarp.  We’ve found them on the bristles of the push broom which hangs upside down near the ceiling of the carport.  We’ve found them in roof gutters, and draped plastic sheeting.  We’ve found them in flower pots, tomato vines, and empty buckets.
            We usually buy dog food in 50 lb bags at the feed store and keep it stored in a large plastic garbage can in the shed.  We carry Chloe’s daily allotment in an old three pound coffee can, which we then shove sideways on the handlebars of the old exercise bike until the next day’s feeding.  Last month we found a wren’s nest in that can, obviously built after Chloe had been fed the day before, hanging precariously, rocking in the breeze. 
            Immediately Keith duct-taped it more securely to the handlebars so it couldn’t be blown or jostled off, and found another old can to use for Chloe’s feed.  It has become something of a joke now—remember to put up the [whatever] before the wrens find it.
            This doesn’t happen just once a year.  The mother wren incubates the eggs for about 2 weeks and then both parents feed them until they can fly, about two weeks later.  Often, the last few days of feeding, the father takes over completely so the mother can start another nest.  In our Florida climate, they often build a third nest after that one.  They are like little nest-building machines—wherever they can, whenever then can.
            Isn’t that the way we should be about the gospel?  Too many times we’re out there making judgments about where to sow the seed instead of strewing it about everywhere we can.  We decide who will and who won’t listen and worse, who we deem “worthy” to hear.
            That certainly isn’t what Jesus did.  He taught dishonest businessmen and immoral women.  He taught the upper class and the lowest of the low.  He taught the diseased and the disabled, as well as the hale and hearty blue collar workers.  He taught people who wanted to hear and people who just wanted to make trouble for him.  Shouldn’t we be following his example?
            Too many times we worry about the reception we will get.  When Jesus sent out the seventy, he didn’t say, “If you don’t think they’ll listen, then shake the dust off your feet and go elsewhere.”  What he said was, “If they don’t listen,” which means everyone had a chance to decline if that is what they chose to do.  We can’t seem to stand the possibility of rejection, not an auspicious trait for disciples of the one who was “despised and rejected of men.”
            We should be like wrens, speaking about our faith anywhere, even the most unlikely places, to anyone, even the most unlikely people.  Over and over and over, like we can’t help ourselves, like our lives depended upon it, because maybe they do.
 
Therefore I testify to you this day that I am innocent of the blood of all of you, for I did not shrink from declaring to you the whole counsel of God.  Acts 20:26-27.
 

 

We talked once before about the need to teach facts as well as attitudes.  You have nothing to base your attitudes on if you don't have the facts.  But there is one real problem with facts-only teaching.  You can know the story of the Good Samaritan so well you can quote it, but can you put feet to it?  Can you look at your own life and apply it to your situation?  Over and over I have taught the lives of various women in the Bible only to have an entire class look at me with a blank stare when I ask how it applies to their own lives.  If we want people to learn this skill, we need to start teaching it to them as children. 
            Keith and I are team-teaching a class.  When we went over the Parable of the Sower (or the Soils), by the time we had finished they could tell you about each soil in depth.  So the next class, I wrote descriptions of different people, giving these imaginary people the sort of names their own friends and classmates have to make them seem more real, and asked, "Which soil is she?"  "Which soil is he?"  Once they got the hang of it, they could answer with only a few seconds thought.  Finally I had them do it.  "Tell me how someone would act if he were…" fill in the blank with whichever soil you care to name.  They did very well.  I had to laugh though when we asked, "What would someone look like if he were good soil?" and one of them answered, "Us!"  I hope he is correct, and at least at this point, I think he is.
            This past week we tried something else.  First I had them name various things Jesus taught in short phrases:  love your enemies, let your light shine, enter the narrow door, do unto others etc., and be wise as serpents— you can easily come up with more.  Then I handed each a situation they might someday be facing if not in exact detail, then something similar.  We asked them what they would do in that situation and what thing Jesus taught had led them to that solution.  They gave us good solutions to the problems.  The difficult thing was finding something in Jesus' teaching that would have helped them know what to do.  As we talked together, if we mentioned one they could instantly see how that tenet of teaching informed the situation.  They could also see that sometimes there was more than one right way of handling the situation and not to be judgmental if someone did something else as long as they did not sin.   We will be repeating this activity again and see if things are improving.
            As many times as Keith has visited fallen away members and read passages to them only to be faced with that same blank stare, I wonder if maybe it's time to give us grown-ups a dose of the same medicine.  Don't think for a minute this is kids' stuff, but maybe if we taught our children this way, there wouldn't be so many adults who are clueless about, as we so often have heard prayed, "applying these things to our daily lives."  That is certainly what God expects us to do.
 
For it is written in the Law of Moses, “You shall not muzzle an ox when it treads out the grain.” Is it for oxen that God is concerned? Does he not certainly speak for our sake? It was written for our sake (1Cor 9:9-11).                                                                                          
 
Dene Ward

We raised pigs when the boys were growing up.  A pig a year in the freezer went a long way toward making our grocery bill manageable, everything from bacon and sausage in the morning to chops and steaks on the supper table, ribs on the grill, and roasts and hams on our holiday table.  The first time the butcher sent the head home in a clear plastic bag and I opened the freezer to find it staring at me nearly undid me though.  After that Keith made sure to tell them to “keep the head.”
            We bought our pigs from a farmer when they were no more than 30 pounds.  That created a problem that usually the boys and I were the only ones home to deal with.  Once the pigs were over 100 pounds they could no longer root their way under the pen, but those young ones did it with regularity, especially the first week or so when they had not yet learned this was their new home and they could count on being fed.  More than one morning I went out to feed them and found the pen empty, spending the remainder of my morning looking for the pig out in the woods.
            One Wednesday evening when Keith had to work, the boys and I stepped outside to load us and our books into the car for the thirty mile trip to Bible study, only to see the young pig, probably 40 pounds by that time, rooting in the flower beds.  We spent the next forty-five minutes chasing it.  You would think three smart people, two of them young and agile and me not exactly decrepit in those earlier days, could corner a pig and herd him back to the pen.  No, that pig gave chase any time any one of us got within twenty feet of him, and they are much faster than they look.
            You see things in cartoons and laugh at the pratfalls exactly as the cartoonist wanted you to, knowing in your mind that such things never could happen.  When you chase a pig you find out otherwise. 
            Once we did manage to corner the thing between a fencepost and a ditch and Lucas, who was about 12, leapt for him with his arms outstretched.  Somehow that pig managed to move and Lucas landed flat on the ground on his stomach while the pig ended up trotting past all of us on his merry way, wagging his head in what looked like amusement.
            Another time Lucas actually got his arms around the pig’s stomach, but even an un-greased pig is a slippery creature.  Nathan and I never had a chance to grab on ourselves before it was loose again and off we all ran around the property for the umpteenth time, dressed for Bible study by the way, which made the sight much more ridiculous, especially my billowing skirt.
            We never did catch that pig.  He simply got tired and decided to go back into the pen.  I had opened the gate and as he trotted toward it, we all gratefully jogged behind him, winded and filthy and caring not a hoot that it was his idea instead of ours.  Still, he had to have the last word.  Instead of going through the open gate, at the last minute he ran back to where he had gotten out in the first place and slunk under the rooted out segment of the pen.  Then he turned around and looked at us.  “Heh, heh,” I could almost hear with the look he gave us.  We shut the gate, filled in the hole, loaded up the feed trough, and went inside to clean up, arriving at Bible study thirty minutes late and too exhausted and traumatized to learn much that night.
            God is a promise maker.  He has given us so many promises I could never list them all here.  We have a habit of treating those promises like a pig on the loose, like something we can’t really get a good hold of, certainly not a secure one. 
            I grew up in a time when it was considered wrong to say, “I know I am going to Heaven.”  Regardless the fact that John plainly said in his first epistle, “These things I have written that you may know you have eternal life,” (5:13), actually saying such a thing would get you a scolding about pride, and a remonstrance like, “Let him who thinks he stands, take heed lest he fall!”  We were too busy fighting false doctrine to lay hold of a hope described as “sure” in Heb 6:19.  
            That word is the same one used in Matt 27:64-66.  The priests and Pharisees implored Pilate to make Jesus’ tomb “sure” so his disciples could not steal the body and claim a resurrection.  He told the guards, “Make it as sure as you can.”  Do you think they would have been careless about it?  Do you think there was anything at all uncertain about the seal on that tomb?  Not if you understand the disciplinary habits of the Roman army.  It is not quite as obvious because of the different translation choice, but the Philippian jailor was given the same order, using the same word, when Paul and Silas were put in prison:  “Charging the jailor to keep them safely [sure],” and he was ready to kill himself when he thought they had escaped.
            That is how sure our hope is--“an anchor…steadfast and sure.”  It isn’t like a pig we have to chase down.  It isn’t going to slip through our fingers if we don’t want it to.  Paul told the Thessalonians that “sure” hope would comfort them, 2 Thes 2:16.  How comforting is it to be fretting all the time about whether or not you’re going to Heaven?  How reassuring is it to picture God as someone who sits up there waiting for you to slip so He can say, “Gotcha!”  That is how we treat Him when we talk about our hope as anything less than certain.
            I never knew what to expect when I stepped out of my door the first few weeks with a new piglet.  If we hadn’t needed it, I would not have put myself through the anxiety and the ordeal.  Why in the world would anyone think that God wants us to feel that way about our salvation?
 
…in hope of eternal life, which God, who cannot lie, promised before times eternal, Titus 1:2.
 
Dene Ward         

Wrens are known for making their nests in strange places.  On the carport, the old exercise bike has become the place to hang things, including the old coffee can we use to scoop Chloe’s feed from the fifty pound bag, and then shove sideways on one handle bar until the next morning.  One Saturday afternoon, after Keith had used the can in the morning, a wren couple went to work right under our noses and built a nest inside it in less than an hour.  When we discovered it, Keith grabbed some duct tape and ran a piece along the side of the can onto the handlebar to hold it steady.  We both hated the thought of the wind or a jostle by one of us knocking the can to the ground, especially after the eggs were laid.
            We have been checking the nest every few days, bending down with a flashlight to look inside.  That mother is obviously devoted, sitting there staring at us through the beam, not moving a muscle though we are only a few feet away from her.  We try to make our intrusions short and no more than once every other day or so.  Last Saturday we looked in and saw a mouth.  An hour or so later there were three more--a fuzzy gray mound of down and four wide open mouths, swaying back and forth, eagerly searching for whatever we might have brought.  I hated to disappoint them.
            From time to time we see the parents flying back and forth.  They come with a mouthful and leave just a few seconds later—over and over and over.  The only time those tiny mouths are closed is when the babies are asleep.  While they are awake, mama and daddy get no rest for they are never satisfied.  It is never enough.
            That is exactly what God should see from us—wide open mouths.  If you think attending every service and even extra Bible studies makes you one who “hungers and thirsts after righteousness,” you have missed the point.  Certainly we need the nourishment provided when the flock is fed the word of Life, but that isn’t even half of it.  Like newborn infants, long for the spiritual milk that by it you may grow up unto salvation, Peter tells us in his first epistle, 2:2.  The point is the longing for the spiritual instead of the physical; understanding that the point of this life is training for the next.
            Yes, you need a good background in the scriptures.  I am often appalled at how poorly my brethren know them.  But where there is no desire for righteousness there will be no spirituality.  Where there is no longing for God, learning facts will simply be an intellectual exercise.  We must be like baby birds—nothing but a wide open mouth that will not be satisfied until the bread of life has completely filled it. 
            What are you longing for today?  Wealth will not satisfy.  Health will not satisfy.  Status and fame, not even our fifteen minutes’ worth, will satisfy.  The only true satisfaction can come from God. They shall hunger no more, neither thirst anymore…For the Lamb in the midst of the throne will be their shepherd, and he will guide them to springs of living water…, Rev 7:16-17.
            The only way to receive that promise—for your hunger and thirst to be filled--is to be hungry and thirsty in the first place. We should all be nothing less than another hungry mouth to feed.
 
As the living Father sent me, and I live because of the Father, so whoever feeds on me, he also will live because of me. This is the bread that came down from heaven, not like the bread the fathers ate and died. Whoever feeds on this bread will live forever. John  6:57-58.   

Dene Ward                 

I have not completely described our new home to you yet.  We are in the Tampa area, on the eastern edge of Temple Terrace.  In fact, if we walked about three blocks east, we would be in the county.  Our community is small, with tiny lots inside a solid white fence.  We sit on the western perimeter, smack in the middle of the westernmost row of homes.  We are called "Bridgeford Oaks" and many oak trees provide cover throughout.  In fact, our line of houses has one in nearly every yard—except ours.  But enough grow behind and to each side to keep off the blazing sun for a good part of the day.  Our back yard is full shade most all day long.
               The house itself would probably be called small yet, not only is it not the smallest house plan in the neighborhood, it is 150 square feet more than I raised my boys in.  But then they had five acres to play in, so maybe that's not a fair comparison.  Our yard is so small it can be mown in 15 minutes.  The house itself is that color of gray you see everywhere now, the popularity of which I have never understood.  Who wants a house the color of a concrete block?  It looks like a giant cinder block sitting on a pretty green lawn.  Keith says he has never seen a cinder block this color, but that is still what it makes me think of.
               The windows in front look out on a short hedge of schefflera bordered by a row of bright blue evolvulus, aptly named "Blue My Mind," and a desert rose sits out by the front curb.  Two pink tabebuias share space in the tiny front yard, trees grown by our grandson Judah from the seeds of their own tabebuias.  I can hardly wait until they bloom.  Along the north side yard are a rose that blooms almost ferociously, huge beautiful red blooms, a gardenia that is also not bashful about blooming, and yet another schefflera.  It may not be the wealth of bloom and color we had before, but it is not minimal either.
               We are still working on the backyard.  The back door now opens into a tiny corner screened porch, maybe 8 x 8.  Too small for a real porch, so when more money comes along, we will screen in the new 10 x 15 slab we had poured, tearing down the back wall of the other and make one larger L-shaped screened porch.  In view of that future, we planted a long row of fuchsia along the fence.  Keith has also laid enough pavers for a patio right beside the slab that already holds the grill, the portable fire pit, and a couple of chairs.  Once we are finished building back there, more planting will commence in the corners and sides, probably shade tolerant perennials and creeping ground covers.
               For now, my elliptical machine is on that tiny back corner porch of the house.  It takes up about a third of the whole room.  But now that we no longer have big burly men in our house hammering, drilling, sawing, and grunting in various levels of exertion, I am back on the machine trying to keep myself as healthy as possible.  And that is where I was when I heard it.
               We must have been there a good four or five months before he came, sat on the grill lid handle, and started his beautiful loud song.  Even I could see that jaunty little tail sticking up at its unusual angle against the white fence—a wren!  All I had heard before was a hawk that circles the neighborhood from his home over the perimeter fence where a retention pond sits surrounded by yet more oaks. I have heard him several times since then and his sound makes me feel at home once again.  They have wrens in this place!  All is right with the world.
               And the truth is, they have wrens every place in this state.  And somehow, that brought to mind the vision Ezekiel saw in chapter 1.  As I looked, behold, a stormy wind came out of the north, and a great cloud, with brightness around it, and fire flashing forth continually, and in the midst of the fire…came the likeness of four living creatures…they had a human likeness, but each had four faces, and each of them had four wings. Their legs were straight, and the soles of their feet were like the sole of a calf's foot. And they sparkled like burnished bronze. Under their wings on their four sides they had human hands. And the four had their faces and their wings thus: their wings touched one another. Each one of them went straight forward, without turning as they went…Wherever the spirit would go, they went, without turning as they went…Now as I looked at the living creatures, I saw a wheel on the earth beside the living creatures, one for each of the four of them. As for the appearance of the wheels and their construction: their appearance was like the gleaming of beryl. And the four had the same likeness, their appearance and construction being as it were a wheel within a wheel. When they went, they went in any of their four directions without turning as they went. And their rims were tall and awesome, and the rims of all four were full of eyes all around. And when the living creatures went, the wheels went beside them; and when the living creatures rose from the earth, the wheels rose. Wherever the spirit wanted to go, they went, and the wheels rose along with them, for the spirit of the living creatures was in the wheels. When those went, these went; and when those stood, these stood; and when those rose from the earth, the wheels rose along with them, for the spirit of the living creatures was in the wheels (Ezek 1:4-21).
               I hope you can visualize that at least a little bit.  The whole point is that this whatever-it-is could go anywhere, anytime, at a moment's notice.  That was important for the people to hear.  If you go back to the first couple of verses of the chapter, you see that Ezekiel is in Babylon along with the exiles.  Those people had grown up in a culture which confined God to Jerusalem and, specifically, the Temple.  Here they were, hundreds of miles away from God—or so they thought.  It took Ezekiel several long years and, finally, a messenger recounting the fall of the city and destruction of the Temple, to get them to believe it when he told them God was there in Babylon with them, that God could be anywhere! 
               We have grown up with the idea of an invisible God who is anywhere and everywhere, but sometimes we seem to forget that too.  No matter where we go, He is there.  He hears, He sees—all those eyes on the wheels Ezekiel saw tell us that.  And so, that morning, when I finally heard that little wren, I was reminded, too.  God is here too, just like he was in all those lush green acres of birds and squirrels and foxes and bobcats and possums and raccoons, yes, and even snakes.  He is wherever His people are, whenever they need Him.  If anyone thought we were just dots on a five acre plot and of no importance to God, they might think we would really be lost to Him now, on this tiny postage stamp yard lost among thousands more people than before.  But that just isn't true. 
               And He can find you too, no matter where you are or what you are going through.  He may not send you a grand vision such as Ezekiel's; but maybe He will send you a little wren to remind you that God is always there for His people.  He will never leave them alone.
 
The LORD is near to all who call on him, to all who call on him in truth (Ps 145:18).
 
Dene Ward

The first few years I only had one catbird at my feeder, a chary fellow who only visited during winter when he couldn’t find anything easily on his own.  He sat clumsily on the suet cage, which was almost too small for him, and pecked away, but it only took a micro-movement from me on the other side of the window to scare him off.
            Although I had read that the catbird got its name from its call, I had never heard him utter a peep.  He quietly came to the square of suet, ate his fill, and left.  The other morning, as I sat by the window he flew into the nearest azalea on the other side of the feeder and I heard it, a “mew” just as clear and sweet as a newborn kitten’s.  And what caused him to mew?  There on the suet perched another catbird--he was jealous.  Suddenly he flew at the interloper and chased him away.   
            Within a week, a third catbird had joined the fray, this one a bit smaller and slimmer, probably a fledgling.  Now they all go at it.  It isn’t enough to chase one away and then eat your fill.  They think they must sit guard and keep the others from getting any of it.  This is not the catbird personality I had always seen before, and I hear that mew more often, too.  Now I know what truly lies beneath those slate gray feathers.
            I have seen it happen with people, too.  You think they are one sort of personality but when circumstances don’t go their way, suddenly they morph into someone you have never met before.  Sometimes that’s a good thing, like quiet mothers who instantly, and fiercely, protect their young, but others times it means we have not really become new creatures, we have just hidden the old one and stress made him rear his ugly head once again.
            Becoming a better person is difficult.  Baptism doesn’t instantly fix the flaws in your character.  They have deep-seated roots from childhood or traumatic experiences in your life.  It takes effort to change yourself.  You have to first realize where the problems lie.  Then you have to prepare yourself to meet those stressful situations with study, prayer and meditation, deciding ahead of time how you will react should the same thing happen again.  You have to learn to accept the help of others, even if it does come in the form of a stern rebuke or disapproving look.  Finally, you have to be on watch.  Most of us just let life happen to us, then wonder why we weren’t able to do better “after all these years,” as if time were the only thing that mattered.  Doing better must come from being better or it won’t last.
            God will not remove the stress from our lives.  He won’t make the trials suddenly disappear.  Any time we convert someone with the promise that all of their problems will now be solved, we are giving them false hopes.  The true hope is that now we have help with our problems--if we use it.  God does not allow trials so we will have an excuse for bad behavior but so we will become stronger and better able to handle those trials. 
            I watch those catbirds and wonder if I have really become a new creature.  Today it’s time to get up out of my chair and work on it.
 
For the love of Christ constrains us; because we thus judge, that one died for all, therefore all died; and he died for all, that they that live should no longer live unto themselves, but unto him who for their sakes died and rose again…Wherefore if any man is in Christ, he is a new creature: the old things are passed away; behold, they have become new. 2 Cor 5:14, 15, 17