Tuesday With Teri

          Today felt like spring!  The smell of wet grass rose to the air as the sun began to warm the rain soaked ground.  The wind subsided making the sun’s warm rays much easier to feel on our skin as we ventured out in short sleeves without sweaters or jackets.  The tufts of green leaves marking the spot where tulips and daffodils will soon bloom finally showed their buds, some even unfolding brightly colored petals.  The yard is dotted with tiny holes dug by squirrels retrieving their buried treasures.  Perhaps the most notable indication of the presence of spring is the activity of the birds.

          The sound of chirping birds has been steadily increasing over the last few weeks.  The persistent pounding of woodpeckers echoes from distant trees.  We have a large Spruce in our front yard that has served as a home for several cardinal families through the years.  Today I saw them flitting about its branches once again.  Yep, definitely springish out there today.  However, I was taken aback by one particular sign of this season, a bird’s nest forming in a very unusual place.

          Last fall we experienced an owl encounter of the weird kind.  It began with a loud crash on our front porch.  We raced to the door and flung it open just in time to see a large owl standing before us on the ground, dinner in his mouth, and then he flew away.  Upon further inspection, we noticed the glass globe around one of our two porch lights had a rather large hole in it and shards of glass scattered below.  Apparently, in his haste to capture his fast flying prey, the owl collided with our porch light.  The light still worked so I put off repairing the broken globe over the winter.  The hole in its side made changing the light bulb much easier, I reasoned.  But apparently it also made it easier for birds to fit into as well.

          I stepped to our front window this morning to look out at the early sun and found myself startled by activity in the porch light globe.  I stood frozen in place, not wanting to disturb the activity.  I watched in amazement as two small wrens busied themselves stuffing dried leaves and sticks into the small opening.  Within minutes, they had amassed enough bedding to fill the globe and form a nifty little nest just under the glowing light bulb.

          Although I will need to keep the light off to give them a safe home, I like the idea of them being there.  I like that something shattered, deemed broken and even neglected, has become a place of restoration, new life, and hope. 

          We are like that porch light I think.  We are broken.  Sometimes we dwell on our brokenness and the world might even encourage us to think we are not redeemable…But not our God.

          Just as those birds took our broken light and turned it into a place of hope and renewal, so God takes our lives and transforms us from broken and lost, to whole and found in Him. 

“Therefore if any man is in Christ, he is a new creature; the old things passed away; behold new things have come. …God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not counting their trespasses against them…”  2 Corinthians 5:17-21