baskets and birdseed

Our family’s latest form of cheap entertainment includes 2 simple ingredients: an empty milk jug and birdseed.  Every morning we have been enjoying watching the birds feast from the birdfeeder that our four year old made (with some parental help).  It was such a simple gesture.  He just thought it would be fun to feed the birds.  And we have received so much joy.  The kids have oooohhed and ahhhhed over all the different kinds and colors of birds.  This simple recycled milk jug hung from the porch by a simple ribbon with a simple hole cut in the side has attracted some of the simplest and yet most fascinating of God’s creatures.  Beautiful bright red male cardinals, a few blue jays, a lot of small brown birds, the occasional woodpecker, and my favorite, the brown female cardinal with bright orange beak and crest.  It has provided hours of ongoing entertainment right outside our kitchen window.  Every time we sit down to eat or enjoy a cup of coffee, we also get to enjoy these birds. 

I was thinking about it this morning and realized that God did not need my son to feed those birds.  I’m pretty sure they were doing just fine on their own without his little milk jug feeder.  But God allowed our four year old to be used to feed the birds.  And in that we have watched him receive so much joy. I think he feels good knowing that he is “helping” the birds when they’re hungry.  We had to wait a week or two after we hung the feeder before the birds found it.  But when they finally did, Graham was sooooo excited.  He was literally jumping for joy and celebrating that they had found his little offering of love. 

It reminded me of the little boy that had the basket full of loaves and fish. 

“There is a boy here who has five barley loaves and two fish, but what are they for so many?”  John 8:9

He offered his little basket to Jesus and God used it to feed over 5000 people.  I realized for the first time this morning as I was watching those birds that Jesus did not really need that little boy’s basket.  He could have fed them from food made out of thin air.  He was God after all.  But he took that little boy’s small offering of love and used it to feed the masses.  He produced a big miracle with a little basket.  And I can only imagine that little boy’s amazement and joy at how God had used him.  Maybe even a little jumping up and down.

I think it’s the same way with us.  God certainly does not need us to accomplish his purposes.  He is perfectly capable of taking care of this world and its people on his own.  But his designed purpose for us it to be used by him and take part in his work of love.  Love for creation and love for creatures, the most important of which is people.  And when we take part in his work we receive joy. 

Maybe that’s why so many of us are lacking joy.  We are too busy doing our own thing.  We are missing God’s purpose for us in loving others.  And we are also missing out on His joy.  And I think many of us hesitate because we are afraid we don’t have what it takes to feed the starving world around us.  And we don’t.  But the God we serve does.  And all he wants from us to meet their need is a milk jug and a little birdseed.