Lessons from Nature: Look at the Birds.

Are you a Christian who worries a lot? Jesus wants you to learn to depend on him and overcome worrying. He wants us to live worry-free. Some may wonder if that is even possible especially since worrying has gotten to our vocabulary. We say things like, “That’s reason to worry?” In a way trying to justify worrying. I don’t know about you, but Jesus’ approach is not what we unusually hear from self-help experts.

Consider this: When Jesus talks about worry-free living, he does not draw attention to anything else but to his Father’s work in creation. He does not tell his listener to “drink and forget their problems” (Proverbs 31:7) that would be for the perishing. But for us who are being saved we live by a different standard. He doesn’t tell them to turn to self-help or positive thinking, but instead he tells them to look at God’s work in nature. He tells them to look at the birds of the air. So what exactly do we learn from birds about worry-free living? Well, let’s look at the birds.

“Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not more valuable than they?” (Matthew 6:26).

They Don’t Sow

The first lesson we learn from birds about worry-free living is that birds live entirely dependent on God for their provision. Since birds were not created capable of sowing seeds, they have to depend entirely on God. They have to either depend on what man has sown and thereby meet their needs or what God has provided in the wild for all other creatures to eat. Either way, birds remain entirely dependent on someone else for provision. Their entire life supply is provide by another. “All creatures [birds] look to you to give them their food at the proper time.“(Psalm 104:27). We too, must learn to depend on God entirely if we’re going to overcome worrying. We must not trust in ourselves but trust in God who gives both the seed and the harvest.

They Don’t Reap

Since we “reap what we’ve sown” birds, therefore, do not reap because they do not sow. Now they do not only depend on God for their food, they utterly depend on him for good. They have no means to reproduce or multiply food. God does that for then. So they are completely dependent on God to provide everything they will ever eat.

They Don’t Store

No sowing means no reaping which means no storing. That’s why birds don’t store away in barns for the future. They are utterly dependent on God for the complete process of food production. If God will not provide, birds will not eat. Other animals will store food, but not birds. They eat for each day what God has provided.

It’s interesting that birds, despite being unable to sow, reap and store, are also not able to pray and ask God to intervene in their situations. Even more interesting is that they don’t seem bothered by it. They just wake up in the morning, sing praises to God, look for food, eat some bugs and grains and sing some more. They are pretty confident that God will provide.

You’re More Valuable

If birds who do not sow, reap, store in barns or even pray are cared for by God. How much more will he care for you and me. Here’s a rhetoric that shutters all worry: “Are you not much more valuable than they, [the birds]?” Absolutely! Far more valuable that he entrusted to us the care of all his creation. He will care for our needs absolutely, because we’re his children. God cannot care for the birds so well and ignore his very own children. That’s the point Jesus is trying to make and that’s the lesson he wants us to learn when we look at the birds of the air. Next time you are tempted to worry, look at the birds and remember the love of the father.

What are we telling God when we worry? Please drop us a comment. I hope you never look at the birds of the air the same way again.