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Pastor Annette's Blog

"OF ALL THE THINGS GOD HAS SHOWN ME, I CAN SPEAK BUT A LITTLE WORD NOT MORE THAN A HONEYBEE CAN CARRY AWAY ON ITS FOOT FROM AN OVERFLOWING JAR."
~ MECHTHILD OF MAGDEBURG, 13TH CENTURY MYSTIC

Accepting the Unexpected

4/4/2017

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​   My bird feeders hang unmolested after two whole weeks and I’ve added the Audubon Birds of North America  app to my phone, which is how I identified the brown-headed cowbirds here for breakfast today.  Ornithologists call them an invasive species, which strikes me as a most generous description.
​
​   Brown-headed cowbirds are parasite brooders in that they neither build their own nests nor sit on their own eggs.  They sneak into other birds’ nests to lay their eggs and fly away undetected.  Occasionally the other mama will notice the eggs
Picture
​aren’t hers and puncture or toss them out.  Usually she’ll just sit on them alongside her own.  Cowbird eggs incubate for fewer days, so the chicks hatch and get more food than the other babies.  They are also given to shoving the other babies out of the nest.  One positive contribution of the brown-headed cowbird I could find is that they eat insects – lots and lots of insects.  They are also beautiful in their own, understated way.
Picture
     ​The best sense I can make of it is that nature needs insect-eaters, but some of the best happen not to be good parents.  Nature needs them to have babies but never raise them.  Nature needs other birds to accept and raise these troublemakers alongside their own as best they can.  I’m not sure it has a human parallel and yet it feels familiar in a way – the call to accept the unexpected, not judge how they’ve come into our lives, to receive them well simply because they are here.  The Bible calls it hospitality.  The gospel calls it grace.  Without it, only God knows where any one of us would be.
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    I write a Tuesday morning devotional to members and friends of UBC.  It is also posted here. 
     
    Enjoy!  
    Pastor Annette

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    Everything on this site is licensed under a Creative Commons license, which gives you permission to copy freely, provided that you attribute the work to me, that you use the work for non-commercial purposes, and that you do not produce derivative works.

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  • Home
  • Start Here
  • About
    • When & Where?
    • Staff >
      • Annette Hill Briggs, Pastor
      • Rob Drummond ~ Music Minister
    • Ministries >
      • Worship >
        • Music
        • Worship Arts
        • Worship Resources
      • Fellowship >
        • Wednesday Night Supper
        • Church Recipes
      • Service >
        • MCUM Collections
        • Habitat for Humanity Project
      • Vacation Bible School
    • Our Story >
      • Denomination
      • Who We Are
    • Contact
    • Calendar
  • Listen & Read
    • Sermons
    • Pastor's Blog
    • Social Media Feed
  • #ITSYOURCHURCHTOO
  • Give
  • Newsletter