Last week on my summer reading list I referenced a bird-watching book by Margaret Clarkson. Today I would like to give you another glimpse of how she handles this subject and the applications she makes to the Christian life.
In chapter five of Conversations With a Barred Owl (Zondervan, 1975; 115 pp.), Clarkson treats the special subject of bird habitats in connection with her chapter on loons. She writes at the beginning,
All living things, including man himself, can exist only in a particular environment. A study of habitat and the ways in which each species is adapted to life in its own element is both fascinating and rewarding.
Then, after describing in more detail some of the habitats of the bird world, she ends with these comments, including a wise application for us:
When a bird has found the habitat wherein by ceaseless endeavor it is possible for him to meet all his necessary needs, that bird will flourish, for he is functioning in his true environment. There and there only will he nest and produce his young; there alone will he know freedom, joy, and total harmony throughout all his being. In total fusion with his world, he finds his destiny – total fulfillment of that for which he was made.
Man’s natural environment is God. If we would realize that destiny for which we were created and redeemed, we must find it in God through Jesus Christ. Nowhere else can we ever be truly and completely at home. Why is it that we are so much slower than God’s feathered children to realize and adapt to our soul’s true habitat (p.25)?
Shall we strive to live in our proper spiritual habitat today as God’s children?
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