The Dog and the Bird

My girlfriend, Shannon told me a story this week that I can’t get out of my mind.

Her friend has this big enormous dog and a very large bird who likes to sing.

Apparently, the big dog likes it when the bird sings,

so much so, that every time he hears the singing,

he stops what he is doing and runs in his 

bumbling, big dog way, right to the bird.

Then the bird promptly bites the dog right on the nose.

Every. Time.

The dog never seems to “get it”.

Singing + running to the bird = pain.

SOURCE

It just doesn’t compute.

The owners of the dog try to warn him when the singing starts,

“Don’t go!”

“No!!!”

“Stop!!”

But every time the dog runs straight to the bird

and every time he gets bit right on the nose.

Shannon and I had a good laugh at that story.

But later, after mulling it over,

I realized that God sees us that way.

Over and over again, 

running to the thing that brings us pain 

rather than Him, 

who will bring us peace.

I am that big ol’ bumbling dog.

The bird is any number of things.

Things that are different for each us.

Possibly even different every day.

God has to watch us get “sucked in” again and again to the false beauty of a song that was not at all what it first appeared to be.

He watches us run to a lie.

The lie that if it makes us happy, it must be right.

The lie that if we just keep trying, we might be able to change the situation all on our own.

The lie that it’s all about us.

God watches us not “get it”.

That the beautiful melody is drowning out every warning sign,

makes us deaf to the shouts from others to stop,

blocks the memory of the inevitable pain.

What is it about that bird’s song that makes the dog think it will be different this time?

The dog isn’t even timid about approaching the bird,

not leery at all.

He RUNS each time.

Head first.

And then, CHOMP!

As the owner of that dog, I’d be tempted to question the dog’s intelligence. And loyalty.

Kinda blows Pavlov’s dog theory 

right out of the water.

But we don’t have a God like that.

His mercies are new every day.

He waits with open arms for us to come to Him,

 with disappointment, 

with frustration,

with a broken spirit,

and with sore noses,

 to seek shelter in Him.

He wants us to trust Him.

Not ourselves.

To spend time with Him.

Not be self-absorbed.

To know His word.

Not the tune of a diabolical bird.

I keep humming:

Trust and obey,

For there’s no other way

To be happy in Jesus,

  But to trust and obey.

"So don’t you see that we don’t owe this old do-it-yourself life one red cent. There’s nothing in it for us, nothing at all. The best thing to do is give it a decent burial and get on with your new life. God’s Spirit beckons. There are things to do and places to go!"

--Romans 8:12-14 The Message