This story is simple...a child's story about becoming lost and the search for mother...for home. We are all that child. Jesus said unless we become as children we can't enter the kingdom of God.
Matthew 18:3-5 ...”Truly, I say to you,unless you turn and become like children,
you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Whoever humbles himself like this
child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. Whoever receives one such child
in my name receives me.. '' (ESV)
This child searched for the very basic of relationships...mother. While as Christians we seek our Father God...the first person of the trinity...this story goes to the more intimate and nurturing relationship we identify with and that is our mother.
It's not a far stretch to see this story as an analogy of our search for a relationship with Jesus. When we were conceived God placed in our tiny, brand new being the need for Him...a void only He could fill. Some have said that our spirits communed with Him before our birth. I have heard that very young children see the spirit world...they see angels around them. As this life and the flesh begin to dominate we lose that ability. This void is what draws us to Him...or should.
Our enemy knows about this void and has taken the good things that God has given us and driven us to excess. We seek so many things before we seek God. We think of addictions, alcohol and drugs. There is an emphasis on leisure and entertainment. We are materialistic, Madame Blueberry and “Stuff Mart” from the Veggie Tales comes to mind. Busyness, status and approval seeking, achievement and awards, overeating, exercise and athletic achievement, fitting into the world's view of attractiveness resulting in bulimia, attempts to control self and those around us with manipulative behavior and relating styles. Relationship is replaced with forms of relating...like pornography and internet social media. We have speed-dating for singles...comparing a persons traits and qualities to a list of what we want and don't want.
So much of this starts with brokenness in some area. When we are children we seek the love of our mother and father....their approval. Often the lines between love and approval are blurred for both the parents and the child. Approval becomes love. Disapproval may be shown by a withdrawing of love. Comfort or reward may be shown exclusively with special desserts, treats or money. What should be fulfilled in relationship is poorly and only half met in the offering of things.
There are even more insidious and grievous paths to brokenness. Many children experience neglect, abandonment and abuse of all forms. One blog post about this book suggested the mother bird abandoned her baby in search for food at the precise moment of birth...leaving the baby unprotected in its environment. We are born into a broken world to imperfect parents..including an imperfect mother. We fell out of the nest so to speak...because it is a part of the design of God. The search and the struggle is a part of His design to draw us to Himself. This struggle is hardly in our control...as children we follow those in whose charge we have been placed...for good or for evil and usually some of both.
The following is taken from Richard Wurmbrand's “The Unreasonableness of God”. I found it posted on the www.soaking.net website.
“If you are in the sad situation of experiencing neither His reason, nor His mad love,
you might consider the fact that in the parable of the ninety and nine, only the lost
sheep had sure proof of His love and concern. The others could reasonably say they
were neglected and abandoned.”
The baby went in search for its mother but walked right past her. He had an idea of mother at the start and she did not fit that. He kept asking along the way. We tend to get more and more desperate as we search and find nothing fills our heart. Many come up with new activities or increase the intensity or go to excess in the search to find what will not leave them empty and afraid when they go to bed at night.
John 4:10-14 Jesus to the Samaritan woman... “If you knew the gift of God, and
who it is that is saying to you, 'Give me a drink,' you would have asked him and
he would have given you living water” The woman said to him “Sir, you have
nothing to draw water with, and the well is deep. Where do you get that living
water?” “Are you greater than our father Jacob? He gave us the well and drank
of it himself as did his sons and his livestock.” Jesus said to her, “ Everyone
who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks of the water
that I will give him will never be thirsty again. The water that I will give him will
become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life” (ESV)
The animals and objects the baby bird queried can represent the people, places, things and experiences we look to outside of Jesus for fulfillment of our destiny in Christ. The steam shovel , the“snort”, is a different sort however. The “snort” lifted the baby bird back to the nest to be reunited with his mother. The steam shovel can be a type of Holy Spirit guiding us home. Often the Holy Spirit works through other Christians to guide us and it may take the form of a personal relationship, a book, radio program, music etc.
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