Tag: worry

His Eye is on the Sparrow


The next song for my Blog is a gospel hymn that was written in 1905 by lyricist Civilla D. Martin and composer Charles H. Gabriel.  A link to B J Thomas performing the song in 1981 is at the bottom of this Blog entry.
 
 
His Eye is on The Sparrow
 
Why should I feel discouraged?
Why should the shadows come?
Why should my heart be lonely
And long for heaven and home?
When Jesus is my portion
My constant friend is He

His eye is on the sparrow
And I know He watches me
His eye is on the sparrow
And I know He watches me
I sing because I’m happy
I sing because I’m free
For His eye is on the sparrow
And I know He watches me
 
Whenever I am tempted
Whenever clouds arise
When songs give place to sighing
When hope within me dies
I draw then closer to Him
From care He sets me free

His eye is on the sparrow
And I know He watches me
I sing because I’m happy
I sing because I’m free
For His eye is on the sparrow
And I know He watches me
For his eye is on the sparrow
And I know He watches me
 
I believe we all have a tendency at times to have that ‘down in the dumps’ feeling.  Sometimes we know what is causing us to have that feeling, other times it just seems to happen.  The net result is we just aren’t happy.    We probably get discouraged about something almost every day.  As that discouragement takes control, we feel darkness around us as well as inside of us, and we feel alone.  It doesn’t matter if we are surrounded by people on a bright and sunny day, we are in our own silent dark cocoon.  Many times, we may just call out for God to take us home to be with him in our heavenly home and just leave this world behind.  These are the times when we need to take inventory of what is happening in our lives and where our hope of getting us out of the dumps resides.


It is during these times when we have forgotten about our comforter.  A portion is a part of a larger whole, Jesus is the portion of God who gave his life for us.  We need nothing else but Jesus to secure eternity in heaven.  Jesus, through the Holy Spirit, is with us always.  There is always a portion of him inside of us, there is always a portion of light inside of us, and the love of Jesus, the friend who will never desert us, is inside of us as well.   Everything we need to conquer the ‘down in the dumps’ is inside of us, we just have to reach for it.


God watches over all of his creations and Matthew 6:25-26 lets us know how God watches over some of the smaller of his creations.  So, if God is going to this effort for the birds, won’t he do the same for us, the beings created in his image?  This should be our signal that everything is really going to be alright, we just need to put our faith and trust in the right place. 
“Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes? 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 much more valuable than they?” Matthew 6:25-26


Instead of hanging out at our personal dumpster, we should feel happy and free knowing we have a father who loves us and is saving a spot in his eternal home for us.  We should be singing at the tops of our voices with a heart full of hope.  Wouldn’t it be great to be singing and someone come up to us and ask why we are so happy?  What an opportunity for sharing the love of Christ.
 
There are other times we are tempted by sin to do something we shouldn’t do.  I am of the opinion that we know when we are getting ready to do something we shouldn’t be doing, when we know we are going against the will of God.  As we start focusing on this temptation, we start falling under the dark clouds again.  Maybe we physically committed the sin, or maybe we committed the sin in our mind; either way we know we are putting ourselves in an emotionally bad spot.  The songs we were singing out loud or in our hearts have disappeared as we once again let the pressures of the world overwhelm us.  Once again, we have let Satan just suck the life and hope out of us.  But deep in our heart and soul, we eventually connect with our best friend Jesus once again.  Satan and this world can try to hide Jesus from us and we let him, but Jesus is always there to hold our hand and put his arms around us and set us free from the darkness around us.  We just need to call upon him.


We then remember once again how he loves us so much and of what he has done for us and what he will continue to do for us.  Our heart and our voice raise once again because we have trusted in him for the happiness and freedom from this world that only he can provide.
I am glad that he loves those birds so much and even happier that he loved me enough to die for me and wants me to spend eternity with him.   Knowing this and keeping my heart on Jesus should make me sing with joy at all times, even more so than the bird who has gained freedom from its cage.
 
Aren’t you glad his eye is on the sparrow?  Think about this next time you hear the birds singing unashamedly.
 
Click here to hear B J Thomas singing His Eye is on the Sparrow

Come As You Are – Entry #3 of 5

Today I will focus on the following part of the song, only a couple of lines but a lot to cover.

So lay down your burdens
Lay down your shame

Have you ever stopped to think about all of the burdens you might be carrying? The basic definition of a burden is that it is a heavy load that slows us down or drags us down in some way. Maybe we do not have a single massive burden such as an oxen might carry, but we have a lot of smaller things we carry that end up being a burden. We have a tendency to carry the past around with us, we carry worry about things we cannot change, we worry about our family, we are concerned about the future. Any one of these is a heavy load, but when combined they become a massive burden that none of us are able to manage. The end result is we make no progress on any of these because all of our time, energy, and spirit are spread across all of these worries. The only way we can make any progress and see that there is a future for us, is to take these burdens and drop them at the feet of Jesus.

Worry is the heaviest burden for most of us and Jesus addresses this for us in Matthew 6:25-34, “Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes? 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 much more valuable than they? Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life?
And why do you worry about clothes? See how the flowers of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you—you of little faith? So do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.

I realize this is a long passage of scripture, but if our greatest burden is worry; then it seems appropriate.

Part of the burden of the past we carry is shame and is also a burden of the present. We have hurt someone, we have not helped someone when we know we should have, and we are ashamed of certain actions that we took that were not appropriate. Perhaps we are ashamed to face God in our prayers because we did not stand up for him when we should have. We encounter situations where we should have spoken up and called out the wrong that was taking place, but we kept quiet. I am not suggesting that we put ourselves in a threatening situation, sometimes we send a message by walking away or perhaps standing alone for what we believe is God’s direction for us. If you think of your earthly father, isn’t it hard to tell him that you did not stand up for him today when people were criticizing him, laughing at him, and maybe not being willing to say in public how much you love him? We would be ashamed of ourselves, and we should feel the same way when we do not support our heavenly father. But all we need to do is confess our sins to him and he will forgive them, he does not want a wall between us at any time. He knows we are ashamed and that we were weak, but he still forgives us and loves us unconditionally. Remember that even the Apostle Peter denied Christ openly three times, yet he was forgiven and ended up becoming a strong leader of the early church.

What burdens and shame are you carrying that you need to give to the father so you can feel the peace that passeth all understanding? What is keeping you from letting go?