“For I know the plans I have for you,” says the Lord. “They are plans for good and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope.” (Jeremiah 29:11)
“There is a Power, whose care
Teaches thy way along that pathless coast,
The desert and illimitable air
Lone wandering, but not lost.” (Verse 4, "To a Waterfowl," William Cullen Bryant)
”By any typical measure, a migratory bird ready for travel ought to head to the ER, not the skies.” In his book "A World on the Wing: The Global Odyssey of Migratory Birds," Scott Weidensaul describes how birds radically expand and shrink their internal organs, alter their blood chemistry, and build immense fat stores to power their flights, avoiding the diseases that would plague a human trying to do the same.
The migratory journey of birds resembles a human pilgrimage from birth to death – both are fraught with danger, challenges, and setbacks. However, while chasing summer with food necessary to a bird’s survival, aside from victims of accidents or illnesses, humans willingly engage in activities as exacting as migration, pushing their bodies, nervous systems, and endurance levels to the absolute edge:
In Wingsuit BASE Jumping, human “birds” leap from fixed structures or soar through narrow mountain canyons in specialized fabric wingsuits at speeds reaching 259 mph.
Big wave surfers paddle into, or are towed onto, massive ocean swells 50-80 feet high, battling immense underwater turbulence, violent hold-downs, and crushing hydrostatic pressure.
In freediving, divers descend hundreds of feet underwater. In cave-diving, they brave pitch-black, submerged subterranean cave systems. On a single breath or with compressed air, these divers face severe risks of nitrogen narcosis, decompression sickness, or hypoxia.
In free solo rock climbing, climbers ascend sheer thousand-foot vertical rock faces, using only their bare hands and feet, without ropes, harnesses, or safety nets.
Ice climbing junkies scale frozen waterfalls and vertical glacier ice with double ice axes and rigid metal crampons, enduring sub-zero cold as they try to penetrate brittle, unstable ice.
Mountain bikers, on full-suspension bikes, hurl themselves down steep, jagged rock and root-strewn alpine trails. Traveling at dizzying speeds and absorbing massive physical impacts requires extreme core, arm, and reflex control.
In trail running, athletes race along 50-100 mile (or multi-day) mountain courses, testing metabolic, cardiovascular, and musculoskeletal limits through extreme elevation changes and sleep deprivation.
Extreme sports leave zero…nil, zippo, zilch…margin for error.
Despite the physical extremes our shorebird faces, Bryant alludes to a Power that guides it to its destination.
“Whose care teaches thy way…”
1. "God created every winged bird according to its kind. And God saw that it was good." (Genesis 1:21b) How good? A bird’s eye produces a highly specialized light-sensitive protein. When exposed to blue sunlight, the protein triggers a reaction allowing birds to literally see the Earth’s magnetic field as light and shadow shift across their vision. Additionally, birds possess an internal compass in their liver, where iron-packed immune cells react to external magnetic fields and alert the brain, helping them navigate even when it is cloudy and overcast. Amazingly, the Creator placed a navigation system in a bird’s genes - a blueprint for the mechanisms they use to navigate.
2. “Our hearts were made for You, O Lord, and they are restless until they rest in You.” (St. Augustine)
If God created birds with a navigation system for reaching their earthly destinations, how much more would He endow those of us created in His image? He provides care and guidance, not only for our earthly journeys, but for the ultimate journey to the Promised Land, our final, eternal destination.
"And if you leave God’s paths and go astray, you will hear {My} voice behind you, saying, 'This is the way, walk in it.” (Isaiah 30:21)
"{We} are protected by the power of God through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time. (1 Peter 1:5)
“Lone, wandering, but {never} lost.”
Postscript: Many years ago, I visited Lauterbrunnen, Switzerland, and witnessed human “birds” hurling themselves off sheer mountain peaks, deploying their parachutes just minutes before landing.
