Taking the Challenge

Now all of this is prefaced on the fact that I just might not be patient enough. There is always the possibility that if I just waited, the same results would follow.

I figured maybe the feeder was too near the house and was freaking the birds out, so I took the heavy umbrella stand and put it closer to the back of the yard…sort of in the middle…and put the pole and feeder there.

Then I broke up the Panera© bread into more bite-sized chunks. So the results…the blue jays found it, but they had found it by the house. What they do is grab a piece and fly away…so they have this nervous, security thing going on.

On the other hand, we have herds of robins and we get like 7 or more at a time scanning our back yard. First, they must know the yard pretty well because they knew the umbrella stand was a foreign object, but eventually got over it and came close. But to my amazement, they went right past the bread chunks on the ground. These are definitely blue collar birds. They want meat, worms, bugs, but not Panera. I’ll bet they’d eat wonder white bread with zero nutrients before they’d touch the swanky, artesian breads of panera.

So here is what I see in church planting. Patience is important. Observation is critical. Getting to know who you are trying to reach is crucial. Being willing to experiment and get into the culture is the only way to do it. Thankfully my livelihood is not connected to having a flock feeding at my feeder or I’d be a wreck, but maybe that is part of the problem with this whole business, it’s not about doing it for me, it’s about being, living for Him and for them.

And God does take care of His own.  Elijah actually got fed by birds doing the Father’s business.