Jill and I love going to Garden Centres; but even after many visits to places as big as The Botanical Gardens in Wales and the Eden project in Cornwall and the less ambitious but just as interesting Garden Centres such as Thetford I am still hopeless at recognising flowers – weeds I seem to have more affinity with – but flowers they baffle me.
Now you would think that the following thought would be about plants, but it’s not – it is actually about when we went for coffee in the coffee shop in one of the Garden Centres in the area. We were both sat enjoying the afternoon sunshine, eating some very nice cakes and drinking coffee when a number of birds decided to join us. There was little fear shown by the birds and soon they were happily pecking away at our feet on the cake which dropped from our hands (the idea of being Francis of Assisi entered my head at this point, but I digress).
A number of these birds were sparrows, and on very close inspection I realised that though we normally refer to these as the common sparrow, they are not the drab little things which flit about on hedgerows, but beautiful creatures in their own right. The differing colours of brown and greys were startling, and the inquisitive looks upon their faces was charming.
As they were scuttling about it called to mind the passage from Luke when Jesus said “Aren’t five sparrows sold for two pennies? Yet not one sparrow is forgotten by God” Sometimes when we are in troubled times, when things are at their worst, we can feel very alone. God it would seem has abandoned us and no matter how much we search and pray there is little response.
It might I think be worth printing out these words of Jesus and place them on your fridge or wall, because it tells us so much of a God who will not abandon us, who cares even more than we can humanly imagine. If those tiny creatures that played about our table in the Garden Centre are not forgotten, then as Jesus goes on to say “Even the hairs of your head have all been counted. So do not be afraid; you are worth much more than many sparrows”
In a world where it seems despair has the highest priority, and life for many is particularly hard going through problems of money, health, and loneliness etc. Jesus offers hope, he offers Himself to carry our burden and in our time of greatest need walks beside us – we are not and never will be forgotten.
“Aren’t five sparrows sold for two pennies? Yet not one sparrow is forgotten by God”
It’s amazing what comes to mind when eating cake and drinking coffee on a sunny afternoon in a Garden Centre.