My broody hen, Fluffina, was nearing the end of her devoted tenure squatting above a clutch of five eggs. She sat and sat and sat some more, and when the other hens tried to usurp the nest on which we’d enthroned her, she would not be moved.
I checked on her obsessively, even though I knew I should let the process unfurl on its own accord, unhindered by my bumbling human interference. Yet we’d never had a hen successfully hatch eggs, and I dreamt I could somehow stave off failure by vigilant monitoring. My paranoia was fueled by painful memories of hopes cruelly dashed, of eggs which I thought were harboring nascent life but were actually putrefying into fetid stink bombs.
The week prior, we’d successfully prompted another hen to “adopt” five feed store chicks, but several days later, one chick drowned in a small gulch of standing water created by the heavy rains we’d been having, its legs stretched long behind it in the echo of its desperate efforts to keep its head above the few inches of water that killed it. The same day, I found another adult hen dead in the coop with no semblance of a cause — no blood, no loose feathers scattered about indicating a struggle.
As I tromped out of the pen, defeated and clutching a limp, feathered body in either hand, I tried to tamp down the surging wave inside me. But it crested and broke and the tears fell hard and fast. I was angry at myself, angry at God, angry at His creation and its infuriating fragility. Why can’t things stay alive?! I sobbed, gasping for air, grasping for hope. And I knew it was about more than dead chickens.
It seemed the last two years had been saturated with death. First, my sister died from an addiction we didn’t even know she had, her death a black shock of trauma and tangled skein of lingering questions. Eight months later, I watched my dad gasp his last hard-won breaths from wasted lungs in a hospice room, as five decades of cigarette smoking demanded their debt. Six months after that, I helped care for an ailing elderly neighbor until she breathed her last too, alone in a nursing home room, echoing with Gilligan’s Island laugh tracks.
In my beclouded vision, it all seemed a mere ruse, a prelude only designed to make the inexorable death march of all created things even more devastating. I knew as a believer my basic posture should be hope. But in that moment, I wanted to roll over and give up. I’m done hoping, I declared bitterly. Hoping hurts.
But Jesus wouldn’t let me go, wouldn’t let me sink into a mire of wounded, reactive cynicism.
Look at the birds of the air, He whispered.
Oh, I look at birds, I said. I look multiple times a day, though my birds are earthbound and flightless and blindly devoted to eggs that may yield only futility and decay.
Look closer, He invited me.
So I begrudgingly thought of Fluffina, who sat and sat with seemingly infinite patience. Although I didn’t know what went on in that blessed, little, tufted, white head of hers, I was pretty sure dread and worry and downward-spiraling navel-gazing were entirely absent. She just waited — the waiting itself a kind of hope. She neither sowed nor reaped, but God provided as I held a tiny bowl of water up to her beak and she drank or as I funneled a handful of grain into a tiny pyramid near her breast and she pecked at it.
“But I’m afraid to hope,” I said out loud, the words themselves fringed with fear. But I knew I couldn’t not hope because hopelessness is death, and instead of steeling me against disappointment, it would calcify my very soul.
In Christ, we are a hoping people. It thrums in our God-breathed blood. It blossoms in our Christ-contained atoms. Teach me to hope rightly, I begged Jesus. In You, through You, with You, guilelessly and earnestly and in such a way that disappointment doesn’t destroy me but draws me even nearer to You.
I thought of Fluffina again. If her eggs hatched, she’d dote faithfully, she’d show her babies where the food and water are, and they’d dart under her wings for warmth and shelter. If they didn’t hatch, she’d eventually reenter civilian flock life as though nothing had happened, the broody spell broken.
But here’s the thing: I bet she’ll try again next year, helpless but never hopeless against this resurgent tide of hope revealed in the death and resurrection of the One through whom all things are made. Jesus is the One in whom hope has its roots, but He is also the radiant sun toward whom it joyfully grows.
Yes, I know, I know. She’s just a chicken. But still, Jesus says I have something to learn from her:
Look at the birds of the air, for they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they?
Matthew 6:26 (NIV)
Jesus is the One in whom hope has its roots. -Ashley Lande: Click To Tweet Leave a Comment
Beautifully written. Thank you for giving us the courage to hope, even in the long wake of death.
Thank you so much, Andrea! He is so faithful to teach us hope. It’s His language!
Thank you for helping me to focus on God as my hope to change my ex husband’s heart! That God would show him truth & end the relationship he has started back up with the woman who he left me for. That God would instill into my husband’s heart restoration for us and our family!
Oh Dawn, my heart hurts for you but I am also so grateful that your hope is in the Lord. I am personally very well-acquainted with the acute, wrenching pain of infidelity BUT I am also gloriously well-acquainted with the beauty God can bring from the ashes of a broken marriage and broken and contrite hearts. He is the God of resurrection, and can absolutely resurrect what the world says is totally dead and the places that the world says are utterly bereft and where it would be ludicrous to hope. I prayed for you this morning, pleaded for you actually, and your husband, and I am hoping for you – radically, boldly, hoping against hope! I thank God for your faith and expectancy in Him. He has done great things and will again! Also I want to say to you that you are so beautiful, beloved and desired in Christ. Your identity in Christ is not affected in any way by your husband’s choices! You are so very loved!!! I will continue to pray for your miracle!!!
Thank you so much Ashley. This has been a very long tough trial. Please pray for my children too! My daughter who is 15 is heart broken & not getting along with her dad. My son who is 12 doesn’t mind what his dad is doing. The pain is overwhelming!
Dawn, absolutely. I will be praying for you all. I am so sorry, but I know that God will bring good even out of this immense heartache!
Thank you, I appreciate it & believe in the power of prayer!
Dawn,
Sweet sister-praying for you. Keep on praying & hoping in the Lord. He is still in the miracle business. He alone can change your husband’s heart. Remember this: God loves you more than you know. Your identity is not in this world but in Christ. You are a beloved child of God! Contemplate this: Jeremiah 29:11 “For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord.” “Plans to prosper you & not to harm you to give you a hope & a future.” He has great plans for you life.
(((((Hugs)))))
Thank you so much!! Encouragement like you all, keep me going!
Ashley,
God has given you a beautiful gift with words. Not just with what words you choose, but with His inspired purpose behind them. Sometimes hope seems fleeting – like a butterfly you just can’t catch as it escapes and flutters away. But our God is showing us that there is beauty in hope, and that our joy and hope can only truly come from Him.
“Jesus is the One in whom hope has its roots, but He is also the radiant sun toward whom it joyfully grows.”
Poignant and poetic. Thank you for bringing to light some well-needed hope for a tough time in life for me. I pray that your words inspire others to reach for hope as well. Blessings sweet sister!
kim
Kim, thank you so much, sister, for your beautiful comment! He is so faithful to meet us in places of pain, anger, disillusionment and darkness and I have faith he will continue to meet you in this season! I’ve learned we need only abide. I am so glad my words served you! He is indeed always writing a story of hope, even when we can’t see it!
Ashley,
Thank you so much for this beautiful reminder. Hope and faith work hand in hand…Thanks to our Lord that he shows us through His word how His light shines even if all one can muster is the tiniest bit of hope and faith, no matter how big or small, He will shine brightly for us and lead the way! He is the light! Also,I loved hearing about your sweet chickens. I’m also a lover of a few sweet hens!!!
Donna, a thousand times yes! Hope and faith go hand in hand – I love that. And yay for chickens! Be warned though – we started with “a few” and now have around 30! Once you start it’s hard to stop!
I love this. I love that you NOTICED the little example of faith God put before you. And I love that we cannot stop hoping because “hopelessness calcifies the soul.” Thank you for sharing these words.
Nicole, thank YOU for reading and caring. I’m so glad my story blessed you. Thank you.
Ashley,
How like God to point to an animal to make His point. Animals have faith & hope. They trust that we humans will feed, water & care for them. Also some build nests, lay eggs & hope little ones come out. Why then do we lose hope so easily? This world doesn’t make it easy to stay hopeful. So much sin, darkness, & hatred. It’s hard to look around & have much hope for this world. But we must! We mustn’t give up. God will bring about His plans for our lives if we trust & obey Him. Have faith, pray & Keep on hoping for the best from God.
Blessings 🙂
Beth, thank you so much! Your comment blesses me. I need these reminders every day and he is so faithful to give them – through his word, through animals, through my brothers and sisters in Christ!
I *love* your writing and actually looked to see if you’d written a book. Yet. :>)
Thank you for the truth and beauty that pointed my soul to Him!
Annie, thank you so so much! I am so grateful that the story God gave me spoke to you. I actually do have a book… well, a manuscript. Buuuut I’m told I don’t have a sufficient platform yet. I’m working on it though! I’m so flattered you checked 😉
YES!!! Another thing to wait for, with hope…..
Ashley,
Thank you for sharing your heart through the written word. You are truly gifted. God has definitely used you in my life to encourage me to seek after Him. Thank you for being such a wonderful friend and sister in Christ. I pray that God would continue to reach people for His glory through your writing.
Oh, I love you, friend! Thank you so very much. And thank you for that prayer. That is always mine as well… that my words will display some small refracted angle of His beauty and truth!
Oh. This “my sister died from an addiction we didn’t even know she had” is what happened to me at the beginning of this year, too. And now I’m fighting cancer. Thank you for a message of hope!
Phyllis, I’m so sorry. I am praying for you this morning, for healing and even more for His surpassing peace to envelop you. As the apostle Paul says, everything that happens to us will turn out for our deliverance. I cling to that. God will continue to be very good to you! I believe that.