A side benefit of teaching for me was being allowed to go on nature trips. Just knowing and seeing animals made me feel better. With a little trepidation, I have run two fingers down a snake someone else was holding. A hedgehog stretches out and then curls into a protective ball. Birds on display are nothing like robins hopping over my yard. A hawk curves his talons into the handler’s leather protected wrist and arches his head majestically. In Boston’s Museum of Natural Science, an owl perched motionless, staring straight ahead. Slowly, he moved his entire head to stare behind him, swiveled back and around past his other shoulder. No mice in sight. Each part of him was designed to be a night time hunter: eyes that adjusted to dim light, a head to move over spaces around him, and wings made for gliding silently in attack without a flap of warning.
Regardless of your age, find a copy of Jane Yolen’sOwl Moon. The time has come for a young girl to go out with her dad on a cold night to find an owl. Her dad stops at times to make a hooting call with no response. Her brothers have told her sometimes there is an owl; sometimes not. You have to be quiet and you have to be brave. When the call is eventually answered and the owl glides in silently to settle on a branch and stare at them, she remembers a final word. When you go owling, you need hope. I have read this to eighth graders to have them sit in silence at the end.
The only Biblical injunction about owls is they live mostly solitary in wild places. and they are not good to eat. At times in my life, I feel an affinity for owls. Three is about their largest grouping, yet the identifying term is a Parliament, representing wisdom as they may gather to discuss important matters. Darkness does not thwart them. It is an element that does not hedge them in. They accomplish what they set out to do without a lot of noise or upheaval. Along with everything else from lilies of the field to birds of the air, God knows what they need and cares for them. I could go for that!
Consider the ravens: They do not sow or reap, they have no storeroom or barn; yet God feeds them. And how much more valuable you are than birds!
Luke 12:24
Let Me Tell Ya 