DON’T
CAGE MY SONG!
Luke 4:18-19
18
The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the
gospel to the poor; he hath sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance
to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that
are bruised,
19
To preach the acceptable year of the Lord.
The joyful and
almost intrusive song of a Texas Mockingbird comes
from a slender-bodied gray bird. They apparently pour all their color into
their personalities. They sing almost endlessly, sometimes even at night. They
go on learning new sounds throughout their lives. The song is a long series of
phrases, with each phrase repeated 2-6 times before shifting to a new sound;
the songs can go on for 20 seconds or more. These are the joyful sounds of
freedom!
Archibald
Rutledge tells the story that as a young boy he was
always catching and caging wild things. He particularly loved the sound of the
mockingbird, so he decided to catch one and keep it so he could hear it sing
any time.
He found a very
young mockingbird and placed it in a cage outside
his home. On the second day he saw a mother bird fly to the cage and feed the
young bird through the bars. This pleased young Archibald. But then the
following morning he found the little bird was dead.
Later young Arch
was talking to the renowned ornithologist Arthur Wayne,
who told him, "A mother mockingbird, finding her young in a cage, will
sometimes take it poisonous berries. She evidently thinks it better for one she
loves to die rather than live in captivity." --James S. Hewett, Illustrations Unlimited (Wheaton: Tyndale House Publishers, Inc,
1988) p. 225.
We hold these truths to be self-evident,
that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with
certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit
of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among
Men, deriving
their just powers from the consent of the governed. (The Declaration of
Independence)
Dear Lord, having been set free from the cage of sin
by thy mercy, let me sing my song long into the night. AMEN
