Today, as I look out my window, something doesn’t seem right. First, it’s the birds, those beautiful bluebirds that flit and flutter on the rail of my back porch. They seem careless, except for being occasionally annoyed by the pesky mocking bird that challenges them for their spot.  

Then there are the daffodils, holding high their bright, yellow trumpets as if to announce the arrival of some majestic king. They’re careless, if not reckless as they bend and sway to the gust of each new breeze.

 

Of course, I can’t leave out the cherry tree, the one I planted in my front yard a decade ago. It’s beautiful, with its pinkish white buds opening up like hands of prayer to give glory and praise to the One who painted their blossoms.  

Chirping birds, budding flowers, and beautiful trees practice their customary spring ritual as if nothing else in the world is going on. And that’s where everything seems so strange, so convoluted, so out of sync; because this is not a time when normal things are happening. These are days of abnormality, days when fear ought to hush the sound of chirping birds; days when the isolation of quarantined humanity ought to make daffodils bow their heads in prayer; days when singing birds and springing flowers ought to offer condolences to the rest of creation as it waits in its uncertain demise.  

 

That’s why I feel so conflicted as I look out my window. The illness, the death and the uncertainty brought about by the coronavirus almost mocks the spring rite of beauty. While nature goes on as nature does, with its exacting normalcy, we who wait realize that nothing is normal. And while that secret part of us doesn’t want to even whisper the question, we can’t help but ask it anyway. Where are you, oh God?

 

Even as I ask the question I know the answer. God is in the chirping bird, the golden daffodil and the spectacular cherry tree. God is there speaking to us and urging us not to let worry overtake our lives.

 

Isn’t that what Jesus said in Matthew 6: 26-30? Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life?

 

And why do you worry about clothes? See how the flowers of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you—you of little faith?  

  

As Jesus spoke to the crowds who followed him he wanted to remind them of God’s love and care. That’s why he told them to look up from their troubles and to notice the handiwork of God. He wanted them to know that the budding daffodils and the singing bluebirds were messengers of God reminding us that God loves us and cares for us.

 

In these days of uncertainty, perhaps we need to take special notice of the bluebird, the daffodils and the budding cherry tree for they proclaim a message we desperately need to hear. They offer God’s answer to our soul’s deepest question. Yes, when we ask, “Where are you, oh God?” he answers with a bud, a bird and a blossom and whispers to us, “I am here, and I care!”