A peculiar thing happened the day we lost Secret. The magnificent Thoroughbred had been sick for weeks. I saw from the window that morning that her eyes were bloodshot. Then while we talked to the vet, she collapsed. A few minutes later there were buzzards sitting quietly in every tree, where there had been none before.
It was as though a silent alarm went off: “Horse down! Horse down!,” and scavengers flew in from across the county. The huge birds quietly shifted back and forth, waiting for the horse to die. The scripture above, enigmatic and foreboding, reminds me of that day.
Jesus is speaking of the End Times. He says watch the signs. You can predict tomorrow’s weather by today’s clouds. You know it’s summer when the fig tree buds. And “where the carcass is, there the vultures will gather” Matthew 24:28. In other words, if you are searching for a missing person or animal and you see buzzards wheeling in the sky, you will find the body below the buzzards. The carrion birds are a harbinger of death: a SIGN.
But you must be ALERT. Otherwise, you will miss God’s signs—not only the signs of the times, but the SIGNS of God’s work in your life and the lives around you.
We miss what God is doing because we waste our time DISTRACTED: Scrolling. Streaming. Filling EVERY SECOND with entertainment: music while driving, screens while sitting still. How can we expect to hear from God if we always have other voices in our ears? —And we know drinking and drugs destroy our alertness.
But guess what else makes us fail to see God’s work?
WORRY.
“Be on your guard, so that your minds are not dulled from carousing, drunkenness, AND WORRIES OF LIFE, or that day will come on you unexpectedly, like a trap” Luke 21:34-35.
STOP THE WORRY. The worries of life DULL YOUR MIND. God wants your mind SHARP so you can see His SIGNS and hear His VOICE.
God, keep us ALERT so we never overlook the signs of Your work. Help us LISTEN WELL to Your voice.
Read Luke 21.
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Abraham Lincoln, a man who read a short list of books, but mastered each, from the Bible to the works of Shakespeare, once quoted this verse about buzzards in a comical and timely manner:
“When Hugh McCulloch, an official of the Treasury Department, introduced a delegation of New York bankers deferentially, he spoke of their patriotism and quoted, in conclusion, what he thought was a suitable text: ‘Where the treasure is, there will the heart be also.’ Reacting quickly to this fatuous use of Scripture, Lincoln, without hesitation replied, ‘There is another text, Mr. McCulloch, which might apply, ‘Where the carcass is, there will the eagles be gathered together.’ “
–As quoted in ABRAHAM LINCOLN: THEOLOGIAN OF AMERICAN ANGUISH, by D. Elton Trueblood.
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