Look at the birds, free and unfettered, not tied down to job description, careless in the care of God. And you count far more to him than birds. (Matt. 6:26, The Message)

Key Thought: The Word of God is relevant even today (no, especially today) because it constantly calls us back to the truth that God is Creator and we are his creation. We need that message today more than ever.

It had not been a productive week. Every project on my "to-do" list had taken five times longer to complete than planned. The sticky notes that littered my desk taunted me with reminders of over-due commitments and unmet appointments. Almost every night had been a late one, yet I felt further behind by Thursday than when the week started.

I awoke Thursday morning surprisingly early after a midnight marathon at my desk. Slipping quietly from the silent house, I stepped into the avenues of a wakening city. The sounds of city buses and commuter traffic reminded me that others shared my plight and pace. Maybe they, too, were rushing off to littered desks and past-due projects. But, for me, there was an hour of reprieve. Despite the packed pace of an unproductive week, it had also been a week of hungering for God. This morning, again I turned with anticipation toward the small park that punctuated the landscape between the highway and high-rises.

Actually, the park is a bit of a wildlife preserve—a swampy sanctuary for skunk cabbages, blue herons, joggers on the wooden walkways, and a soul-hungry God seeker with a Bible in a tattered daypack.

Almost impatiently, I waited for the traffic light to change, the blinking red hand to yield to the little walking figure, and the vehicles to pause and let me intersect their path. Just beyond the crosswalk yawned the opening through the trees to a world apart. Within seconds, the woods and berry bramble muffled the drone of motorists hectically hurrying to attack another day.

It was just at the point where the trail meets the pond that I spotted a walker and her dog. Nothing unusual. But they were motionless, intent on observing something without being observed. I approached quietly. Their gaze was fixed on a small branch rippling its way through the water several meters from shore. A small dark head emerged behind the branch and propelled it forward. "Look," the lady with the dog whispered, "a beaver!" There was a touch of wonder in her voice.

We watched silently for a few moments before she left and I was alone with the beaver and his branch. He navigated it to a muddy bank and waddled ashore to enjoy it. I crept closer for a better view. For almost twenty minutes, the beaver happily broke bits of breakfast from the bushy branch. I stood motionless in the chilly morning marveling at the beaver’s cautious yet strangely carefree enjoyment of the meal provided by his Creator and mine.

The rising sun splashed gold and pink onto the ripples of the pond. Wisps of morning fog embraced the geese honking low over the water. A loon called from somewhere out of view. If I had not seen the apartment complex punching through the trees, my imagination could almost have persuaded me that I was hours of hiking from civilization and carried a backpack with bedroll instead of a daypack with Bible.

The magic broke. I involuntarily cleared my throat. Startled, the beaver raised on his hind legs and sniffed in my direction. He paused, returned to his meal, paused again, then slipped soundlessly into the water. A moment later, he slapped his broad tail on the water in warning to a companion beaver that had joined him earlier on the shore and was indulging in an early morning grooming. Immediately the two were gone. I was alone again, but overcome with a sense of worship and awe.

It was time to retrace my steps. Time to join the traffic. Time to return to my desk littered with tasks and lined with notes. Time to be productive. Yet time also to attack my productivity more as a creature than creator. I might gather the branches, but only God could grow the trees. I might remain alert and cautious, but never so tense that I could not munch contentedly on the simple gifts from my Creator’s hand.

My Bible never left my pack that morning. But the words of Scripture entered my day, "He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High will rest in the shadow of the Almighty. I will say of the Lord, ’He is my refuge and my fortress, my God, in whom I trust’" (Ps. 91:1–2 NIV). And the parting words of the stranger along the trail underscored that Scripture truth in my daily life, "It’s amazing how those little creatures find a quiet life in the middle of all this clatter."

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