This One is for the Birds

I spoke in the Mexia Branch today with Paul and Rebekah. It was a great trip, but I had a lot of trouble putting the talk together this time. I think it's because I needed to have a few experiences with some birds and those experiences didn't end until late yesterday morning.
I woke up with a fresh perspective at 6 a.m. and everything came together.

Here is the first third of the talk:

I've had some interesting experiences with birds lately. Several years ago a pair of Barn Swallows built a nest on an overhang on our front porch. My wife and I thought it would be neat to allow the birds to stay. We wanted our children to see nature up close.

Well, we soon found out that sometimes it is best to view nature from afar. Those birds where anything but neat. When it was feeding time, the birds would chirp loudly, and they always seemed to be hungry. But the worst thing about having the nest on our front porch is the way the birds’ kept house. In order to keep the nest clean, the young birds learn early on a balancing act that I was not fond of. They would hang their backsides over the edge of the nest and relieve themselves.

The birds’ house stayed clean, while my front porch amassed more bird droppings than I ever imagined. We let the birds stay through the season but vowed to never let them build a nest there again.

They came back the next year and for a time slept on a ledge every night. We shooed them away at every opportunity. For a time we tried keeping a slinky on the ledge but is was as hard to keep up there as it was keeping the birds away.

We have now been fighting these birds every year for at least four years. Just this week I walked out on the front porch one night and saw one of the birds on the ledge. I clapped my hands loudly to frighten the bird away.

That worked but I had left the front door open and much to my chagrin had frightened it right into our home. It flew around our living room for the longest time. We turned off the ceiling fan so that it wouldn’t get hurt.

My children loved having a bird flying around the house, but I don’t think the bird enjoyed it. It was scared being confined in such a small area with very few places to land.

I eventually threw a towel into the air and captured the bird. It played dead until I got it outside and opened the towel. Then it flew into the night.

One year I put my children’s action figures on that ledge and for a while the birds were too frightened to land. After a few days, however, the birds knocked the figures off the ledges.

One of the best things we have used to try and scare the birds away was a small plaster Cardinal that was a gift my wife got from one of our children. We put that cardinal on the ledge and for a long time, the swallows left us alone.

This year I saw how the Cardinal lost its effectiveness. The birds became friends with the Cardinal, sleeping on the ledge with it at night. Soon they started building a nest near it.

I gave my youngest son, Isaac, who is not here today, the job of making sure progress on the nest did not go too far. The birds would gather small balls of mud and pack them together in neat rows and Isaac would knock the mud bricks down before they became a nest.

One day I came home from work and what the sparrows had done shocked me. In hours they had built half a nest – and they attached it to the plaster Cardinal.

It was the Cardinal’s last day on the ledge. It had obviously lost its effectiveness – plus it broke while we were removing the nest.

We have actually had those birds in our home twice now. And both times that has scared them so much, they have stayed away for the season. Next year I’ll invite them in early and get the ordeal over with. My youngest daughter even bought the family a net so that we could catch the bird the next time it comes inside for a visit.

Not all of my experiences with birds lately have been like this. Each year when the stake holds the father and son camp out, I listen for the Whippoorwill.

I prefer this bird to the swallow. Whippoorwills like to be heard and not seen, so if they are making messes, I’m not aware of it. It was on a father/son camp out that I learned where the Whippoorwill got its name. Its name comes from the song it sings. When it chirps it does so crisply and clearly. It sounds like the bird is repeating the word whippoorwill over and over again.

One of the things I look forward to every year at this camp out is the song of the Whippoorwill.

Last Sunday I was at Stake Conference in Killeen. One of my responsibilities for the high council is to take 15 minutes and walk around the parking lot and nearby neighborhood to make sure that nobody is breaking into cars. It is a small service the stake quietly provides it members each time there is conference.

As I left the parking lot and walked toward the corner of the street, I walked under a tree. I heard the song of a different bird. It was a unique song. I thought to myself, “that is the most mournful bird tune that I have ever heard.”

Then it hit me. I said to myself “I bet that is the song of a Mourning Dove.” That is what makes it distinct. That is how it got its name.

I scanned the tree and saw the dove. It was a unique experience for me but yesterday when I told my neighbor about it he said, “haven’t you seen them in our trees? They sing every morning and evening.”

Maybe I need to do more yard work during those hours because while I had seen the doves but I had never heard them.

What kind of songs do you sing? Is your life different from others around you? Do you chirp incessantly and help make your workplace or home less appealing?

As Latter-day Saints we believe that Jesus is the Living Christ. We should sing the song of redeeming love. I say sing but I am really talking about how we live our lives.

I think we are a lot like my experience with the Mourning Doves. People see us but they don’t hear the music we produce. We go about doing good deeds and lifting up the feeble. We try to be like the Savior, but the world is concentrated on other things. It may take a moment of quiet reflection for someone to understand how distinct and good we are. What we must continue to do is to sing the song of redeeming love often and with a spirit that is appropriate. As we do this those who have ears to hear will do so and the work will continue on in this area.

If you wonder how to sing this song, a good place to learn it is from the apostles of the Lord.

President Boyd K. Packer told a story recently about a time when he had been called to a new position in the church and it made the newspaper. When one of his former high school teachers heard about the calling she said, ““That just proves that you can’t tell by looking at a frog how high he is going to jump!”

That is the beauty of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. The weak and the simple move it forward. The Savior can help the lamest frog jump and in turn that frog is always invited to help build the kingdom.