The Blessing of the Mother Bird | Jentezen Franklin

This is a big deal. These are the things, when you forgive your father who wasn't there. Not that, not when I say forgive, I can't stand him and all of that. You don't necessarily have to be around somebody, but you do have to forgive them truly from your heart. And God says when you do that, when you do that, when you have disagreements, and especially with the mother bird, get over it. Love, forgive, show mercy, show kindness, because God sees it. God sees it. Together we're inspiring people to live for Jesus. If you're looking for more in life, to live with purpose and peace, to make a difference for your family and those in need around the world, Jesus is the answer, and our mission is to simply point you to him. You're watching Kingdom Connection with Judson Franklin. If you have your Bibles, I'm going to preach just a few minutes. I want you to look with me in Deuteronomy chapter 22. If a bird's nest happens to be before you along the way, in any tree or on the ground with young ones or eggs, with the mother sitting on the young or on the eggs, you shall not take the mother of the young. You shall surely let the mother go, and take the young for yourself, that it may be well with you. This is something that seems so amazing to me, that God says, if you do what I just said, if you treat the mother bird like I tell you to treat her, it will be well with you that you may prolong your days. I'll give you my title in just a moment, but I want us to understand something very important this morning, that it's the little things, it's the small, seemingly insignificant things of attitude and heart and internal stuff that God sees. Man looks only outward, God sees the heart, and when we please the Lord in little things, in the kingdom, little things are huge things. Big doors swing on little hinges.

Doors are huge compared to the tiny hinges that they hang upon. Hinges are small compared to the doors that they open to our lives and the things that we enter into by that tiny hinge the door hangs on. For example, when Moses was 80 years of age, he had been in the wilderness for 40 years tending his father-in-law's sheep. And the scripture said he saw a bush that was burning, and he noticed it, and the thing that caught his attention is that it burned, but it was not consumed. And something in him, something he had seen it many times, it's very normal to see a plant catch on fire, it gets up to 120 degrees, it's combustible, it's a fire that just happens because it was dry. And so when this happened, it wasn't something he had never seen before, it shouldn't have piqued his interest, but five words changes the whole human race. Five words would change everything about our lives. The Bible said in the scripture, when he saw the bush and it was not consumed with the fire, it kept burning, he turned aside to see. Five words, he turned aside to see. Had he not turned aside to see, when he got there, it was not a burning bush, it was God and God's voice and God's call. And that burning bush said, take off your shoes, you're standing on holy ground. And that burning bush began to give him the plan of God for a nation to be born out of bondage. That plan of God was communicated through that burning bush. Had he not turned aside to see, five words, the big door of the Ten Commandments would swing on five words. The nation of Israel being in existence would swing on those little hinges. Five words, the Messiah coming through the tribe of Judah would ultimately swing the first five books of the Bible from the story of creation all the way up to the tabernacle plan in the wilderness, the sacrifices, the priesthood,

all of those things, types and shadows of Christ, they came from five words of a door that swung on seemingly, it was a normal day, it was not a special day, he felt no chill bumps, he saw no angel, he just got up, he was on his way to go somewhere, he sees from a distance a burning bush and he turns aside to go see. And when he does, God noticed that tiny obedience and opened massive doors that are almost mind boggling to us. What can happen if you show the mother bird mercy? When you understand this and you see it, the mother bird is a type, I believe, of our mothers. The Bible said, honor your father and your mother and then it gives this add on condition, honor your father and mother as the Lord God commands you that your days be long and that it go well with you in the land the Lord God will give you. There is an undeniable blessing that is connected to the mother bird and how you treat your mother. And God says, it will go well with you and I will bless you and I will prolong your days if you will obey this small hinge of honoring your mother. Be careful, be careful teenagers, be careful husbands, be careful children, grandchildren, how you treat the mother bird. I God, I see that stuff. I don't care how much you preach, how much you sing,

I don't care how religious you look when you bring your Bible. I watch how you show mercy to people that I allowed across your life that you could crush them if you wanted to but instead you obey me. It's a big door attached. You know, when you understand that, the purpose for this scripture is how much more if we show it to a mother bird, how much more if we show it to our mother physically or our father or our brother or our sister or our brothers and sisters in the body of Christ or the people that we work with. We're supposed to be kind people. We're supposed to be nice people. We're supposed to be when nobody's watching, our heart is to be kind and merciful to people. This is Christianity in action. It's shining a light in a dark world. We don't react to people like other people react. We don't say things like other people say. I'll never forget as long as I live, we had been given for Christmas BB guns. My mother sitting down here and her and my dad, they always had great Christmases for us. We didn't get a lot but we got a lot. And we was given for the last time. And man, I was so happy. I wanted to be with you.

And I said, I love you. I love you. I love you. And we would end up on the end street around the junkyard, literally a junkyard of beer bottles to shoot all day long. And we would set them up, shoot them, all kinds of stuff. And I remember one day I went out and I saw the most beautiful blue bird sitting on the power line. And I had my BB gun. It had to be God. And I pointed that thing and 99.9% of the time I would have never hit it. That's a very small target. I shot that thing and I nailed it and it flopped and fell over. And I ran and grabbed that dead bird by the claws. I ran to the front door of the parsonage next to the church in Henderson and I pounded on the door and my mother came to the door and she looked down and I was holding that with my BB gun. I was so excited, I felt like a man and I was just standing there. Mama, look, mom, look, look. And all she said, the Bible said, son, a righteous man regardeth the life of a beast. Go bury that thing in the backyard. And she closed the door and it marked me for life.

I'm standing there with that dead bird. Had I known the book like she knew it, I would have had more wind of the Holy Ghost to my back if I'd have just let Blue Robin or whatever it was go. And the point that I'm trying to make is it's amazing that there's something about this law. If you can take care of a mother bird, it touches God's heart. And God says, it'll go well with you. I won't forget it. I'll put the Holy Ghost wind behind your back. You'll have a force behind you because you treated mother bird right. Galatians chapter six said, let us not be weary in well-doing. Don't ever stop doing it when you know you're doing what is well in God's eyes. For in due season, we will reap if we faint not. Good people are kind to their animals. They care for their animals. Even caring for animals, the Bible said, for the wicked is cruel. Some people are so mean, so wicked, so cruel, they can't do anything without having meanness attached to it. There's a little twist of meanness in some people. And that stuff should not be in us. In Christianity, you must have the spirit of Christ that you get smoked, you get convicted. You feel a check in your spirit

when your attitude is wrong and you're just letting it fly. Something's not submitted to the cross until we reach that point. God, wash it out of us. God, whatever you've got to do to work on my tongue, on my mind, on my temper, on my disposition, on my attitude, on how I treat my people, my family, my loved ones, my employees, the people that I work with, we must have that spirit of kindness. Not that we can't, at times you have to deal with things. At times, not all meetings are pleasant. Say amen, somebody. But the end result is I'm going into this meeting, I want everything to be aired out. I want every issue to be covered. Family, we're gonna go through some stuff and we're gonna talk about this, but when it's all said and done, it's not blaming you and you blaming me and I'm so right and you're so wrong. It's a spirit of restoration that says, now that we've aired it out and everything is, give me your neck, come here and hug me and I'll hug you and let's move forward. That's what it's all about. And how you treat the mother bird is a big deal to God. David was a man after God's own heart. Why? I believe the big doors for David swung

when God sat back and watched Saul try to kill him and Saul's son, Jonathan, became his friend. And when Saul's house was killed, the scripture said, and David went to the throne in 2 Samuel 9 and one, he said, is there any left in the house of Saul that I might show kindness to? Who was the house of Saul? The people who had chased him and tried to kill him and assassinate him over and over and over. And he said, I made Jonathan, my friend, a promise and I heard he's got a son and he's crippled and I want you to go get him and I want you to bring him to my palace. He will sit at my table. And by the way, I want his ranch and his farm restored. All the land will be. given back to him that he lost and I want Ziba to take his 15 sons and hire 22 servants and make sure the old home place is there for that crippled boy if he ever wants to go out and just somebody take him around, but he'll eat at my table every day for the rest of his life. You, that's the, he's a man after God's own heart. That's a photograph of what it looks like. It's somebody who is blessing a family that tried to take him out. This is a big deal. These are the things, when you forgive your father who wasn't there, not that, not when I say forgive,

I can't stand him and all of that. You don't necessarily have to be around somebody, but you do have to forgive them truly from your heart. And God says, when you do that, when you do that, when you have disagreements, and especially with the mother bird, get over it. Love, forgive, show mercy, show kindness because God sees it. God sees it. Now, let me give you a couple of scriptures. In Galatians chapter six and verse 10, as we have therefore opportunity, let us do good to all men, especially unto them of the household of faith. In first Peter chapter one and verse five, add to your faith, virtue, knowledge. And he says in temperance and patience and controllability and godliness, here it is, brotherly kindness and charity so that you will not be unfruitful and that these things may abound in you. Ephesians four and 31 says, let all malice, bitterness, wrath, anger, clamor, evil speaking be put away from you with all malice. Everybody read it out loud. And be kind to one another, tender hearted. Oh, what a beautiful word. Tender hearted, everybody forgiving one another, even as God Christ forgave you.

Do you know that Jesus said in Luke chapter 12, that there would be five sparrows sold for two denarius. Not one of them is forgotten before God, the text said. Not one of them is forgotten before God. God remembers the mother bird, Matthew 10 and verse 29, but even the very hair of your head is numbered. Fear not for you are more valuable than many flies. A box of sparrows. What he's saying, what he's trying to teach us is if I feel that way about a mother bird, how much more do I feel that way about you? First Peter chapter three and verse 10, they that love life must refrain those who love life and wanna see good days. Refrain your tongue from evil and your lips from speaking guile, the King James says. For the eyes of the Lord watch over those who do right. Be friendly, forgive, love. You know why? Cause he's a good God and he keeps good records. And when he sees you doing things that nobody else sees you doing in the realm of kindness and forgiveness, he says, hey, Holy Ghost wind, get behind their back. And it's gonna be harder for some people to get there, but it's gonna be easy for them to get to the place of destiny that I've called them to because they've got the wind behind their back. I don't need Holy Ghost headwinds. I want the wind, the blessing on my life

on our families, on our marriage, the blessing of the wind of forgiving one another, honoring our father, honoring our mothers, honoring one another. And when you do it, God says, it'll go well. Big doors swing on loose. little, little, little, little bitty hinges. And today, a big door can be waiting behind one hinge of simple obedience to God's Word.