A
BIRDSNEST
By Clinton White
Have you ever been entangled
in a complex situation? Has your life ever become so complicated
and ensnarled that there
seems absolutely no way at all for things to straighten out? It appears
hopeless? You've tried everything, but things just become more and more
confusing, depressing, and overpowering? Perhaps this message is for you. It's
called A Birdsnest.
I'm not talking about the
kind of a nest a robin makes its young; that's not the kind I mean. Do you know
what a fisherman calls a birdsnest? This is sort of a slang term they use. Do
you know what it means? Well, when a fisherman casts his line out and gets a
backlash or otherwise becomes snarled up in his reel, that's called a birdsnest.
I suppose because the line is so tangled, so interwoven, that it resembles a
bird’s nest. The line at the reel becomes so balled up it looks like something a
swallow made from horse hair.
I don't know how come
fishermen started calling this thing a birdsnest. I suppose it was like this:
Two men fishing, one stops fishing and starts picking away at his reel and the
other says, "What's the matter, got a snarl?" And the other says, "Snarl? Man,
I've got a birdsnest!"
Some of you know what I
mean. I have gone through these times in my own life. If someone says to me,
"Has your life become snarled?" I could say, "Snarled? Sir, I have a
birdsnest!"
Once, not so very long ago,
I was praying about a birdsnest in my life, a hopelessly entangled situation.
There seemed no way out. As I prayed, a memory flashed into my conscious mind.
In my mind's eye I could see two hands holding a fishing reel. The line was so
snarled it looked like it had been stirred up with an egg beater. Let me tell
you what the memory was and how God used it to minister to me.
I enjoy fishing and I
especially like to take my son, Stephen, fishing. I have ever since he was four
or five years old. The memory that I mentioned happened in reality when he was
about seven. We were fishing together on a wharf. I could see that his line had
become tangled up at the reel, and he was trying to get it straightened out.
Actually, it wasn't too bad, but he was having a hard time with it. So I said,
"Son, do you want me to get it untangled before it gets any worse?" He said,
"No, I can do it, daddy." So I let him go ahead and I went on fishing, kind of
pretending I wasn't noticing, but I was watching out of the corner of my eye. I
could see my little boy's neck getting red. His jaw was set. He was determined
to get his line untangled, but the harder he worked, the worse it got. I could
hear him muttering and making sighs. I could see him picking and pulling until
he was holding a regular birdsnest. At that point he gave up. He reached the end
of himself, his abilities. He realized that this was too much for him to handle
and he said, "Here daddy, I can't do it." He handed it over to me and I was,
after some effort, able to straighten things out again.
Some of you reading this
today are ensnarled in sin. Your life has become complicated because of sin.
Your character has become very complex because of lies and deceit. You may
hardly know who you really are, what you really are. You're so snarled up you
don't have a true identity. You dream what you want to be, but your actions
belie those dreams. You fantasize about what you could be, but your weaknesses
keep you in the realm of dreaming, away from the place of doing. You think about
going forward, when all the time you are marching backward. Sin has woven your
life into a birdsnest and you know it. You have tried and tried to untangle this
mess, but it gets worse.
Listen. Jesus loves you. Why
don't you come to Him? Why don't you just hand your whole life over to Him? Say,
"Lord, here's my life. I've really made a birdsnest out of it, but I believe You
can straighten it out. I'm going to place this whole mess in Your hands. Please
have mercy on me. I have no hope but in Your mercy." Try that. Try that and I
tell you that it's the first step toward a new untangled way.
You might not be very deep
in sin. Perhaps your life is entangled but yet you go to church every Sunday.
Hear me carefully: you can become terribly ensnarled by trying to work out your
own salvation. You need Jesus, too, just as much as the skid row wanderer. No
matter what has gripped your life and spun it into a confusing, bewildering,
imprisoning web, no matter what, Jesus knows how to untangle you. Greed, lust,
selfishness, fear, pride, poverty, hatred, no matter what the entanglement,
Jesus can free you. But if you keep on trying to do it alone, you will only
become more and more snarled up.
First . . . come to Jesus.
Just talk to Him. Tell Him in plain language what is on your heart. Receive His
pardon for sin. Sin is trying to live your own life when God made you
for Himself. That's what sin is. Receive His pardon for that, and then ask
Him to come into His temple, which is your body. Ask Him to possess your life.
Give yourself to God. He will accept you. Then, only then will your life begin
to untangle and unwind.
I use the word tangle and
birdsnest for a reason. You see, too many people think that the preacher's
telling them that when they come to Jesus their life will instantly become
untangled. Not so! At that moment you will be on the right path, but some
birdsnests take a while to straighten out. You’re forgiven, you receive eternal
life the moment you come to Christ, but have patience. It might take just a
little while for the mess that you have made of your life to become untangled.
Perhaps it may be family squabbles, broken relationships, deep indebtedness,
legal complications; whatever snarl your life has taken, just have patience. Now
that you have come to Jesus, it will be straightened out. God's word promises
that to you.
Return to Single Slices
| Return to Main Page
|