House Martin Top

A strange thing happened on Saturday morning, as a dozen or so of us men gathered for our monthly church breakfast. Outside the windows were dozens of birds -house martins*, ducking, diving and hovering outside the panes. I went out to see what was going on; there must have been sixty of seventy or so, swooping above the grass in the neighbouring field, inspecting our chapel’s gutters and fascia, and sometimes sitting on the telephone lines to recover their breath. Why so many came at once, I cannot say; by the time we had concluded our food and heard an encouraging testimony, they were gone. As they depart these shores for their famous migrations back to central and southern Africa in early September, I can only imagine that we were a staging post on their colossal journey ‘home’. Doubtless, the invertebrate population of Martin Top offered a fine meal on this stop off, much as a motorway service station serves us as we endure some awful car journey north or south. It also means there are fewer flies and creepy-crawlies to annoy us; I hope the swifts return next year.

In one respect, the birds came to Martin Top for the same reason we all do. It is not our final destination, but a filling station, an oasis during our desert sojourn, a motel where we seek hospitality before the next stage. We come to feed on God’s word and take a break from the worldly troubles which desecrate every other day. Our destination is the throne room of heaven, the very presence of Christ Jesus. Do not mistake the church with all its flaws and problems for heaven, and do not get too comfortable. Bowland is lovely and Martin Top rather pleasant, but those feathered pilgrims were keeping their eyes trained on the lush lands of tropical Africa and the southern hemisphere which is even now warming up as our land in the north cools down. So feed well and prepare for your homeward journey.

Dearly beloved, I beseech you as strangers and pilgrims, abstain from fleshly lusts, which war against the soul; 1 Peter 2:11

Image by Kev from Pixabay

* a few, similar birds appeared on Sunday morning, and some discussion took place between the present writer, a deacon and the welcomer as to their identity. I had orginally thought them swifts, but they had pale underbellies; the wedge-shaped tails seemed to preclude their being swallows.