No Wonder You Have Birds - You Feed Them All the Time

Ranger Bob went outside and saw birds feeding on the tops of the garbage barrels. We have Blue Jays, Cardinals, Goldfinches, Starlings, Grackles, and Doves. Squirrels will jump up and land on or near a bird, scaring it away. A Jay kept jumping up and screaming at one feeding squirrel. He didn't care.

Turning over the soil when planting or weeding will excite the interest of birds, who know fresh food will be wiggling and squirming near the top. I had an ultra-compost spot at our Midland parsonage, overseen by a flock of birds. As soon as I began working on that area, they all began to chatter and make happy sounds, like fans waiting to get into the rally or the World Series.
The reason was that the compost ingredients were welcomed by a mass of earthworms, because I was testing how much they could grow in numbers in that location. The birds knew that my labor would provide a feast of fresh worms in softly stirred soil.  Sometimes people left the kitchen door, spooking all the birds into flight - lots of noise. "Why didn't you warn me?"

Similar things happen when the faithful stir up the classics of the past. When they are suddenly visible again - though they were always present, if hard to find - people begin talking about them. One reader said, "I would never know about Loy, Reu, Jacobs, and Schmauk except for you writing about them."

Likewise, we would not have instant access to them without the Lutheran Librarian making them public in print and in ebooks.

Lutheran Library Publishing Ministry

Lutheran Librarian Print Books

God creatures expand according to the food, water, and shelter available. When soil creatures are encouraged with organic matter and deep roots, plants increase and so do birds and bunnies.

Ranger Bob mocked my "backyard jungle," but it is a food jungle for birds. The corn patch is solid with Blackberry canes, The other patch has Butterfly Bush, Poke Weed, and Chaste Tree.

The tool shed is overshadowed by a giant Elderberry bush on each side. Some Raspberries grow and so do Beauty Berries for the late fall.

Too many congregations want the results, not the cause. The cause is an abundance of the Means of Grace - the Word and Sacraments.

Planting roses is easy. The results come from fertile soil and beneficial insects. Light work after is mulching with fertility products like Peat Humus and shredded wood.

Sermons are tough for ministers who do not study the Word. They realize they are trying to grow in dry sandbox, so they steal from others. Those sermons are like flowers delivered by mail on a Phoenix summer day - dried out and wilted. Reading another's sermon is as thrilling as reciting the phone book. No wonder live online services caused universal clergy panic.

Veterans Honor for Ranger Bob's Step-Father and Army Ranger

 After Peter Ellenberger died, we put this Veterans Honor rose on the altar. He loved telling us how he was put up for discipline for "threatening an officer" with a potato knife. When the commander saw Peter's 100 pounds of skin and bone and the spud knife, he laughed and dismissed the case.

Ranger Bob came over Sunday afternoon. I wanted him to take the altar flowers to his step-father's grave. Both were Army Rangers. We had a vase of Veterans Honor roses, which were kind enough to bloom on the right day. When I look at photos from previous years, I think, "They cannot be that perfect." And they are, far more than the photos indicate.




Sassy addressed the door knocking with ferocious barking, as if I were not headed for the door -  or  - as if I wanted to throw extra locks on. Her initial stage of greeting Bob is to feign great hurt about not getting her Milkbone, followed by a Pupperoni, followed by some cinnamon cracker. Many chastening barks are laid upon him, so we can hardly converse.

Bob scowls and says, "You chow hound. Can't you think of anything else?" Sassy is in heaven. Like all dogs, she reads the emotion and not the words or feigned scorn. She can hear the slight change in words as he tries to hold back his smiles and laughter.

We had some new dogs move in across Scott. They wanted to do the "Stranger come to kill us all!" bark. I said, "Who's a good boi?" Pause, pointing at each one, "YOU are a good boi." (Animal language is misspelled with bad grammar, so editors, sheathe your swords.) Now the dogs perk up and remain silent. They are good bois.

Try that on strange dogs. They will pull back, as if to say, "You know me? How do you me?"

Sassy sets up a security perimeter after her snacks. Outside she picks a spot where she can see into two back yards, across the street, and over to Scott Lane. No threat has ever come near with her on duty, and she never stops watching and listening.

Five Ellenbergers, German born, served in the US military.