The Bungee Cord 8-1-22

Hello,

The other morning I was sitting on my front porch drinking my morning coffee, when I heard a very familiar sound. Peck, peck, peck, peck, peck…peck, peck, peck…peck, peck, peck, peck. The rapid fire pecking of a woodpecker. I live in the country with trees all around me, and I hear, and sometimes see, all sorts of woodpeckers doing their work in our trees. There are woodpeckers of all sizes from small downy ones to huge pileated ones.

Something that amazes me about woodpeckers is the speed at which they peck. When I hear the rate at which their bills hit the trees, I wonder, “How do they do that?” How do they manage to get their bodies to strike with such quick recovery. Their recovery rate is far faster than I can reach when trying to pound a nail in with a hammer. And it doesn’t seem to matter how hard the wood may be (oak, ash, maple, locust), the force and the speed of their pecking leaves a trail of holes in their wake. It seems like they should be knocking themselves silly as their beaks pummel the trees. How do they do it?

I imagine that the woodpeckers around me must likewise be fascinated when they see me imitating their behavior, pounding my head against the wall, and they ask one another, not, “How does he do it?”, but rather, “Why does he do it?” They, of course, do their head pounding because they are hunting for bugs and they are equipped to handle such head trauma. But me, clearly I am not after bugs and my forehead is not equipped with anything that could perforate a wall. I imagine that somewhere in the midst of their chirping and tweeting, they are laughing at me, banging my head against a wall, saying, “Why does he do it?”

I suspect that the woodpeckers are not the only ones asking that question. I suspect that God is asking the same question, too. God knows the frustrations that build up in my life like a lidded pot of water creating exploding pressure in my soul. God knows the failures that I have accumulated in my life that create a landscape of dried pine needles awaiting a spark. God knows the mud and muck that I step into that impede me from getting anywhere. God knows the anger that is building steam from the callous and careless way that people treat me. God knows…God knows all these things, and even though he knows these things, I am sure that God asks of me when I am pounding my head against the wall, “Why do you do that?”

“Why do you do that?”, God asks of me because God knows something else about me, too. God knows that I am not a woodpecker. I am not a woodpecker. What I am, and God knows this, too, is a child of God. A child of God who God has said powerfully to me and my frustrations, “I am with you always.” A child of God who God as said to me and my failures, “The water that I will give will become in them a spring of water gushing up to eternal life.” A child of God who reaches out to me with a shepherd staff and puts me on a solid path toward green pastures and still waters. A child of God who rests me in his arms, and comes rushing home with me to celebrate having found me when I was lonely and lost. Knowing all these things about me, I am sure that God wonders of my head banging, “Why do you do that?”

Why do I do it? Because I have a way of listening to the world…the world that keeps on telling me that the only way to make my way through life is to live like a woodpecker, constantly banging my head against the wall….getting nowhere, bringing more pain to my life, and driving me silly.

But today, as I sit in the presence of God, God has broken through the bellowing of the world to say to me….and you….”You are not a woodpecker. You are a child of God.”

Have a great week.

God’s grace and peace, (ggap)

Pastor Jerry Nuernberger

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