Before I moved to the woods, I believed bald eagles to be noble fisherman, mighty hunters. I had only ever witnessed them darting from trees over Shuswap lake, pulling out salmon, congregations of them at the river head waiting for the spawn; Sitting like royalty on the edge of the Kettle River, curved beak pointed toward us, keen eyes watching us cooley as we floated by.

Now though…Now I see them mostly sitting at ‘road kill corner’, the place on Highway 33 where the wildlife dies. We most often see the dead white tail deer, though once there was a small black bear, an elk, more. And now we see the eagles there too. The animals cross over there, from the good eating on Black Knight mountain on down to Mission Creek for water. Eagles have become, much less the noble creatures I once believed them to be. Now they sit and attack the vultures, get chased by the murder of crows who make this home. Watching an eagle rip into a deer carcass has changed the image for me.

Why does he eat maggots? Does he not know he is the top of his food chain? The mightiest in his family? How did he forget?

He chooses what is easy…that is all. Don’t you?

Don’t you, so often, choose what is right in front of you, the path of least resistance? Don’t you, sometimes, choose just what gets you by instead of what raises you up? How often do you revert to your base instincts?

How often do we let our fear rule when Christ should?

How often are you picking off of dry bones when you should be sitting down to a feast?

These days, I can barely read the news, so many giving way to the worst of themselves…letting fear rule. It was no mistake that we are told to ‘fear not’ more than we are told anything else. This world can be/is always a scary place. We were never told it wasn’t. We are asked to be brave anyways. To let love rule.

Rise up. Rise up and be a force of Love to this desperate world. Rise up and join the prince of peace. Rise up and care for the widows and orphans. Rise up and do the thing you were made to do.

Please don’t settle for a life of fear…

You are called to be so much more than a scavenger.