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The 1000 Hours Outside Podcast
1KHO 841: Wise People Watch Birds | Kevin Burrell, Considering Sparrows
00:56:46
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- [00:01]
Podcast Host/Advertiser
This episode is sponsored by Fora Travel. I've always been the person people come to for travel advice, whether it's planning a camping trip in Northern Michigan, figuring out how to travel well with kids across the country, or finding experiences that actually help families connect instead of just filling an itinerary. I genuinely have loved helping people create meaningful adventures. And I know a lot of you listening are probably that person, too. The friend who plans the trip, the one who researches the details. The one person people trust to find the hidden gems and make everything run smoothly. I Fora is built for people exactly like that. Fora is a modern travel agency that helps people build their own travel business, no matter what stage of life they're in. You don't need prior experience because Fora gives you the training, technology, and support to help you get started. And you're joining a community of people who are building businesses centered around experiences, relationships, and helping others travel well. A lot of advisors begin simply by helping people they already know and grow naturally from there. What I also appreciate is that there are no sales quotas or minimums. You can build this at a pace that works for your life and your family. Your next act starts here. Become a for adviser today at foratravel.com 1000hours. That's F O R A travel.com 1000hours. And make sure you tell them we sent you for travel.com 1000hours.
- [01:16]
Jenny Urgent
Welcome to 1000hours outside podcast. My name is Jenny Urgent, the founder of 1000 Hours Outside. And I have just read. I don't know if, like, this is how you'd want me to describe it, but a delightful book. A delightful book called Considering what Birds Teach Us about who We Are, Where We're Going, and the Joy of Following Jesus. And it is. It's beautiful. First of all, it's just a beautiful book. And then with just really deep, interesting content. And the author, Kevin Burrell, is here. Welcome, Kevin.
- [01:46]
Kevin Burrell
Hey. Thank you. Glad to be here.
- [01:48]
Jenny Urgent
So there was a couple things about it that were kind of like threads of other experiences that I've had. So first of all, it opens with a liturgy from Douglas McKelvey, and I was able to interview him earlier this year.
- [02:05]
Kevin Burrell
Good.
- [02:06]
Jenny Urgent
And that was the first time I'd ever seen any of his stuff. All these liturgies for kind of everyday things. And one of the ones was for bird watching. So that was a cool thing. Then as I'm reading this book, I'm noticing all the illustrations. They're stunning. It's like black and white watercolor that's what it looks like to me. I've never even seen that. And then I realize it's illustrated by Aiden Peterson, who's also been a guest on our show. So I've had a chance to talk with him. And then Will Parker Anderson is the editor who I realized at the very end who has also been a guest on our show. So there was all of these overlaps beyond the fact that I really enjoyed the book. So, Kevin, huge congrats. I know this came out earlier this year. Can you give people a little bit of your background about how you got interested in bird watching to begin with? And then this book is about, I mean, I love it. How God has imbued, imbued all of these. All. I never know if they're right. They come out and I'm like, I
- [03:07]
Kevin Burrell
don't know if I've ever say it with confidence. Right? Yeah.
- [03:11]
Jenny Urgent
How there's all these spiritual lessons, all these things that we can learn, can be inspired by through creation. And this is a focus on birds. So when did the bird watching, bird noticing part of your life begin?
- [03:25]
Kevin Burrell
Yeah, well, first of all, I'll say all those people that you mentioned at the front end, like, they're the ones that made this book beautiful. Right. I mean, just what a, what a team. When you write it's a lonely thing and then suddenly people are on board with you and suddenly you're working on something together. And it's just, I'm so grateful for Aidan and Will and, you know, Douglas McKelvey gave us permission to use that at the beginning. And that probably gets at it. Right. Like McKelvey's whole concept there is about how every is holy and how we need to be looking for God in just the ordinary things of life. And so I would say bird watching, for me, it was a college discovery. For me, it was my senior year of college. And that doesn't mean I didn't notice birds as a kid, but I think I got birders talk about the spark bird. It's that bird that you see and it just, you suddenly go, I want to be a bird watcher. Like, this is amazing. And I was in Costa Rica, I was a biology major, so I was on a tropical biology study in the rainforest. And this toucan flew over me and could have stared at that thing all day. From that point on, I was like, I'm going to keep a list of birds and my first one is going to be this amazing one. And so from that point, I think I started noticing birds when I would travel and then I started just noticing, wow, they're also in my backyard and they're no less amazing. And I take these ones for granted. You know, my, my family of cardinals in the backyard and all the rest. And then about six years ago, I think that started connecting. I'm a pastor, so that started connecting at an illustrative level with my, with my faith and just started noticing like in a McKelvey kind of sense, like, hey, this is a holy moment. Like I think that there's something that is revealed in this. Like there's lessons to be found in, in the things that I'm looking at. And that turned into a blog and that turned into a book. And you read the book and there you go, there's the short, the short speed up of the story and people
- [05:17]
Jenny Urgent
can find the blog. The blog is still there. The blog is still there. It's called OrniTheology.com the gospel according to Birds. So people can go check out the blog and also the book which is called Considering Sparrows, which I just love. I love that him, his eyes on the sparrow. I love the verses that talk about not worrying. But then you go so much deeper into all these different kinds of birds. So it would be a wonderful book to read as a family, like for your family devotions if you're trying to get outside. So you talked about the spark bird, which I had never heard about. Then you also talked about bird lists. I didn't know people do this. So can you talk about. I mean these would be great things for families to start to do.
- [05:57]
Kevin Burrell
Right? Right. Right. Yeah. In fact, I just took a dad and his 12 year old son out birding just this last weekend and what a cool thing to watch dad and son like noticing things together and all that. So yeah, it is a great, what a great family pastime. Right? But. But I don't know, along the way, I guess. But you know what, ask me your question again because I got off the.
- [06:21]
Jenny Urgent
I don't think I didn't realize that that was a thing that people did. And so I thought, well, you can sit and read this book as a family as it's not written like a devotional. But I just feel like it's such a hands on thing to go through as a family and then you could start making your family list.
- [06:35]
Kevin Burrell
That's right. So if you're into lists, I mean we try and make everything I think competitive in some way, shape or form. It's funny how, how we can. Humans can be that way. Right there's 11,000 or plus species of birds on the planet and nobody has seen all of them. It's amazing. But the idea of keeping up with the ones that you've seen and knowing, hey, this is a bird I've never seen before. And so birders have their lists. I mean, we've got an ebird makes this easy. It's now it's all online. It used to be in the margins of field guides, and now it's all in one place. And so I can log, hey, I just saw this loggerhead shrike here in Mecklenburg county, in Charlotte, and it will now add that, hey, that's on your life list. That's on your county list. That's on your state list. That's on your patch. Like it knows what, what list to add that bird to. And I don't know, like, every morning I get a, I get an email that tells me, here's the birds that have been seen in the county that are not on your year list yet. Like the birds that I haven't seen since January 1st. And of course, there's a, there's a seasonality to birding, which makes it such a great outdoor pastime. It's a, there's, I think you can, you can notice, hey, not this, not just, this is new for my year, but this is the earliest I've seen this bird. You know that he's here in April. He's usually here in. And just. So when you keep a list, you notice the year to year, you notice the cadence and the seasonality of, of, yeah, just of the year. And, and it's amazing that birds can do that. And where you are geographically, too. Right. Like, my list is going to look different than somebody in Pittsburgh or somebody in Nebraska. Right. Because it's different everywhere. And anyway, it just, I think lists help you kind of understand where you are and when you are kind of grounds you a little bit.
- [08:17]
Jenny Urgent
So I didn't know about any of this. I didn't know about ebird. What an incredible thing to start to do with your family. I think this is perfect.
- [08:24]
Kevin Burrell
Ebird.org it's amazing. And if I can add to this, Jenny, if, if your readers have not discovered Merlin yet, that is, if you got Merlin and Ebird on your phone, you're, you're like, you're on your way to professional at that point. So Merlin is put out by the same, the same folks. It's the Cornell Lab of Ornithology. They're up in Cornell, New York, and they do Ebird which is the citizen science. You know, all these just people like you and me just uploading the brain birds that we're seeing. But then Merlin helps you identify them. So you can either take a picture of it with your phone and. And it'll take a good guess at what it is. Or my favorite is you can just turn on the microphone and listen. And the birds and that, you know, you gotta trust, but verify it doesn't always get it right, but I would say it's getting more and more accurate and it will tell you, hey, there's a. There's a what? There's a Phoebe off in the. In the very distance that you might not have heard, but. But it heard it. And so it'll help you identify birds. You better at knowing what the birds are in your backyard. And over time you start noticing the new ones too. So those two together are just such a great pairing.
- [09:27]
Jenny Urgent
So what a great motivation to get outside. I think it could affect your travels. It. You know, if you, if you become really interested in this. Where are we gonna go? Different parks that you can check out. So you wrote in the book, it's called Considering Sparrows. You exhort the reader to be attentive to something. And I, I love this part of it because it's all small. It can be small stuff. So you are. I'm convinced that to remain sane and grounded this planet, every one of us should make some sort of attentive effort to some aspect of God's creation. You pick astronomy, gardening, fungus, whatever. And you say, I chose birds. And there's this verse in Job that says, but ask the animals and they will teach you. Or the birds in the sky, and they will tell you. Or speak to the earth and it will teach you. Or let the fish in the sea inform you. Which of all these does not know that the hand of the Lord has done this. So you talk about how wise people bird watch and even just that part of seasonality where we're so disconnected from the Earth in this stage of the world because of technology and being indoors. So, you know, there's that verse that says, teach us to number our days that we may gain a heart of wisdom. And so I would imagine that as you're like, oh, this bird came in April. You. You feel more in your body. I think the passage of time. Here's another April, another March has come and gone, another June, and you see these birds and you know, maybe I'm not going to see this one again for another. So can you talk about the statement Wise people bird watch.
- [10:54]
Kevin Burrell
Well, I'm going to Solomon on that one because it's great in the Bible, like we do see, not just that birds are mentioned a lot, but that the fact that people looked at birds is mentioned a lot. And when you talk about when, when the Bible talks about Solomon in all of his wisdom, and it goes on for a few verses to say, here's some of the ways in which he was so wise. It mentions that he noticed animals, and he specifically. It mentions that he mentions that he noticed birds. He also noticed the little grasses that grow in the sidewalk cracks right just between the stones on the temple. I mean, he noticed these things. And so here, here's this guy who maybe the first recorded biologist. He's just paying attention to the things around him. And yet now when you get into places like the psalms and places where now we're interacting with God on the things that we're noticing, you see that birds are being brought into that a lot. You know, it's like, wow, I'm looking at the temple and I see there's a. There's a bird up there. And I wish that I was as close to the Lord's holy place as that bird is right now. I'm just. There's lessons pulled in along the way. So I think, you know that quote about being. Trying to remain sane and grounded on this planet, I just think I'm going to go pastor for a minute here. But, you know, I mean, In Psalm, Psalm 19 says, the heavens declare the glory of God and the skies proclaim the work of his hands. And that means that God made the creation not just as something for us to, you know, drive through on our way to work, but he made us to notice it. And there's lessons there. And if we slow down and pay attention, I think that's where some of the, some of those aha moments come from. And it doesn't matter what you're looking at, but birds are easy because they're kind of everywhere, wherever you are. I mean, you look out the window, there's probably a bird there. So pick something that is maybe, you know, I could, I could have. I could have gotten into whales, but it would have been a lot harder to, to pay attention to the whales, right? You gotta, you gotta be where they are. And birds are everywhere. So.
- [12:48]
Jenny Urgent
And there's these verses that say to consider. And I've always thought about that, especially in a day that's screen heavy, that this is something that Jesus says to do, right? Like consider the birds of the Air. Consider the ravens in the field. Consider the. The lilies of the. Whatever, you know, it's like, consider the wildflowers, like. And you. You don't do that. You don't consider things when you don't see them. So I think for all of us, it's important to get our families outdoors and to do these things. So let's talk about the way that the. The book is set up. So you call it ornitheology. It was coined by a theologian, birder, John Stott. He's got a book called the Birds Are Teachers Ornitheology. And you go through a bunch of different types of birds in the book and you have all these lessons that go along with them. So I figured we could talk about a couple of them and then people can pick up the book to read some of the others. And like I said, I think it'd be a fantastic book to read with a family. So here's one that relates to me because our oldest son is going to graduate from high school this year. So you talk about the empty nest. Now, this is a phrase that people use all the time.
- [13:54]
Kevin Burrell
Yeah.
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Jenny Urgent
And I didn't know any of this, and I don't know if I'm going to even pronounce these words right. You're gonna have to help me. So you talk about. I didn't know this. So you're gonna learn a couple things. You're gonna learn a tremendous amount. You know, it's great. You're gonna learn about. I had no idea. I'm like, how am I this age? And I didn't know that there was two ways that parent birds get the, you know, the baby birds out of the nest. There's two ways. Precocial.
- [14:19]
Kevin Burrell
That's right.
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Jenny Urgent
And altricial.
- [14:21]
Kevin Burrell
Yep. Good job.
- [14:22]
Jenny Urgent
Okay, can you explain what those are? And then you relate that towards. To spiritual maturity.
- [14:29]
Sponsor Voice (Google Health)
Yeah.
- [14:30]
Kevin Burrell
Right. So you'll probably know, like, right now, birds that you might find. If you found a nest of birds in your mailbox or something. Those birds are. Are what's called altricial. So they're. They are very helpless. When they're, when they come out of the, the egg, they. They look like they like something. A toy you'd find at a Cracker Barrel. Right. They don't, they don't look like. Like the eraser end of a pencil. And they're. They're fully helpless. And the bird, the. The parent birds are going to have to do a lot of work to get them to the point where they can fledge and Then there's other birds like you probably, if you hatch ducklings, you know, they, they, they come out and they start, they just start following mom. Like they, they, they're, they've got enough feathers to protect them. They, they, they can, they can walk, they can swim, some of them. There's actually, this is more of a, rather than like two different ideas. It's more of a continuum, right? It's like a. Because there's some birds that are even called super precocial where they just, they, they hatch and they're. The parents aren't even around when they hatch and they just, just gonna have to figure it out on their own. And so the question that I was asking in the, in the book was, hey, what, what does it look like for us to disciple others? Like, we can't take either one of those approaches by themselves, right? Because if, if you just assume, hey, think in terms of a new believer, right? In, in a church sometimes we say, well, hey, you're pretty, you're pretty altricial. Like, you just stay in the nest. We'll feed you for a few years, we'll make you memorize a bunch of verses. And we, we don't expect you to really do anything yet because right now you just gotta, you just gotta grow. But I think when people are new to something, they get excited about it and they, they have, they immediately have things to offer. And so we don't want to put new believers on the bench to say, hey, when you figure, you know, once you grow up a little bit, then you can start getting in the game. I mean, you're. No, you're like, you're on the varsity team now. You don't have to wait, you know, you don't have to play JV for a while. And then the. But the other end is, you know, we, we take this precocial approach that we say, hey, hey, they're okay. They, they just, they signed the commitment card they're in and they'll figure it out, all right? And instead, we do know that there's a walk alongside. I love the way that Jesus walked alongside his 12 disciples and just invested in them for three years. I mean, that was, that was how he changed the world. He invested in 12 people. And over the course of three years, they did life with him. They didn't just sit under his sermon for an hour a week. They went where he went, they ate where he ate. And that's how they started to imitate him and started to, they started to be the reflection of who he was into the world. And so I think it's not entirely when we're trying thinking about discipleship, it's not fully one way or fully the other. It's good. We've got to have, it's got to be a both. And that was the idea behind that.
- [17:08]
Podcast Host/Advertiser
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- [20:52]
Kevin Burrell
I'd also have a really soft spot for my son. Just went off to college last year and so that question of hey, when is it right for a kid to leave the nest? Which is how I started that chapter was was not hypothetical for me. That was very close to my heart. And I did write up, I think I would call it a memoir on the blog of what it was like to send my son off to a college five states away. And that son did great. Dad did not. I mean emotionally, that one was a rough, a rough One for me. And I know a lot of your listeners are probably heading into that, that phase of life right now. And there's it, it, it shifts you, but there's, there's hope on the other end of it.
- [21:33]
Jenny Urgent
So I want to read a little bit of this so people can get a good sense of how you write and what's in the book. The book is called Considering Sparrows. What Birds Teach Us about who We Are, Where We're Going and the Joy of Following Jesus. So you talk about different types of birds. The pre kosher are the ones that just, just kind of kick them out of the nest or possibly like you said, the parents aren't even there when the egg hatches. So one of the examples is the mallee fowl.
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Kevin Burrell
Yeah, I think that's right. They're in Australia. Okay, let's call them a mallefowl. I think that's right.
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Jenny Urgent
It's super precocial. So their eggs are incubated in a huge pile of dirt and debris and when they hatch they have to dig their way out which could take up to 15 hours. You're right. Without a parent or legal guardian anywhere in the vicinity. So there's a little bit of humor sprinkled through. And then they freeze for like. Because they're just probably exhausted and trauma trying to dig out. Or then you also talk about the torrent duck that has to cannonball off a cliff into a cold raging torrent. And then I ended up watching the Hooded Merganser, some sort of a duck, where as I watched a video because it says in the book, watch a video where they're high up in the tree like five stories up and they've got a video of this nest of eight or nine of these little ducks. And they're kind of trying to, they're down in this hole in the tree and they're trying to kind of like jump up the side of the inside of the tree to get to the opening of the hole and then they just jump off. Yeah, it's a five story drop and then they bounce.
- [23:01]
Kevin Burrell
They bounce wonderfully. It's so much fun to watch. Yeah. And slow motion is great. So it's so much fun to watch that you can't capture that in a book. So actually in the book say go ahead, I'll wait, go watch this video. Like it's so funny to watch. Right? So. Yeah, yeah.
- [23:15]
Jenny Urgent
And so then they, you say they've got this adrenaline fueled start but their brain development tapers off later. And then on the other Hand is the altricial. So these are the ones that are, I mean they are getting so much food. The songbird chick can eat its own body weight and food every day, which makes the grocery bill challenging already. But now factor in that the parents are feeding triplets, quadruplets or even quintuplets and it's no surprise that the parents are constantly foraging, making trips to the nest every 15 minutes, 12 to 14 hours a day without any me time. So it's just interesting that these different kinds, on one hand the development slowly but, but slow. But over time the brain development is
- [23:57]
Podcast Host/Advertiser
a little bit bigger because there's all
- [23:59]
Jenny Urgent
of this, you know, high protein food that these birds are getting. And then you talk about the peregrine falcon. It's just such beautiful writing. Like you wrote before you go fast you've got to go slow. Ask the fastest animal on the planet, the peregrine falcon. Adults have been clocked at speeds up to 238mph in an aerial dive called a stoop. That's slightly faster than the top speed of a Formula one racing car. But teaching a young falcon how to handle that sort of power involves a
- [24:29]
Podcast Host/Advertiser
process of slow discipleship.
- [24:31]
Jenny Urgent
And then you go through and you talk about how the parents actually teach challenging maneuvers to train their youngsters in basic aeronautics. They play follow the leader games, they advance to holding prey in mid air. They practice mid flight food transfer. They graduate to catch free falling food. And it's about a six month process. So I, it does really make you think about the creativity of God.
- [24:56]
Kevin Burrell
Yeah, yeah. And what a model that is for us. Right. Like as parents think about how, okay, how do we do that with our kids. Kids. Because I think that sometimes we, we default to this kind of didactic like okay, I'm telling you what to do now. You go do it. But you see the, the falcon and I think really a good path of discipleship involves other steps. So it's okay, I'm going to tell you what to do, but I'm showing you I'm going to model it right now. I'm going to do it. Here's the next step. I'm going to do it, but you're going to help me. Like hey, we're gonna, we're gonna go teach the Sunday school class together and I'm gonna let you teach five minutes of it, right? Well eventually I'm going to let you teach the majority of it. I'm going to kind of bow out. That's, that's you do. And I watch and then eventually now you've been. You've been empowered, you've been equipped, and so now you're doing. And I'm. I'm cheering you on. Right? So. So it goes from I do to you do. I do you help to you do I help? And now you do, and I will cheer you on. And I think that we do that with a lot of things with kids as we're trying to. My. I have a son with. With down syndrome. He's 13, and he wants to help in certain ways. He loves to vacuum the house. And that has now progressed to him really wanting to mow the lawn. Well, now that's terrifying to me. Like, I don't. I don't want my son mowing the lawn. Like, you know, the only. So much can happen with the vacuum cleaner. But the lawnmower is a different thing. So I am letting him push the lawnmower, but I've got one hand on it as well, and I'm letting him go. He cannot keep a straight line. He is all over the yard. And. And when he's done and tired, I go back over and I. I'm gonna mow the rest of it. Well, eventually, maybe he'll learn how to keep a straight line, and maybe one of these days he can be the lawnmower. But right now, it's. It's him with the hand on it and. With two hands on it and me right behind him holding on and making sure that he doesn't go too far afield. I think that's. That's the peregrine falcon. And that's. That's parenting, right?
- [26:45]
Jenny Urgent
Yeah. Yeah. You have to go slow in order to go fast down, down the road. So it just. It's beautiful writing. That's why I wanted to read a
- [26:52]
Podcast Host/Advertiser
little bit of it, because it's.
- [26:53]
Jenny Urgent
It's interesting and there's just a lot of things going on there. And I had never heard or considered the fact that there's these. Just two different types of birds, but some are kicked out of the nest right away. They have to jump on their own. And that's. Some are getting all of this intense parenting. And then, you know, you talk about that sometimes churches and ministries can air at the extremes. So you. That's something to think about. Okay, let's talk about another one. The mermaid. Murmurations burnadoes okay, I've heard the word murmuration, but I don't think I've ever said it. I do think. I think everyone is just like, whoa, when you see all these birds. Flying in similar directions and not hitting each other. So can you talk about your trip to North Carolina with the chimney swift? Chimney swift, sure.
- [27:42]
Kevin Burrell
Yeah. Yeah. So the, the chimney swift and the starling are part of that. That's chapter five. And those are two kind of, of honestly kind of boring looking birds. If you were to look at one of those birds, you wouldn't think much of it. But when they're in flocks, it just is jaw dropping, right? So the, the chimney swifts, which are here in North Carolina, and then the, the starlings as well. You probably see those in lots of places. They, they do these tight formations, especially in the fall. The chimney swifts do these things. And my kids called it a birdnado, but that's kind of what it felt like. We go outside, we're standing in a parking lot nearby, one of those big old schools that's got the big chimney, right? And these birds are coming through in the fall, and around dusk, they circle the, the chimney and then they all drop into it. And when I say they all drop into it, I mean thousands and thousands of birds. Like one guy, the local one here, counted 7,500 birds dropping into this one chimney over the course of just maybe 20 minutes, 30 minutes or so. And as they do that, they're circling this, this chimney. It looks like a funnel cloud, right, of birds. And they're not very, they're fast, but they're not very aerodynamic. So when they get above the chimney, they just kind of stop flying and they just fall into it and they grab something on the way down, some other bird or whatever, and that's where they'll roost for the night. So the point is, wow, these birds are really kind of boring individually, but they're beautiful in formation. They're beautiful in, in, in community. And the same thing with a murmuration is a word that's been used to describe the way that starlings will fly in flocks of up to, you know, a hundred thousand birds that they. And it looks like this one collector, you're like, who's in charge of this thing? Like, there's, it looks like there's one bird that must be, there's like a collective consciousness. But, but it turns out it's as best as we can tell, these birds just, they have, they have very, very quick reflexes and they, they are marching to the beat of the six or seven birds that are closest to them. And, and this whole thing looks like just this Rorschach inkblot just floating in the sky. It's Amazing. And you'll see those often in the fall as well. Again, kind of a boring bird, but in community. Wow. And so I use that chapter to talk about how important community is, especially in the church, that we think about who we're called to be and we think. We tend to think very individualistically. We kind of think in terms of a buffered individual self. Right. Like, that's. I'm. I don't think of myself as I am in community, connected to other people. And yet there's this thread that holds us together. And the Bible talks about how this thread holds together believers in these unique ways that when I'm worshiping the people around me who are trusting the same God that I'm trusting, we're connected. And I'm also connected to that church down the street and that church in the next town over, and I'm connected to that generation that lived two. Two decades before me and. And the ones that will live after me. And I'm connected to other nations across oceans. And like, there's something that. Blessed be the tie that binds our hearts in Christian love. Like, there's something that connects us all. And so we need to. The Bible doesn't tell us. Hey, doesn't tell us to be one. It says, you already are one.
- [30:49]
Sponsor Voice (Google Chrome)
Now just act like it.
- [30:50]
Kevin Burrell
Like, just act. Act like you're connected, because you are. And so anyway, that's. Yeah. In the fall, just look up. You'll see those flocks. And I hope that when you do, you would think, wow, like, in the way that. That is so unified. I want to be that unified to the flock that the Lord has given me and that I'm supposed to. To fly wingtip to wingtip with. So that was the idea.
- [31:12]
Jenny Urgent
I love that one. How do birds coordinate themselves into a united, tightly choreographed unit? Who's in charge anyway? How come they don't hit each other? It's just a one wonder. It's a wonder. And, you know, you always have these scientists and things that are trying to. Inventors. You know, they're trying to copy God's creation. He's now, like, you see drones doing it right.
- [31:33]
Kevin Burrell
Like, right.
- [31:34]
Jenny Urgent
You know, they make these drone shows, but God did it first. So you say they have to think so fast that their reaction time is 15 milliseconds, 10 times faster than that of a seasoned NASCAR driver. I'm thinking about how small their brains are. So it's just remarkable. You wrote they find their beauty by coming together. We might be tempted to look around on a Sunday morning and feel, to be frank, underimpressed,
- [31:59]
Kevin Burrell
not talking about any church in particular, you know, but.
- [32:02]
Jenny Urgent
But I love the part about weaving back in time and weaving forward as well, through new generations yet unborn. I got chills on this part. You're at your Sunday morning gathering of everyday people may seem ordinary in isolation, but the invisible realities that hold it together are astounding. This is the invisible church. Listen carefully. You may hear the murmuring wing beats of the saints. So it's just a reminder, too, when you see those things in nature now you've got something to attach it to, something that you can talk about to your kids about faith. Like when it says in Deuteronomy to when you walk, by the way, you know, when you lie down, when you stand up. I think that, that nature was supposed to be a part of that. Otherwise you might sound like a robot or. But, but it's a natural outflowing of seeing these different types of things. Okay, let's switch to a new question and a new topic. Which bird is the biggest jerk?
- [32:56]
Kevin Burrell
Yeah. Right, right.
- [32:57]
Jenny Urgent
I was not expecting that.
- [32:59]
Kevin Burrell
That was actually a formal study that they did a few years ago. Right. So. And that's the question they asked, like, what's the most obnoxious bird out there? Right. So. Yeah.
- [33:06]
Podcast Host/Advertiser
Yeah.
- [33:06]
Jenny Urgent
Okay. So can you talk about the power rankings? I didn't know that this was a thing.
- [33:10]
Kevin Burrell
Yeah, I think this happened on, if I remember right, this, this survey was done kind of Eastern United States. And they, they, they looked at 200 different birds that might show up at your bird feeder. And from that they tried to determine in any pairing between two birds, which one is going to tend to back out. Right. So when one bird's in the feeder, another bird lands in the feeder.
- [33:30]
Podcast Host/Advertiser
Who's.
- [33:30]
Kevin Burrell
Who's going to give first? It's like this, this bad, like steri competition or whatever.
- [33:35]
Jenny Urgent
Right.
- [33:36]
Kevin Burrell
And it's no surprise, I mean, if, if you've looked at your own bird feeder, you know that crows can be pretty aggressive. The blue jays are very aggressive.
- [33:45]
Jenny Urgent
Yeah.
- [33:46]
Kevin Burrell
Even like mockingbirds, some of the woodpeckers. But in that chapter that you're referring to, I thought, well, everybody's looking at, well, who's, who's at the top, but who's at the bottom? Like, I want to know, like, who is the meekest, humblest, like, oh, please, no, you go first kind of bird. And that to me is a picture. You know, this whole, my whole book is, is looking at the book of Philippians, just kind of section by section. By section. And so when I got to that part about the humility of Christ, I thought, what's a bird that would picture that? And number 200 of 200 is a bird called the Brown Creeper, which even the name sounds kind of, you know, he's, he's gonna skulk. He's not going to be. He's not going to put himself out, out there. And I love that bird because he, for him, the way up is down. And I think that that's what we're called to be as believers too, that we're not called to elevate ourselves, but to we. We lead by serving. I mean, it's just, it's this inverse kind of concept of what leadership is and what, what it means to the first shall be shall be last, and last shall be first. And so this bird, he goes up the. A tree trunk. When he gets to the top of it, instead of flying around and in the canopy, he dives back down to the next. The bottom of the next tree trunk. And he works his way up these tree trunks, eating insects off of it. But he always starts at the bottom. And so whatever heights he ascends, however high he gets, is always just so that he can go low again.
- [35:04]
Jenny Urgent
Right.
- [35:04]
Kevin Burrell
So he just, he's going to dive to the bottom of the tree. I thought, I want to be like that. Like I want to be to whatever, whatever perch I might find myself on, that it would be for the purpose of me diving back down and going low. And yeah, I just, I think that that's a pretty biblical, countercultural kind of concept.
- [35:22]
Jenny Urgent
Yeah. Yes. And. And who would have thought that there's a power rankings list of birth aggression.
- [35:27]
Kevin Burrell
It's fun, isn't it?
- [35:28]
Jenny Urgent
I had no idea.
- [35:29]
Kevin Burrell
Yeah.
- [35:31]
Podcast Host/Advertiser
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- [39:39]
Jenny Urgent
okay, let's talk about the Greater Honey Guide. I never heard of this, but I recently interviewed this girl named Taryn Smith who's in her 20s, and she rode a boat, rode a rowboat across the Atlantic Ocean by herself.
- [39:54]
Kevin Burrell
Oh, wow.
- [39:55]
Jenny Urgent
3,000 miles. And she was telling me that there was a bird that accompanied her almost the whole way. She said there was a small period
- [40:03]
Podcast Host/Advertiser
where the bird left.
- [40:05]
Jenny Urgent
I know, 3,000 miles. And she named the bird Joe March from Little Women. And it was like her friend. And she said when the bird was gone for a little bit, she was like really distraught. But then the bird came back. And so I didn't. You know, you think of birds as not really interacting too much with people, but you're talking about the Honey Guide also when you talk about. I think it's. Is it the ravens is the ones that are bringing gifts, right?
- [40:31]
Kevin Burrell
Yeah. Crows and ravens can do that. That's right, yeah.
- [40:33]
Jenny Urgent
Okay, so can you talk about the. I mean, I'd never heard of the Greater Honey Guide.
- [40:38]
Kevin Burrell
Well, honestly, that was not one I was familiar with either. I've never birded in Africa, and that was a tough chapter. There was a concept that I was. Was trying to get across. And I just, that was probably the last chapter I wrote because I just had a rough time getting that concept. But it was because I wasn't familiar with this bird. You know, birds do, I mean, obviously we have birds in captivity and there are birds that can communicate with, with humans like parrots and things like that. But, but the thing about the Greater Honey Guide is nobody taught the bird to do this. This is a wild bird. And on its own it is decided, it is determined this, that it loves honey. It knows where it will find honey, it'll find hives. But because of the bees, it can't get at them. And so it goes and gets help from hunters of tribes in Africa. There's a particular tribe called the Yao. There's, there's several in several countries. But I write about the Yao. And the bird will come and get a hunter who is able to bring. The bird will lead maybe two hours through the, through the forest or you know, through, through the grassland to, to lead the hunter to where this honey is. The hunter can then smoke the bees out. And it has a spear that it can come in and get a honeycomb. And when it's done doing all that, it will leave a little bit of honeycomb for the bird. And the bird knows all this, right? And then is incentivized to help the next hunter out. But this bird has figured out like, okay, you know, if only I had some opposable thumbs like, and some smoke and a spirit, let me go find somebody who can help me. And how cool. In other words, there's a partnership between the hunter and the bird. And this wasn't something that was trained over time. This was just something that developed. How cool. Like just that this would naturally happen. It's one of the only examples where we see animals in the wild cooperating with humans for a common purpose. And so there's this verse in the Bible that talks about how we and God cooperate for a common purpose, which is our sanctification. Like God's doing a work in us and I'm called to cooperate with that. And in the end I thought that that bird was a beautiful picture of that. Because when you talk about a partnership between us and God, let's, let's face it, that's pretty one sided, right? I mean, yeah, God's in all caps and we're, we're in like eight point font, right? So we're really small in that. But nonetheless God is calling us to play a role. And how beautiful, right, that, that, that he dignifies Us with a cause and a purpose. And he asks us basically to cooperate with him in the work that he's doing in us. And anyway, I love the idea of this bird leading and wow. I mean a bird leading you across the Atlantic Ocean or like that sounds like. That sounds like Moana. That sounds like a Disney story. Right? I mean that's amazing that these things happen in real life.
- [43:19]
Jenny Urgent
Yes. Like this wild animal is personally escorting you, you wrote through the forest. So talking about then other birds that interact with humans. Crows. So crows remember faces and this is both good and bad.
- [43:33]
Kevin Burrell
It is, yeah. Yeah. You do not want to tick a crow off because he's going to remember that for years and years. But the most, I mean, more than that, more terrifying than that is the fact that crows tell other crows, like, hey, don't trust Jenny. Like she threw something at me last week in the backyard and don't trust her and I now other crows will learn to avoid people that, that maybe one crow might pass along a juicy tidbit about. They're like, it's just cancel culture, these crows. It's amazing. And so generations of crows, like there's this guy in Seattle who bans crows and studies them and none of the crows like him. And generations and generations of crows have learned, don't trust that guy. And they, they will. It. It turns into a Hitchcock movie. Whenever he's, you know, walking near them, they just all swarm him. But they also remember faces of people that they like. So if you've, if you've ever done something nice for a crow that's good, that's getting passed along to other crows as well. So. So feed the crows, be nice to the crows. And I think maybe it was Solomon who said it was in the Proverbs that said that, you know, be careful the words that you say because a little bird may pass along your indiscretions to. And you know, may it may be sung in king's palaces. And so be careful what you say. And I think it's funny that with crows that might actually literally be true. Like, you know, check, check your windows before you say things you don't want to get passed along because crows remember.
- [45:00]
Jenny Urgent
Okay, so here's one of the stories that you put in the book. So in 2015, an eight year old girl named Gabby Mann began feeding her lunch leftovers to crows on her walk home from the school bus stop. When the crow started waiting for her and following her all the way home, she asked her mom if they could set up a food tray in the backyard one morning, Gabby noticed a trinket carefully placed on the tray. In the coming weeks, random treasures began appearing. Bolts and screws, earrings, buttons, random plastic objects, and Gabby's personal favorite, a pearl colored heart charm. One day, while Gabby's mom, Lisa was trying to get some bald eagle photos, she dropped her camera lens in a nearby alley. The next day, she found it sitting neatly alongside the bird bath. When Lisa played back her home security footage, she was astounded to see that a crow had rinsed it off for her.
- [45:54]
Kevin Burrell
I don't get that. What a crazy story, right? Like, who knows what that crow was doing, but it seems like picking out those pearl heart charms or whatever, it seems like thoughtfulness and who knows what's going through. But crows are among the most intelligent birds on the planet. They're crows and ravens are top of the list. They're very smart. They, they don't just make tools, they make tools to make tools. Like, they, they can think three steps out there. I mean, you can look, you can find that on YouTube. There have been some amazing studies that have been done with crows, but it's not just like, wow, they're smart. But it's, wow, they're, they're almost thoughtful. Like, that's a, that's a gift. It's like they went to the mall and picked out a nice gift to thank Gabby. You know, they picture them kind of looking around until they find something interesting that they can, they can leave for her. And she's kept that whole. There was, there's another story in there of a guy who, he's putting out this slop every morning for the crows, just attracting the crows. And one day, and it's Valentine's Day, I think, and he's just joking with them, but he's talking to the crows and he says, hey, I give you guys something every morning. Why don't you guys ever get me anything? He just said, says that later he goes out and the, the food's all been eaten. But there's a, there is a, one of those little hearts that, those little candy hearts that you get for Valentine's Day sitting on the platform that had. Was not there. A crow went and got it and it still said, it still had the words on it said love. Which is just, I mean, what a, what a crazy story, right? That these birds would say, this is a tip for good service. Just wanted to say thanks things.
- [47:25]
Jenny Urgent
So you really get the sense from the book, even if you've thought about it before, there's all these different types of books. You know, you read about the woodpecker and it's got a tongue that wraps around its head, you know, that type of thing to absorb the shock. You know, you read about them. But when it's all there in one book or people can go to your blog as well, it really gives you the sense of the creativity and the vastness of God. Because you're going from this, you know, these birds that are interacting with people to the, you know, the hummingbird that weighs the same as a couple paper clips. And you're going from that to the, the homing. The pigeons that are being used in war, I mean, they won medals. You've got pigeons that are winning medals in, in the wars in, in World War I, World War II, that actually saved soldiers. There was one bird that saved 194 soldiers in 1918. From that to the mockingbird that can copy all sorts of songs. The eagle of the, you know, the endurance of the eagle. And so it just is the reminder of the vastness. And even within species, sometimes you'll talk about, you know, there's eight kinds of this bird or ten kinds of this, but that you've never even heard of. The bower bird that collects things that are blue, but there's really nothing blue in nature, hardly ever. And so you said sometimes it will like take people's keys right off the picnic table. So the, the chest, the creativity, the, you know, like, who could have thought of that? That didn't. And then you're like, I think is the biggest thing that can't evolve.
- [48:59]
Kevin Burrell
I, I agree. Yeah, yeah, yeah. There's just something, there's just. So there's such an intelligence to it. Right. And think about some of these birds. A warbler is one that comes to mind. For me, this isn't in the book, but I just think about. There's about 46 species of warblers in the United States and they're all about, they're all, they all look about the same, body wise, but the, the painting, I mean, the coloration on them is uniquely different on each one. There's no, there's no adaptive, there's no evolutionary benefit to having a little yellow dot behind your eye. It's just beautiful. Or these, these stripes that kind of, you know, cut through the eye and along the malar, you know, the jawline and the beak and just there's. Each one is uniquely different. And if you, if you were to say, well, this is an evolutionary advantage of this one, well, then why don't they all have that, like. No, each one is painted differently. It's like if you gave your, your. If you gave a classroom of kids a shape of a bird and, and a box of crayons and said, go for it, every kid would come up with something different and it wouldn't even be as amazing as what the Lord has done. So I think there's. It's hard not to see not just an intelligent design, but an intelligent creativity like an artistry and art. Art requires an artist. That's. That's where I'm coming from anyway, so.
- [50:15]
Jenny Urgent
That's right. Okay, let's talk about these verses that I've always loved from Matthew 10. Are not two sparrows sold for a penny yet not one of them will fall to the ground outside your father's career? So you talk about sparrows now. I didn't realize how numerous sparrows were. So can you talk about that? They're incredibly numerous. And what we can learn from these verses about not worrying, which, I mean, anxiety is really high statistically. It's high for adults and it's also high for kids. So these are verses that we could be talking about constantly because sparrows are everywhere.
- [50:50]
Kevin Burrell
Yeah, right. Well, I, in that chapter, I talk specifically about the house sparrow. And those are the ones you see everywhere. Like, you see them when you're not even bird watching. They're. They're flitting around the, the rafters at the Home Depot right there. It's those birds that are just, They've. They've acclimatized to our, our world. They're. They're urban and they, It's. It's estimated that as wild birds go, probably three out of every hundred birds are house sparrows. They're. They're on, they're on six continents. They're everywhere. And so if God. I don't know, Jesus picked a. Really. When he said consider the birds, or specifically when he says two sparrows for a penny, he's talking, he's noticing these sparrows that are kind of just very commonplace. He's not pointing out something that's. That you would maybe gravitate to as, wow, that is beautiful. He's pointing to a little brown drab bird and he's saying, listen, my, like, my father takes care of that. Like he, He. He has that. He knows when he knows the falling of a sparrow. Like when that, when that bird gets to his last day, the, the Lord prepares the ground for him. You know, to something like that. There is a care in that, that if God cares for the Most ordinary kind of drab. I mean, really, a lot of birders don't even probably think about how sparrows, when they're logging their morning list, they might forget. Oh yeah, and then I saw that sparrow on the way in. For that, it would be cool if God said, hey, consider the, the bald eagle, or consider the, the, the Resplendent Quetzal or the great horned owl. The word. The birds that like, wow us. So we go, wow, that's like they, they make a stop in our tracks. But he's saying, no, consider the bird that you would just walk right by the art, by the way, in this, Aiden Peterson did a beautiful job. He just did a couple of sparrows and, and in the background you just see some feet, human feet walking by. The point is these birds are entirely ignored. And he says, if I care, God says, if I care for that, do you understand how much I care for you? It's the same passage where he talks about, about even the hairs of your head are numbered. Like, I have that level of providential care for you. And so when you get to Philippians and it says, be anxious for nothing in everything, with prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, make your request known to God. And that peace of God that transcends all understanding will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus, like, there it is. How can I be anxious for nothing? Well, I can be thankful for the way in which he cares, for the, the minutiae of my life. I know he's got this. I know the lilies of the field. I don't need to worry about what I'm going to wear. I know the birds of the air. I don't need to worry about what I'm going to eat. Like he's going to take care of me. And so in the moment, I think anxiety, it's complex. But we certainly, if we can get to that level of breathing easier by recognizing, just getting that perspective shift of, okay, the Lord is in this moment and the Lord's in this place, and I'm inviting him into this place and I'm. That, that, that will help. I believe in calming our anxiety. So. And isn't it cool that Jesus uses a bird for all of us?
- [53:54]
Jenny Urgent
Yeah, yeah. So this is two separate passages, right? There's the passage where it's talking about the sparrows and says, even your, your hairs are numbered on your head. So that's one passage. Are not two sparrows sold for a penny yet not one of them will fall to the ground outside your father's Care and even the very hairs of your head are numbered. So do not be afraid. You are worth more than sparrows. You can just see how by paying attention to nature and talking about these things with your kids on a regular basis, it's helpful. And if you're detached from it, you can see how that. I think that would make things harder. Then there's the other. There's like a different passage, whereas the one about the lilies of the field, they don't labor or spin. The birds don't store in storehouses. That's a whole different passage. Right.
- [54:40]
Kevin Burrell
Right. It is. Well, they're in the same place in Matthew 5 in the. The Sermon on the Mount, but. Right. He moves from the birds to the. To considering the lilies as well. Maybe that'll be my next book. We'll talk about flowers. I'm not a flower guy. I'm not a flower guy, but I'm. I'm sure it's been done. So.
- [54:56]
Jenny Urgent
Yeah, so these are two. Okay, so look at the birds of the air. They do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your Heavenly Father feeds them. And when you read then about these altricial birds, they get fed a lot. A great tit, for instance, may deliver over 900 beakfuls of insects a day.
- [55:13]
Podcast Host/Advertiser
You wrote.
- [55:14]
Kevin Burrell
Yeah, that's a lot.
- [55:16]
Jenny Urgent
So it's an interesting animal. Like, okay, so I'm not going to know any specifics, but I feel like there's some animals, maybe like a snake that would eat a mouse once every. I don't know any of the details for a while.
- [55:30]
Kevin Burrell
Right. He can go. He can live a long time on that.
- [55:32]
Jenny Urgent
Yes, for a while. So it's interesting that he uses a bird. I read a book by Douglas Tallamy called Nature's Best Hope.
- [55:42]
Podcast Host/Advertiser
He's got a couple books and he.
- [55:43]
Jenny Urgent
He talks in there about how many insects. It's like a bizarre, wildly huge number that. Because you think of a bird and you think they're small, they probably don't eat that much, but they go through so many caterpillars and worms and that type of thing. So look at the birds of the air. They do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your Heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? Can any of you by worrying, add a single hour to your life, and then it goes on about the.
- [56:11]
Podcast Host/Advertiser
The lilies of the field.
- [56:13]
Jenny Urgent
So it's just a reminder to get outside and see the simple things.
- [56:17]
Kevin Burrell
I agree. You know, I was so glad you invited me out of your podcast because the very first sec. The very first sentence of my book is this is a book that is best read outside. Outside.
- [56:26]
Jenny Urgent
That's right.
- [56:27]
Kevin Burrell
And I mentioned it. If you can't do that, at least get a four ascended candle. Play some background bird music or something. But just like if we're gonna truly appreciate what the Lord has done in all of these illustrations from the bird world, let's get out there. Let's get out there and notice it more. So. And I know that that's what you're all about. So get, get people outside more.
- [56:45]
Jenny Urgent
Yeah, you have a four year forward is by Joni Erickson.
- [56:48]
Podcast Host/Advertiser
Tada.
- [56:48]
Jenny Urgent
And she is quadriplegic. She had an accident and so she, you know, obviously she's in a wheelchair and she has chronic pain and so she wrote. And you had quoted her in this section.
- [57:00]
Podcast Host/Advertiser
So she does the forward of the book.
- [57:01]
Jenny Urgent
But you also quoted her in this section about sparrows. She say, she said, I could understand Jesus noticing an eagle, but a scrappy sparrow. Yet from thousands of bird species, the Lord chose the most insignificant, least noticed, scruffiest bird of all. A pint sized thing that even dedicated bird watchers ignore. And she said that thought alone calmed my fears. It does a lot, I think if you notice and, and you, and you consider, and that's what your book helps people to do is to consider the
- [57:33]
Podcast Host/Advertiser
birds of the air.
- [57:34]
Jenny Urgent
Okay, well, let's talk about one more before we wrap up. So there's, there's so many different kinds of birds in here. I did look up the Potu Po, right? Yeah, it was the weirdest looking thing.
- [57:46]
Kevin Burrell
It's so weird, funny looking.
- [57:48]
Jenny Urgent
It looks like a buggy eyed Muppet.
- [57:50]
Kevin Burrell
Yeah, Yeah. I tried to get the book, I tried to get a bird from every continent and that's kind of a Central American, South American bird. And it's, it is a picture of what we try often to do as believers. We just try and blend in with the culture. We just want to get the, get the target off of our back. Just don't say anything offensive. Right. We just like, just. And, and the, the, you know it's funny, when I did the audiobook, they told me it's a patu. I'd always pronounced it as a putu, but so I had it wrong. So you got it right. But they, they stand on the end of a branch and then they just, they stretch their neck out and they close their eye and you wouldn't, they disappear. You would never see one they look like the end of the branch and they'll just hold really still and you would not know where the branch ends and the bird begins. And I thought, I think. I think we try and do that a lot and we need to be. I think the. The scriptures call us to be bolder. Bolder than that.
- [58:37]
Jenny Urgent
Oh, that. When it opens its mouth, their eyes are like, wait, wait a minute.
- [58:41]
Kevin Burrell
It.
- [58:41]
Jenny Urgent
I've never seen anything quite.
- [58:42]
Kevin Burrell
When you see it and it's not camouflaged, it is a freaky bird and it makes a terrifying scream and it just looks like its mouth is. Is just gargantuan. Like it doesn't look like the mouth even could fit on a bird's face like that. It's. It's a weird, weird bird for sure. And not. Not endangered or anything. Just really awkward, really hard to see. So. Yeah, because they're camouflaged, not because they're.
- [59:04]
Jenny Urgent
Blends in.
- [59:05]
Kevin Burrell
Yeah.
- [59:06]
Jenny Urgent
Just bird after bird. And you talked about the vulture, how the, you know, the vulture, everyone's like, ew. But you say the noble bird, like the eagles like ripping apart its prey and it's like a ton of violence. And you're like, the. The vulture is actually cleaning up after everyone else. You know, they can. They're. They call them death eaters. The Mayans call them death eaters. They stare death in the face and fear it not at all. It goes through their bodies and comes out harmless. They cleanse the world. So an interesting way to look at vultures. It's just a fantastic book. And it is. Was a stunning book. I was just, you know, I remember, I got to. I don't remember how far I was like, what. What is going on with these watercolor black and white feathers? Yeah.
- [59:48]
Kevin Burrell
And it's a brushed ink. It's what he did. It's a. It's ink, but it's watered. And he did it with a brush. And it was just a beautiful. We knew we were going to go black and white with it, but he just made it. I don't know if you can see right over my shoulder is actually, wait, over this shoulder is. That's chapter eight. Like, I. I was hanging out with Aiden in Nashville and it was around my birthday and he said, I wanted to give you something. He gave me. That's the original from. From chapter eight. And so you can see the detail of just the. The way in which you can see the brush strokes. And it all got kind of cleaned up when they did the digital and put it in the book. But man, Aiden, what I love about Aidan's art. And if I could brag on him for just a minute, like, he made the. It's not just pictures of the birds. It's the theological concepts.
- [60:28]
Jenny Urgent
He worked it in, right?
- [60:29]
Kevin Burrell
And there's a lot of cool little. Yes, like that. That's a picture of hope, right? I said. I found that when I said, hey, can Aiden, can you make a vulture look hopeful? So the. Even though there's death in the foreground, like, the reflection on the water is showing life. And that chapter we talked about, about the. The empty nest, there's a picture of a duck with the eggs in it. And if you. After you read the chapter, then you need to go back and look at the art again, because you go, oh, I get it. Like, he put 12 eggs in the nest. And I talk about Jesus and his disciples, and so there's that. It's a picture of how Jesus incubated his nest. You know, it's just really cool. He did that with everyone.
- [61:04]
Jenny Urgent
Beautiful and creative. It's both.
- [61:07]
Kevin Burrell
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- [61:09]
Jenny Urgent
It's just stunning. So such an honor to get a chance to talk with you about it.
- [61:12]
Podcast Host/Advertiser
I love it.
- [61:13]
Jenny Urgent
Considering sparrows, it's like one of those books you could get for anyone as
- [61:17]
Podcast Host/Advertiser
like a beautiful gift, right.
- [61:18]
Jenny Urgent
You know, to help with their faith and to, you know, tell them you're thinking about them. So considering sparrows, people can go to ornithology. OrniTheology.com. i'll put the link in the show notes. The Gospel according to Birds. We always end our show with the same question. What's a favorite memory from your childhood that was outside.
- [61:35]
Kevin Burrell
Oh, favorite outside memory. Oh, that's great. You know, I'm sure I'm of the generation where the door was just open and you went outside and mom called you in when it was time for. For. For dinner. And I had a friend at home, that one. I lived in kind of a valley, and if you went up one hill, there was one friend, and the other side there was another friend. And it was riding my bike back and forth between those places and feeling like that was my kingdom, right? Because I. I had this. This area where I was a. Just there was a freedom there, and yet almost always within earshot of. Of dinner time. And I. I wish that we did more of that today.
- [62:14]
Jenny Urgent
Yeah, for sure, for sure. And I think that you're pro book encourages people to do that and while you're doing it, to pay attention and you can do that liturgy for bird watching. It's right in the book kicks it off. Oh Christ. Uses practice of bird watching to refine my vision to more fully see as you see, to look hard for the unseen and unpraised. Let the avocation of bird watching become for me a training ground, tutoring my thoughts, my heart, my habits to more intently see your love expressed in all the details of your creation, your world, and your people. It's a wonderful book, Kevin. Thanks for being here.
- [62:51]
Kevin Burrell
Thanks so much. I'm grateful we get to talk about it. Thanks.
- [62:57]
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