My prayer-bird was cold—would not away,
Although I set it on the edge of the nest.
Then I bethought me of the story old—
Love-fact or loving fable, thou know'st best—
How, when the children had made sparrows of clay,
Thou mad'st them birds, with wings to flutter and fold:
Take, Lord, my prayer in thy hand, and make it pray.
(George MacDonald, Diary of an Old Soul).
About four hundred years after Jesus death and resurrection a story began to circulate in Christian circles that Jesus, as a young child, made little birds out of clay and caused them to fly away.
And when the Lord Jesus was seven years of age, he was on a certain day with other boys his companions about the same age. Who at play made clay into several shapes, namely, asses, oxen, birds, and other figures. Each boasting of his work and endeavoring to exceed the rest. Then the Lord Jesus said to the boys, I will command these figures which I have made to walk. And immediately they moved, and when he commanded them to return, they returned. He had also made the figures of birds and sparrows, which, when he commanded to fly, did fly...” (The First Gospel of Jesus' Infancy, Ch. 15).
The story was repeated about two hundred years later in the Quran.
The story is almost certainly apocryphal. Jesus' miracles were never done for play or for fun and the tale seems silly on the face of it. But MacDonald makes an apologue of it that has become a source of great comfort to me.
Sometimes my prayer birds flutter about and fall to the ground; they seem to have no life of their own. But I know I can count on Jesus: He can take them in hand and make them pray.
Paul assures us that Jesus' Holy Spirit helps us when we don't know how to pray. He makes intercession for us with a power and passion that exceed our poor words (Romans 8:26).
So we don't need to worry if our prayers seem to flit about aimlessly and die. Jesus can breath life into them and make them fly.
David Roper
11.13.20
