Vantage point

A thunderstorm was brewing. I had hiked about a mile of lake shoreline, casting artificials in pursuit of bass and walleye. It had been a good catch-and-release day, and I was working my way back to the car when some motion on the water’s surface caught my eye.

I soon realized that it was a bird desperately flailing in an attempt to reach shore.

By extending the tip of my rod I was able to guide the exhausted little creature close enough to scoop out of the water. It was a baby cliff swallow, nearly fledged, that had evidently fallen from one of the mud nests attached to the underside of the nearby bridge.

As I cradled the little bird in my cupped hands, the heavens opened and the downpour began. Shielding the swallow from the rain, I dashed to the shelter of my car.

There I continued to hold the little creature in hopes it would dry out and recover. Several desperate attempts to fly by flapping its soaked wings failed. After it made one last heroic attempt, I felt the little form quiver, then its beak dropped forward, lifeless.

I sat for some time with the small form in my hand. Though only one small life, one of countless such birds, it still grieved me to feel the death shudder of one of God’s creatures.

"Aren’t two sparrows sold for only a penny? But your Father knows when any one of them falls to the ground. … You are worth much more than many sparrows" (Matthew 10:29,31, CEV).

Lots of tiny lives pass unknown and unmourned every day. I cared about the little swallow. It was a creation of God. And God knew when it fell.

If God cares for sparrows — or swallows (see Psalm 84:3), how much more must He care for all those tiny, unborn children created in His image, who have their lives snatched violently and mercilessly from them while in the should-be protection of their mother’s womb? Their existence falls beneath the notice of most, and they perish before having had a chance to emulate their Creator.

This repeated tragedy has seen little letup in America for nearly three decades. And today, many Christians have seemingly wearied of standing up for the rights of the unborn.

But God still cares. The Creator who makes the tiny birds and sees when they fall, knows and sees every time a tiny child perishes at the hands of those who have sworn to protect life.

So many children have died needlessly. We must not let the efforts to stop the infant holocaust die too.

— Ken Horn