On His Wings

Been delving into trivia again. It is amazing how it happens. One question leads to another and before you know it, you know which two animals have been used -far, far more than any others- as national and family symbols throughout the ages and throughout the world. Any guesses? Here they are, in no particular order- the lion and the eagle. It was the eagle that led me to this bit of trivia. And so I also noted that one particular species of eagle, namely the majestic golden eagle, is the most widely heralded of all the chosen eagle species. I found out that its habitat stretches across the whole of the northern hemisphere and so it has a prominent position in the history, religion, and folklore of countries from Mongolia to Mexico to Indonesia to Canada to Egypt.

Now you might wonder what exploring the webs store of knowledge on the golden eagle has to do with my current study of the Old Testament. If you've read my blog on Noah, you might recall I quoted a scripture from the Book of Isaiah, which included this: But they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles…. (Isaiah 40:31) (See "Through the Storm)

That quote was indeed the inspiration for this little foray into wildlife -that, and the life of Joseph of Egypt. It was the word "wait" that particularly caught my notice this time. It comes from the same root as the Hebrew words for "hope" and "obedience." It literally means "to bind together" and indicates the patience needed to bind or weave something together. If ever there was an example of someone "waiting" on the Lord, it was Joseph. And if ever there was an example of someone who mounted up as with "wings as eagles," it was also Joseph. In a way, Joseph's story gives us an eagle's eye perspective of life, and the way the Lord works with and teaches his children.

Joseph is the one of the few Old Testament characters whose impression, in my eyes, improved the first time I read the Old Testament for myself. I remember in my primary class, knowing that what is brothers did when they sold him into slavery was a bad, bad thing, but I couldn't help but sympathize with them being jealous of Joseph when Jacob favored him and Joseph bragged about his dreams (he claimed came from God) of becoming a leader over them. Even if he did have those dreams, did he have to share it! I come from a family of eight children- I understand sibling rivalry.

However, after reading Genesis for myself, I quickly realized that was only half the story. Jacob didn't arbitrarily choose Joseph as his favorite. Jacob's favoring Joseph had a great deal to do with trust, and knowing that in Joseph he had a son who would work with him in faithfully following the Lord. Genesis 34, 37 & 38 seem to be pointed efforts on the part of the author of Genesis to give us some idea of why Joseph's desire to seek after and follow the Lord, as well as how he faithfully obey his father, made him Jacob's favored son. I do not deny Jacob's imperfect humanity, but I think his favor for Joseph is a type of what Nephi, in the Book of Mormon, tried to teach his brothers about who is favored of the Lord:  Behold, the Lord esteemeth all flesh in one; he that is righteous is favored of God. (1 Nephi 17:35)

All the other sons, who by birth may have had a prior claim to this type of favor and claim of leadership, had quit simply blown it - in big, messy, decidedly wicked, complicated ways. Their actions towards Joseph only emphasize how unrepentant they were at that point. Perhaps Jacob's words "Ye have troubled me to make me to stink among the inhabitants of the land," says it best. (Genesis 34:30)

So here is Joseph, young and maybe even feeling a little fallen-man pride about the righteous choices he has made. Not perfect, but good and striving to do his best. One day he is the favored son of a rather powerful nomadic leader, and the next he is beaten by those he thought he would lead, thrown into a pit, and later sold as a slave to a passing caravan. It is easy for us, because reading the whole account takes only a few minutes, to see how he became so much more, had so much more, was able to serve his family and father so much more, because of that fateful day. But when he was roped, driven like a beast to market, and sold, and then spent years as a slave and prisoner, he could not see that.

Yet, in the first verses describing his life as a slave and prisoner, it tells us "the Lord was with Joseph."(Genesis 39:2, 21) That is a very significant phrase because the Lord has taken great pains (as I've noted before) to make clear to us the importance of agency and that he will not force himself on us. For instance:

Behold I stand at the door, and knock, if any man hear my voice and open the door, I will come in to him and will sup with him, and he with me. (Revelation 3:20)

Or:     Draw nigh to God, and he will draw nigh to you. (James 4:8)
Or:

Learn to pray. Pray often. Pray in your mind, in your heart. Pray on your knees. Prayer is your personal key to heaven. The lock is on your side of the veil. And I have learned to conclude all my prayers with “Thy will be done.” (Matthew 6:10; see also Luke 11:2; 3 Nephi 13:10). (Boyd K. Packer, “Prayer and Promptings,” Ensign, Nov 2009, 43–46)

So that phrase "and the Lord was with Joseph" together with Joseph's own words declaring his devotion and obedience to God, show that the one thing Joseph did do was to continue turning to the Lord for comfort, strength and help as his life took unexpected, unwelcome turns. This is particularly thought provoking when you consider that both his being sold into slavery, and then his being thrown into prison, could be construed as directly resulting from his obedience to the Lord's commands.(Genesis 37:13-14, Genesis 39:9) Perhaps his life lens is summed up best in what he said to his brothers when his brothers when they came to him, after their father's death, worried that Joseph will use his considerable power to get justified revenge, and he tells them,

Am I in the place of God? …Ye thought evil against me; but God meant it unto good, to bring to pass, as it is this day, to save much people alive. (Genesis 50:19-20)

In other words:  God knows best. He has always known best, and what happened was never out of his control. He allowed you to do your evil deed. He prepared a way for it to be a good thing for me, and many others. I'm good and I love having you and your families here. You just worry about making sure you are right with God.

His approach to life and his Heavenly Father, and the result of that approach, seems to be a perfect example of the perspective the Lord tried to illustrate for the wandering, often angry and bitter, children of Israel. I found this previously underappreciated gem by following the footnotes from, (can you guess) Isaiah 40:31. It too, uses the example of eagles to illustrate the way the Lord lifts and teaches his children. But this time it compares His efforts to teach the children of Israel with the efforts of an eagle to teach her young to fly.

As an eagle stirreth up her nest, fluttereth over her young, spreadeth abroad her wings, taketh them, beareth them on her wings: So the Lord alone did lead him, and there was no strange god with him. (Deuteronomy 32:11)

This is what led me to the golden eagle. I wanted to know what type of bird would most likely have been the "eagle" spoken of here. The golden eagle was well known to the children of Israel. The plains of Goshen and the Sinai wilderness are both natural habitats. Culturally, it was revered as a messenger of the Horus and Isis, the chief Egyptian deities. So the Lord is giving a powerful reminder that He, and He alone is the only true God. And he is also answering one of Israel's most repeated and pressing concerns:

Why, if God is really with us, do we go from being majestically led out of Egypt one day to being hungry and thirsty in the wilderness the next? Why if he has such power doesn't he use it, but instead leaves us to struggle with such painful problems? "Is the Lord among us or not?" (Exodus 16:7)

I found the Lord's illustrative example to be incredibly powerful.  You see, the golden eagle is a devoted parent. It mates for life. The mated pair claims a territory of up to 60 miles in diameter, and, carefully builds a nest. The nest is made of woven branches, sometimes small rocks or other hard materials, and then, in preparation for the young, covered in comfortable, soft material- leaves, moss, even their own feathers. For the first six to eight weeks the eaglets grow rapidly in their comfy home, being fed the choicest bits of meat. And then they fledge- or grow the wings they will need to fly, and things begin to change.

Apparently flying is not an instinctive behavior for the eagles. There are recorded cases of golden eagle eggs being successfully hatched by brooding hens. Without intervention, the eaglet will grow up to act like a chicken, pecking at the ground, living on insects, and never thinking to use his powerful wings to soar. However, the eagle parent knows that eagles are meant to fly- and that means gaining muscle and leaving the comfort of the nest. Most eaglets do not take the initiative, but need firm encouragement to realize their potential to soar.

Just as the verse above describes, this encouragement can include the mother flapping her wings close to the fledglings. This shows them how it is done, and the fledgling has only to make a weak attempt to flap his own wings to get his first taste of flight, courtesy of the draft created by the mother's powerful wings. Mother eagles have also been observed literally "stirring up the nest", taking away the soft moss, leaves or feathers that made it such a comfy place to stay. Wise eagle parents also stop bringing the fledglings choice bits of meat, instead inviting the fledgling to leave the nest and dine with them on a nearby ledge or branch. This is an offer most fledglings refuse at first. They scream their outrage- but to no avail, and eventually they learn they are ready to leave the nest. Now it is time to learn to fly. And it is true- golden eagles have been observed "spread(ing) abroad her wings" to help support their young in learning to fly. However, as is evident in the quote below, the fledglings were no more keen about being dropped off the ledge and spreading their wings, than they were about leaving the nest.

Last summer while my father and I were extracting honey at the apiary about a mile southeast of Thacher School, Ojai, California, we noticed a golden eagle teaching its young one to fly. It was about ten o'clock. The mother started from the nest in the crags, and roughly handling the young one, she allowed him to drop, I should say, about ninety feet, then she would swoop down under him, wings spread, and he would alight on her back. She would soar to the top of the range with him and repeat the process. One time she waited perhaps fifteen minutes between flights. I should say the farthest she let him fall was 150 feet.


My father and I watched this, spellbound, for over an hour. I do not know whether the young one gained confidence by this method or not. A few days later father and I rode to the cliff and out on Overhanging Rock. The eagle's nest was empty. (Dr. Loye Miller (1918) published the following account, as given to him by one of his students: Miss F.E. Shuman) http://www.birdsbybent.com/ch61-70/goleagle.html)

To watch an eagle's flight is truly a thrill to the soul! Just imagine what a truly great tragedy it would be if the mother eagle, knowing the capabilities inherent in her offspring, gave way to their screeches and let them comfortably waste their lives as fat, dependent, flightless parasites. Perhaps, with that in mind, we can begin to see the purpose in the Lord's allowing us to experience strengthening and growing opportunities, even when those opportunities cause us to cry out in pain and fear. The purpose is not our suffering- it is to give us the chance to know the meaning of soaring. But, it requires something of us. It requires that in that moment when we feel proverbially dropped off a cliff, as Joseph must have, we turn to Him in trust that His outstretched wings will be there, to give us the lift we are well aware we are too weak to give ourselves. He will always be there for us, just as He was with Joseph -if we will allow it.