Tina spotted me from one hundred feet down the ridge when I came out my front door. She briefly opened her five-foot wingspan, bounced excitedly, and, giving off her welcoming gurgling yelp, came running up the hill. Well, perhaps running does not convey the right impression. Tina is a wild turkey, and her running is a weaving, head-bobbing show. But it gets her where she’s going. And where she was going at the moment was coming to see me and the handful of corn she knew I had for her.
For years, we have had a flock of wild turkeys visit us every summer. They move through the yard a couple of times a day to check out the spillage from the birdfeeder and help themselves to the smorgasbord of ground-dwelling insects a Tennessee ridge offers in the summer. Usually, they give us a wide berth, and for our part, we don’t bother them. In the summer, they’ll roost in the woods around our house.
But this wild turkey hen we named Tina was different from the start. She wouldn’t always follow the flock. Sometimes, she would just linger around the house. She would follow us as we moved around the yard, always keeping her distance, but not necessarily running away. In time, we began to toss her a handful of corn. After the first tentative attempts, as she figured out what it was, she happily accepted it. Now, she’s practically one of the family. Our cats tolerate her, and she tolerates them, just as long as everyone, turkey and cat, respects personal space. She has even taken corn from our very patient grandson Caleb’s hand. I’ve not accomplished that with her, but then I don’t have Caleb’s natural patience and affinity for life with wings or four legs … or six or even eight legs, for that matter.
In the Bible, there are only two miracles that appear in all four gospels: The Resurrection and the feeding of the five thousand. Jesus drew people to Him by meeting their needs. He healed them and fed them. While there are many, many layers of meaning to that story of five loaves, two fish, and five thousand hungry people, at the heart, it is a tale of Jesus showing His love by meeting the people’s most basic needs. And Jesus' love for us is the most basic message of all.
Tina the turkey has no idea what I'm saying when I speak to her. But she recognizes my actions. My simple act of love by offering her food when she was hungry drew this wild creature into our extended family. It is the same with the lost souls of this world.
A simple act of love can draw someone out of the dark and into Jesus' eternal light. Isn't it amazing what you can accomplish with a handful of corn?
Kevin Spencer likes to play with words, help others play with them, and is privileged to be a staff writer for Christian Devotions. He lives with his beautiful blessing of a wife, Charlotte, and his amazing collegiate grandson, Caleb.