I have always had a fascination with aviation, and I’m pretty sure it began with birds. I was an outdoors kid with a big yard and beautiful garden, and I loved to watch the birds just doing what they do—flitting about, building nests, feeding their young, flocking, murmurating, and eventually heading south. I have also had a long fascination with theology—with knowing who God is, what he has done, and how he acts in this world. It’s not often these two fascinations come into contact with one another, but I’m thankful they have in Kevin Burrell’s work of ornitheology, Considering Sparrows, which bears the descriptive subtitle, “What Birds Teach Us About Who We Are, Where We’re Going, and the Joy of Following Jesus.”
If you aren’t familiar with the word ornitheology, that’s because it was made up by John Stott. It is a clever little portmanteau that combines ornithology, the study of birds, with theology, the study of God. Stott, like Burrell, was an avid birdwatcher. (I, by the way, am not for two reasons: first, I once suggested to Aileen that I would like to take it up and she replied simply, “no;” second, I am colorblind, which would make it abnormally difficult since the birds would often be indistinguishable from their backgrounds.) Burrell says ornitheology is “a great description of the interplay between creational attentiveness and biblical teaching, or specifically, the study of birds and the study of God. Although both of those undertakings have been a regular part of my life, they took on new meaning on my front porch swing in the spring of 2020.” That was, as I’m sure you remember, the beginning of the pandemic that quickly shut down the world and confined us to our homes for days, weeks, or months, depending on our location. This often forced people to double down on their hobbies. In Burrell’s case, it was his hobby of birdwatching.
A talented writer, he soon took to writing articles about the lessons these birds brought to mind. The articles, which I have often linked to in A La Carte, eventually led to a book—this book. And it’s a good one. It differs from his Substack in this way: All of the chapters are themed around the book of Philippians. In fact, Considering Sparrows is a kind of walk through the epistle with almost all of the illustrations relating to birds. It is a surprisingly effective and enjoyable combination that draws lessons about the Creator from his creation. It teaches theology by illustrating it with ornithology, often relating some of the most fascinating and nearly unbelievable facts about the bird kingdom.
If you’re into theology or you’re into birds, you will enjoy this book. If you’re into both (as are Joni Eareckson Tada, Conrad Mbewe, and others who endorsed it), I’m sure you’ll enjoy it even more. Either way, I have little doubt that you’ll benefit from reading it and pondering not only the birds, but also the One who made them.
