A Devotional on Psalm 104:12, Matthew 6:26, and Matthew 10:29
“The birds of the sky nest by the waters; they sing among the branches.” —Psalm 104:12 (NIV)
“Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they?” —Matthew 6:26 (NIV)
“Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? Yet not one of them will fall to the ground outside your Father’s care.” —Matthew 10:29 (NIV)
There are moments when we feel utterly disposable—like our existence makes no real difference, like if we vanished, the world would move on without noticing. In a life that feels small, in a voice that feels unheard, the question haunts us: Do I matter? Yet, Scripture answers with a resounding yes. Nowhere is this clearer than in God’s care for the sparrow—small, ordinary, and seemingly insignificant, yet never outside His watchful eye.
The Smallest of Creatures, the Deepest of Care
Psalm 104 describes God’s vast creation, yet it includes this simple truth: birds find homes and sing in the trees because God provides for them. Jesus builds on this in Matthew 6:26, pointing to birds that do not plant fields or store food, yet they lack nothing. If God feeds them, how much more will He care for us?
In Matthew 10:29, Jesus highlights the sparrow, the cheapest bird in the marketplace. They were sold two for a penny, used as food for the poor. Yet not one falls without the Father’s care. If God watches over something so small, He surely watches over you.
A Substitute for the Poor
Small birds were not only a symbol of insignificance; they were also a provision for the poor. In Leviticus 12:6-8, those who could not afford a lamb were allowed to offer doves or pigeons instead. Even Mary and Joseph, at Jesus’ dedication, brought two doves (Luke 2:22-24), showing their humble status. God never makes worship exclusive—He always provides a way.
God’s Heart for the Unseen
No one is disposable. In a world that discards what it deems insignificant, God declares that every life has value. The sparrow, small and ordinary, might seem unimportant, yet it is never beyond His care. If He watches over the least, He will not abandon you.
If you feel unseen, know that He sees you. If you worry about provision, trust that He will care for you. If you think you have little to offer, remember that God delights in even the smallest gift.
God’s eye is on the sparrow, and His eye is on you.
Prayer:
Lord, when I feel small, remind me that You see me. Help me trust Your provision and rest in Your care. If Your eye is on the sparrow, I know You are watching over me. Amen.
“How many are your works, Lord! In wisdom you made them all; the earth is full of your creatures.” —Psalm 104:24 (NIV)
Have you ever stood beneath a vast, starlit sky and felt small? Or watched the waves crash against the shore and been overwhelmed by the sheer power of the ocean? There is something about grandeur that naturally stirs our hearts toward God. Psalm 104 captures this sense of awe, describing Him as “clothed with splendor and majesty. The Lord wraps himself in light as with a garment; he stretches out the heavens like a tent” (vv. 1-2). The psalmist speaks of God’s voice commanding the natural order, marking the rhythm of time itself: “He made the moon to mark the seasons, and the sun knows when to go down” (v. 19). This is the God of the extraordinary, the One who creates, sustains, and reigns over all things.
Yet the psalm does not linger only in the heavens or the depths of the sea. It shifts, drawing our eyes down from the skies to the flowing streams in the valleys, to the birds singing in the branches, to the grass growing for cattle, to the simple work of human hands cultivating the earth. “He makes springs pour water into the ravines; it flows between the mountains. They give water to all the beasts of the field; the wild donkeys quench their thirst” (vv. 10-11). The same God who commands the stars in their courses also provides water for wild animals. He is present not just in the vastness of the universe but in the smallest, most ordinary details of life.
The psalmist continues, highlighting the beauty of God’s provision: “He makes grass grow for the cattle, and plants for people to cultivate—bringing forth food from the earth” (v. 14). Even the daily work of human hands—tending the land, growing food, and providing for families—is part of His divine order. Life moves according to His plan: “People go out to their work, to their labor until evening” (v. 23). Work may feel repetitive, even mundane, but in the rhythm of ordinary tasks, there is the quiet presence of God.
It is easy to recognize God in the spectacular moments of life, in grand worship experiences, in moments of deep revelation or divine intervention. But do we see Him in the ordinary? Do we find Him in the morning light filtering through the trees, in the simple act of making a meal, in quiet conversations with a friend? Do we sense His presence in the work we do each day, however routine it may seem?
Psalm 104 teaches us that worship is not confined to the extraordinary. It is woven into the very fabric of daily life. The same God who holds the universe together is the One who sustains us in the smallest ways. There is holiness in the small things, in the unnoticed rhythms of creation, in the steady work of our hands. When we begin to see life this way, the ordinary becomes sacred, and worship becomes a way of living rather than something reserved for special moments.
Today, as you go about your routine, pause and look for God’s presence. Recognize Him in the small details, in the simple provisions, in the daily tasks that may seem insignificant but are upheld by His hand. Let your work, your rest, your daily bread, and even the breath in your lungs become an offering of praise.
“I will sing to the Lord all my life; I will sing praise to my God as long as I live.” —Psalm 104:33 (NIV)
Prayer: Lord, open my eyes to see You not only in the grand and glorious but also in the simple and small. Teach me to worship You in the ordinary moments of my life, knowing that all of it is held in Your hands. Amen.
When I was in College, I spend my weekends tutoring Cambodian refugees/immigrants in Lowell Massachusetts. (It was the 1990s) Once the teachers asked a Cambodian teenager who he admired the most, I was surprised by his answer: “President Jimmy Carter”. When Carter was president, this teenager was too young to have any meaningful understanding of who Carter was. He then explained, “President Carter allowed my family to come to America.”
Allowing families from suffering parts of the world to come to America is a life changing humanitarian gesture that this nation is well known for. Immigrants are in general thankful. In this tradition, President Biden announced his plan for allowing (illegal) immigrants a path to citizenship over 8 years as a reversal of President Trump’s “anti-immigrant” policies.
As an immigrant myself, and having served among Cambodian immigrants, international students, Chinese immigrants, and inside Honduras, I believe I can give a more diverse point of view than a typical American Christian. I would like my Christian friends to lend theirs ears to a few of my stories.
There are 11 million undocumented immigrants in the US. Roughly 1 million of them came from Honduras. Much of the discussion surround what happens at the US southern border. However, if you think that the problem begins at the southern border, you are hundreds of miles away from the root cause.
Honduras has a population of 9.7 million on paper, 1 million of whom are in the US. Any country losing 10% of its population, especially 10% of their most educated workforce, will quickly descend into chaos. Here is a true story: in a Honduras public school, there was a teacher who was drawing a salary for many years. But he never showed up in the classroom. His students never received the education they deserve. Eventually when the school was audited, they discovered the teacher driving a cab in Manhattan.
The mission organization that I serve runs a children center in southern (rural) part of Honduras. This is the picture in a typical Honduran village: there are no capable men. In the village, there are only women, old men, and children, lots of children. One of the churches I visited in a village of 200 population have 1 elderly man in his 70s as the pastor. 10 women as Sunday school teachers, and 80 children most of them younger than 10.
Average age of first pregnancy for a girl in rural Honduras is 14. Migrant workers come through the village during rainy season to work on farms, they get the local girls pregnant. They left for the cities once the farming season is over to look for jobs. So the poor girls are left behind with the children. The cycle repeats itself year after year, a girl may have 5 or 6 children, each of them by a different father, and none of the fathers stay to care for them.
Once they are in the cities, the men’s next stop would be heading to the US. Especially those who have the means to do so. Sometime the ticket to go the the US is the ability to speak English, but often it is through the drug trade that they punch their ticket north. Capable men run away from the country, the rest of the country, including the abandoned mothers and their children, are left behind in poverty.
The US immigration policy is spawning a humanitarian downward spiral. People migrate from Honduras to the US because the economy is bad. Those who are capable left, leaving the less capable behind. Economy get worse, more people want to leave.
Don’t forget the elephant in the room: DRUGS. The drug trade through the southern border destroys lives and family. The migration pattern and the drug trade are closely related and promote each other.
On to discussing another group of people whom I serve: Chinese immigrants. There are two groups of Chinese immigrants: professionals and grass-root workers. They practically live in two separate worlds, their paths seldom cross except for the former being served by the latter while eating or shopping at Chinatown.
Chinese professionals are concerned with limits in H-1B visas which they are competing over a limited quota against Indian and European professionals. Latin American immigrants at are not likely to be competing with Chinese professionals in terms of visa or jobs. However, since the total quota of immigrants per year is not likely to increase, allowing Latin American immigrants to get citizenship is going to make our H-1B professionals wait longer to get their green card/citizenship. My software engineer friend from India jokes that, at the current rate, he will become a US citizen when he turns 103.
Chinese immigrants who are grass-root workers faces direct competition for the limited government resources with Latin American immigrants. Affordable housing being the most critical. They also compete for low skilled jobs. In a time of economic boom, jobs are easier to find. In the current COVID climate, such competitions are less than friendly. I had a very well meaning coworker, a well-educated suburban professional, who was very surprised when I describe to her that the urban Chinese church that I served did not welcome the “immigrant friendly policies” of the Obama administration. After hearing my explanation, she just went, “Oh well, that make sense.”
At this point, you may ask “so what is your point, Kai?”. My point is, there are many many points instead of just “a point”. Americans are brainwashed to reduce every issue to one point – who should I vote for?
Ignorance is the worst form of discrimination. For anyone living in any urban centers in the USA, we have no excuse to not get to know the stories and the struggles of immigrants. We are practically next door neighbors (in my case, I literally have an immigrant family as my next door neighbor.) For most Americans, we intentionally decide to not care about our next door neighbors. Instead we prefer to pretend to care by keeping them as images on our screens.
The point I want to make is probably best told by a very well known story:
A scholar tried to trap Jesus.
Scholar: Teacher, what must I do to experience the eternal life?
Jesus(answering with a question):What is written in the Scriptures? How do you interpret their answer to your question?
Scholar:You shall love—“love the Eternal One your God with everything you have: all your heart, all your soul, all your strength, and all your mind”—and “love your neighbor as yourself.”
Jesus:Perfect. Your answer is correct. Follow these commands and you will live.
The scholar was frustrated by this response because he was hoping to make himself appear smarter than Jesus.
Scholar: Ah, but who is my neighbor?
Jesus: This fellow was traveling down from Jerusalem to Jericho when some robbers mugged him. They took his clothes, beat him to a pulp, and left him naked and bleeding and in critical condition. By chance, a priest was going down that same road, and when he saw the wounded man, he crossed over to the other side and passed by. Then a Levite who was on his way to assist in the temple also came and saw the victim lying there, and he too kept his distance. Then a despised Samaritan journeyed by. When he saw the fellow, he felt compassion for him. The Samaritan went over to him, stopped the bleeding, applied some first aid, and put the poor fellow on his donkey. He brought the man to an inn and cared for him through the night.
The next day, the Samaritan took out some money—two days’ wages to be exact—and paid the innkeeper, saying, “Please take care of this fellow, and if this isn’t enough, I’ll repay you next time I pass through.”
Which of these three proved himself a neighbor to the man who had been mugged by the robbers?
Scholar:37 The one who showed mercy to him.
Jesus: Well then, go and behave like that Samaritan.
(from the Voice translation of the Bible)
Immigrants are our neighbors. Go and behave like that Samaritan.
With the election on the horizon, both sides want to convince us that if we vote for the “wrong candidate”, civilization as we know it will end. The truth is nothing much will change.
Regardless of who wins the election, the rich will become richer and the poor poorer.
Regardless of who wins the election, hundreds of thousand of unborn children will be aborted and discarded.
Regardless of who wins the election, tens of thousands of young girls and thousands of boys will be trafficked for sex.
Regardless of who wins the election, drug dealers will be killing their competitors with guns and their customers with fentanyl on the streets of America
Regardless of who wins the election, black high school students will score much much lower than their white and asian classmates in their AP exams.
Regardless of who wins the election, Americans will continue to be fat and stupid.
Civilization as we know it will end. But it will end not because we voted for the wrong candidate. It will end because it deserves to be ended.
Civilization as we know it will end not because we choose the wrong political party but because we choose the wrong God.
We choose to wake up starting our days with our cell phone instead of starting with the Word of God.
We choose to repeat fake news on social media instead of repeat “I love you” to our spouses.
We choose to believe that standing in line at the polls will change the world, but kneeling down in prayer is only a personal matter.
Don’t get me wrong. Democracy is a good thing. It might be the best human invention. But the best human invention will not change the human condition. Only divine intervention is capable of changing our sinful nature. We have made democracy our god and the ballot our idol.
Our Lord tells us to “love our neighbors”, not to “vote for someone else to take care of our neighbors”.
之後迦勒底人來了，一切比以前更加不堪。那殘忍暴躁之民，通行遍地，占據那不屬自己的住處。而且迦勒底人是國際性的，他們殺戮的是列國的人。「他用鉤鉤住，用網捕獲，用拉網聚集他們。因此他歡喜快樂， 16 就向網獻祭，向網燒香，因他由此得肥美的份和富裕的食物。」 他們用的不是魚網，而是天網 big data 罷了。
Devotion for busy working people 