The Little Eagle with the Broken Wing

The Little Eagle with the Broken Wing

            An eaglet was born in a nest high up in the treetops. His mother nourished him, along with his brothers and sisters. But this little eaglet was different from the others. He was small and puny, always restless and fluttering back and forth. The other eaglets picked on him, chased him, and flapped at him. Even his mother paid just the slightest attention to him. She fed him only out of natural instinct. Even the other eagles soaring about the sky slighted this little eagle’s worth.

            One day an eagle with a wounded wing saw the eaglet perched on the edge of the nest. This eagle, angry about his own wounds, swooped down and whacked the eaglet with his good wing. The startled little eagle plummeted to the ground. The other eaglets watched in amazement as their brother crashed and lay there, motionless. Both his wings were injured. The mother eagle swooped down a time or two to see what was happening but showed only a passing interest.

            A short time later, a stranger happened by and scooped the eaglet up in his hand. Seeing his wounded wings, the man set the eaglet on a small log to keep him off the ground and went on his way.

            By and by, a compassionate eagle flying low saw the eaglet. This eagle had lost her own eaglets to a predator. She adopted the wounded eaglet and began to feed and nourish him. However, she was wary about staying so close to the ground with the eaglet. She never stayed long for fear of being caught by an enemy.

            The young eagle grew and learned to hide and protect himself from his enemies. Occasionally a passing human would catch him. Once he was even put on a string and tied to a tree. Thankfully, it was a poor knot and he managed to wriggle free.
           

            As he grew, the young eagle struggled to make short flights. Finally, he could reach a limb higher off the ground. From that higher perch, he would watch the other eagles soaring effortlessly in the sky. They saw him watching and often swooped down to pick at him. When he had his guard down, they would sneak in behind him and knock him to the ground. Only with a great struggle would he once again fly up to the higher limb.

            One day the adoptive mother eagle stopped coming and bringing food. His siblings floated effortlessly on the wind under the watchful eye of his natural mother, but she continued to ignore little lonely eagle.

            An old man hobbled by that day. He spotted the eagle with wounded wings and felt sorry for him. On returning home, he couldn’t get that wounded little eagle off his mind. A few days later he came back and scattered some food on the ground. He waited for the eaglet, but the frightened bird just watched from his limb. Finally after the man left, the eaglet fluttered down and hungrily scarfed down the food. Once again he managed to reach his perch and rested contentedly with a full stomach. Day after day the old man came and put food on the ground for the young eagle. Every day the eaglet fluttered down to eat. And he grew.

            One day after eating, the eagle decided not to make the effort to fly up to the limb but sat on the ground all night. Another man, not so kind as the old man, happened on the young bird as dusk settled over the woods. Seeing the sleeping eaglet, he quickly made a net and captured the young eagle alive. Taking the eagle home, he put him in a hastily built cage and left him there.

            At first the young eagle fought the wires surrounding him but eventually settled in the corner, anxiously awaiting his fate.  Days passed. One morning the eagle’s captor rushed in with another man, whose evil eyes surveyed the young bird.  Some sort of deal was made and the evil man put a net over the eagle and carried him to his home, where he placed him in a cage in his backyard.

            Day after day the eagle sat in the cage, gazing sadly at the free birds soaring on the currents in the sky. At night he watched the sparkling stars until a new day dawned.

            The young eagle grew larger and stronger, but the evil man built a bigger cage with much sturdier bars to keep him in. Then the man did something strange—he brought a platter of something different for the eagle to eat. The eagle was not sure what it was but found it deeply satisfying and distracting. It soothed him to the point he became unmotivated. He began to live just for that special “food.” It made him forget his problems. He no longer yearned to be up in the sky soaring with the other eagles. He began to view his captor as less of an enemy and even a necessity. The eagle lived in a place of constant melancholy, just an existence. He did not even notice how much he had grown.    

            Another gentleman came by the home one day to ask about the eagle he had heard about, but the evil man would not let him in. He knew the gentleman was a bird lover and especially fond of eagles. He knew this stranger would not approve of the medication he was putting in the eagle’s food or of the bird’s condition, and he wanted to avoid an argument.   

            But the gentleman was not so easily dissuaded. During the wee hours of the morning before the eagle was fed his daily concoction, he squeezed through a gate and found the caged young bird. He spoke kindly to the captive. Reaching through the cage, he applied splints to the eagle’s wings. Every morning he would return and treat the young eagle, always keeping the splints from sight so the evil man wouldn’t discover them.

            Gradually the eagle’s wings healed. At last one morning the gentleman broke the lock and swung the gate open. “Go fly, young eagle, as you were meant to do,” he urged. “Go fly in the sky like the others and be free!”  

            Cautiously, the eagle stepped from the cage and flapped his now fully-grown and healed wings. Suddenly he was aloft and the wind rushed beneath him, lifting him ever higher. A feeling of exhilaration raced through him. He was free at last!  

            The evil man, finding the cage open, guessed what had happened, but he did not waste time on anger. He knew just what to do.  He knew the eagle would be back.

            Meanwhile, the young eagle flew on and on until he came into his own birthplace and rested on the edge of the nest. He watched his mother tenderly care for a new batch of eaglets. Why hadn’t she cared for him like that? The rejection by her and the other eagles began to weigh on him. Feelings of anger and pain mounted and began to drain the exhilaration of his newfound freedom. The old scars on his wings ached, and he suddenly found it difficult to fly. He swooped down and sat on the limb he had occupied so long as an eaglet.

            His mind wandered to the cage he had left. The food that dulled the pain. Suddenly he knew what he wanted. He flew up and away, right back to the evil man’s house. Flying low, he looked in the cage for the feel-good food. Sure enough, it was there. Without thought, he flew in the door and consumed it, but before the medicine took effect, he flew out into the forest where he was free.

            Daily he would swoop back to devour the food mix and fly away again. But the evil man was watching patiently. He knew the eagle would be more and more distracted. Would get more careless and spend more time in the cage. The day eventually came when the eagle turned from gulping down the meal to find the door slammed shut. He was a prisoner again.

            In time the kind gentleman again was able to sneak in and free the eagle, but the eagle got careless and returned to the cage for his treat, which eventually led to captivity again. This happened repeatedly. Could the young eagle ever be free? Eventually he chose freedom. He chose to turn to the one who could help him be free for life instead of to the temporary solutions provided by the drugged food. The eagle did indeed find true and lasting freedom through God’s great mercy.

            God gave me this story while I was dealing with the struggle of addiction.

             So often we cling to a crutch to handle our pain. But turning to the Master is the key to healing. The key to freedom.  Remaining free from crippling addictions takes more than perseverance—it takes a powerful desire for a deep and meaningful relationship with the Father. Allowing God to fulfill us and embrace us in His loving arms is a step of faith and belief.

            What is an addiction? Depending on a substance or relationship or habit to fix our problems, to help us cope with life’s struggles, to bring meaning to our life. A coping mechanism. Depending on anything or anyone other than God for resolution of our problems, for answers to life’s challenges.

            Even good things can become addictive when we depend on them more than on our Father. Addictions can be more than drug, alcohol, cigarette, or other substance abuse. They can be things like the need to succeed, to always be in control, to gossip, to live immorally, to disconnect, to eat excessively, to hide in distractions like TV, the Internet, hobbies, or work. We use various things to break the barrier of disappointment, boredom, pain, and anger. But they all have this in common: they do not bring us lasting peace and freedom from the pain. They only work to temporarily mask the pain, while putting us in a place of vulnerability to the enemy. These temporary fixes bring us only temporary release. Then when they have lost their potency, we only sink deeper into despair.

            Addictions cripple us in our relationship to the Father. Our God will not share residence with the enemy. The enemy is the one who sells the lie and influences us to depend on things that have no real benefit in our lives. Things that will lead us to bondage. Things that place us in danger of being captive to the enemy’s will. Satan is our enemy. He wants to devour us, and he often works through people. In the eagle story, he worked through the evil man who offered the eagle a quick fix for his problems. And these quick fixes led to captivity. The eagle was turning to the wrong person for help.

            If we are dependent on some form of coping mechanism, the devil will capitalize on it and deceive us into embracing sin. When we fall into this kind of deception, we take a substance or submerge ourselves in a relationship or habit to cope and receive the feeling of contentment. But our problems are not solved—we are just developing a thirst for more of the coping mechanism. This defines addiction. The continual cycle of need, deceptive fulfillment, and greater need. A cycle that will lead to depression, despair, discontentment, and an unfulfilled existence.

            When we depend on anyone or anything other than God to help us cope, we eventually realize it isn’t working. Then we may begin to fall into deeper and deeper despair. The despair leads to a desperate need to cope, which only brings a limited solution. We turn to our coping mechanism more often until we eventually become depressed or accept our dependence on our coping mechanism.

            We become dependent on these mechanisms, and withdrawal from them causes much pain. (Remember the eagle.) This is why we end up in bondage to the enemy. He sees our pain and our coping mechanisms—and he capitalizes on them to his benefit and our harm.

            The world’s solutions may help us cope—temporarily. But God takes away the need for coping by showing us our pain and healing us of it. Then we are free indeed.

            Anything we use to cope with pain other than going to the One who created us places a wall between our God and us. A wall between our pain and the only One who can heal us.

            The answer? Release our pain to God and give up our dependence on other people or things. Then focus on building a relationship with God. Only then will the void in our life be filled.

Release your pain to God.

Give up your dependence on a coping mechanism.

Focus on a relationship with God.

Receive the peace you long for.

            We must being honest with ourselves. We must admit who and what we have become and why we have allowed it. We must recognize what we do to cope with our pain and how that is affecting our ability to have a deep relationship with our heavenly Father. After all, He is the only one who can give us true healing, freedom, peace, joy, and completeness.

            When you develop the kind of relationship with the Father that He intends, you will never want to go back to the old life. Once you develop this kind of relationship with God, you will no longer desire the negative influences that haunt you now. You may sometimes feel a wave of old desire or temptation, but you will stop and consider the cost of giving in. You will begin to value the intimate relationship you have with the Father above anything else, and you won’t want to do anything to destroy that. This is true freedom: the overpowering desire to say no to anything that could jeopardize the peace and fulfillment that come from a close and personal relationship with the Father.

            You cannot have that kind of relationship while being a yoyo with sin and addictions. Count the cost and flee the addiction that made you vulnerable to the wiles of the devil.

            Because few people cultivate this kind of relationship with the Father, we have a generation of people struggling to cope with unresolved issues and pain. This is not something new to the world but it is abounding in this generation and will only increase in the generations to come.

            Ask yourself . . .

What motivates me each day to do what I do?

What gives my life meaning?

What is there in my life, that if removed, would cause withdrawal?

How do I respond to pain or disappointment?

How do I respond to excitement?

Most of all, what stands between me and complete submission to God?

            Anything you use to cope with life’s everyday struggles will be used by the devil to bait you into sin and imprisonment to his desire.         Continually seek a closer relationship with God, and these coping mechanisms will begin to lose their appeal. Then you will be free indeed.

            True freedom is recognizing all we need for a fulfilled life is a relationship with God through His Son Jesus Christ.

“So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.”

John 8:36 NIV