Sparrow He is your Habitation

Sparrow He is your Habitation

Psalm 102:7 (Amplified Bible) 7 I am sleepless and lie awake [mourning], like a bereaved sparrow alone on the housetop.  His Eye is on the sparrow and I know he watches me. God's presence is your habitation. It is better to be serving God in solitude than serving sin with a multitude. Like the sparrow, followers of Christ endure a life of solitude. Some of you are questioning your value in the community. Your soul searches for rest and habitation. Sparrows provide habitations for themselves in houses, as other birds do in the woods, for their own repose and in which to lay their young. Psalm 102:7 (Amplified Bible) 7 I am sleepless and lie awake [mourning], like a bereaved sparrow alone on the housetop.  David supposes there were birds in the buildings about the courts of God’s house, and wishes himself with them. He would rather live in a bird’s nest nigh God’s altars than in a palace at a distance from them.

You are worth more a penny. "Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? and not one of them shall fall on the ground without your Father." This is a reference to the common custom in the East of catching small birds, and selling them to be skinned, roasted and sold as tid-bits--a bird to a mouthful. These lines no doubt are the origin of the oft-quoted phrase, "He marks the fall of the sparrow." Then in verse 31 comes this comforting assurance: "Fear not therefore: ye are of more value than many sparrows." Luke 12:6: "Are not five sparrows sold for two pence? and not one of them is forgotten in the sight of God." This affirms the implication of Mark that these tiny birds were an article of commerce in the days of Jesus, just as they are now in the Far East.

Reverence. Temple builder had reverence for any bird that built on a temple, because he thought it meant that the bird thus building claimed the protection of God in so doing. For these reasons all temple builders were so reverenced that authentic instances are given of people being put to death, if they disturbed temple nests or builders their is reverence and awe for any bird that nestles in the house of the Lord. Dr. Thompson, in speaking of the great numbers of the house-sparrows and field-sparrows in troublesome and impertinent generation, and nestle just where you do not want them. They stop your stove-- and water-pipes with their rubbish, build in the windows and under the beams of the roof, and would stuff your hat full of stubble in half a day if they found it hanging in a place to suit them."

Sparrows sing in the Temple. the harmony they had singing-birds in cages hung about the courts of the tabernacle (for we find the singing of birds taken notice of to the glory of God, Ps. 104:12), and David envies the happiness of these, and would gladly change places with them. Observe, David envies the happiness not of those birds that flew over the altars, and had only a transient view of God’s courts, but of those that had nests for themselves there.

Solitude. The reason he said he was like a "sparrow that is alone upon the housetop" was because it is the most unusual thing in the world for a sparrow to sit mourning alone, and therefore it attracted attention and made a forceful comparison. It only happens when the bird's mate has been killed or its nest and young destroyed, and this most cheerful of birds sitting solitary and dejected made a deep impression on the Psalmist who, when his hour of trouble came, said he was like the mourning sparrow--alone on the housetop. Another exquisite song describes the bird in its secure and happy hour: