Like a Chicken with Its Cut Off

I was reading a story on the internet today about a chicken that lived 18 months after having its head cut off. www.miketheheadlesschicken.org

In a nutshell, there was this guy who went out to the barnyard to behead a chicken for dinner. Unfortunately, the axe barely missed the jugular vein, leaving an ear with the majority of the bird’s brain stem intact – but it took off its head.

Well, according to the story, the chicken shook off the blow and went about being a chicken, still pecking with his neck (even in the absence of its head) and continuing to try to straighten and clean its feathers with its nonexistent beak. 

The guy waited for the chicken to die, but when it made no signs of doing so, he decided to have something different for dinner that night and he took to caring for the bird. He fed him things like milk and water through his open esophagus using an eyedropper. And, small bits of gravel were also dropped down his throat to help his gizzard grind food.

The chicken was initially able to walk but clumsily. It soon got used to the situation and its new center of gravity. But it could no longer crow, but instead made a gurgling noise.

The chicken died 18 months later.

Is there a lesson to be learned here? Perhaps like this ‘headless’ chicken, we, too, will live a limited, less than quality life if we’re running around without our ‘head’, trying to ‘make-do’ with what we have left of ourselves.

I’m not referring to just being overloaded with much busyness that leaves us exhausted and stressed out. I’m suggesting we consider it’s a greater problem than that when we’re disconnected from our ‘head’ – who is Jesus Christ. He is the Head and we are the body. We can grow up healthy in God only as he nourishes us. (Col. 2:18-20) Without our ‘head’, we will operate like the chicken without a head.

I don’t want to be like a chicken with my head cut off! I really want to be like the eagle that flies. Those of you who know me, know that this my favorite scripture:  “But those who wait on the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint.”  (Is. 40:31)