The Wonders of God’s Creation
“There is a time... for every purpose and for every work.” Ecclesiastes 3:17.
One of the first signs of spring throughout North America is a nighttime sound like tinkling bells from ponds and marshes announcing that the little peeper frogs are coming out of their winter mud-baths. Peepers don’t care which day is the first day of spring according to our calendars. For them it is the first day temperatures rise to about 50° F. The males then appear, soon followed by the females which have been attracted by their pretty chorus. Tiny tadpoles soon hatch from sticky eggs laid in great numbers in shallow water, and it takes these tadpoles most of the summer to change into mature frogs. Peepers are all of one family, though some may be tan-colored while others are orange or reddish-brown.
The Coqui frog of Puerto Rico is also small — less than two inches long, and three together weigh less than a pound. Only the males “sing,” but their croaks sound about as loud as a noisy motorboat. These noisy little creatures usually sleep in the daytime and come out only at night, but after a heavy shower they all come out and join in a chorus, making a terrible racket —whether day or night.
Ecuador is the home of the pouched frog, so named because the female has a pouch on her back where her male companion tucks the dozen or more eggs she has laid. When the eggs are ready to hatch out as miniature frogs, the mother goes to a nearby pool under the trees and releases them out of her pouch by using a long toe on one of her hind feet to pull open a slit on her back. The tiny froglets, happy to leave their crowded home, hop into the pool and start life on their own. Soon they climb to the high tops of tropical trees where their bright-green bodies are well hidden among the leaves. Some of the leaves hold little pools of rainwater, providing the moisture all frogs must have.
Another South American species is called the poison dart because natives use a poison found in them to make their arrows and other weapons more effective. The eggs of these frogs are laid on watery ground, and when these little frogs hatch out they are carried piggyback by the parents to plants growing high among the treetops. Here they find necessary water, just as their cousins, the pouched frogs, do.
Frogs are not liked by everyone, except perhaps young boys and animal-lovers, but they are God’s creatures and serve His purpose in our interesting world and are under His watchful care. We may not understand His purposes for all creatures, but we can understand a wonderful purpose He has for all boys and girls and men and women who love Him, as expressed in Romans 8:28: “All things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to His purpose.” Does this verse apply to you? If you know the Lord Jesus as your Saviour it surely does.
ML-04/03/1988