Every October and November the Samoan Islanders receive a supply of food from the ocean which they consider a great treat. In each of those months, this food comes at sunrise, for two days during the last quarter of the moon. Just three days before this happens, there is a great migration of land crabs marching from the mountains to the sea to spawn, so the natives have this double notice to get ready to collect this treat.
The treat is the tails of the Palolo worm. The Palolo worm lives at the bottom of the ocean, hidden in rocks and coral. At these two months of the year, they back partly out of their burrows and break themselves in two. The hind part — the tail, which has undergone a huge change for just this purpose — rises to the surface to lay great numbers of eggs, and the front part stays in its underwater home, where it grows a new tail. By the second day, the whole area is afloat with these tails. The natives eagerly collect as many of them as possible.
What an amazing performance this is! Do you think the crabs and worms are watching the moon or looking at calendars? No, they simply follow the guidance of their Creator in ways we cannot understand.
Species of the Palolo worm go through similar activities in the waters around Japan, the Fiji Islands, the Gulf of Mexico and other places in the Pacific. Some are active at the same time as those near the Samoan Islands, but many are active at different times of the year.
How do these interesting residents of the ocean know just the right days to appear? What controls them so that they all leave their homes at the same time? It is God who has given them the instinct and living patterns suited exactly to their needs. This instinct tells them the exact hours and days to leave their underwater homes. The Lord God, who “upholds all things by the word of His power,” watches over them to see that they carry out their appointed role in His creation.
If the Lord of all creation guides the Palolo worm, we know He cares much more for us. Haven’t we found it true that “His compassions fail not. They are new every morning” (Lamentations 3:22-2322It is of the Lord's mercies that we are not consumed, because his compassions fail not. 23They are new every morning: great is thy faithfulness. (Lamentations 3:22‑23))? But He does more than taking care of us every day. He has also given us an everlasting soul and made a way to give us an invitation to spend eternity in heaven with Him. It cost Him His own Son to give you this gift ... have you taken it?
Messages of God’s Love 11/21/2021