The pangolin lives in Africa and Asia and looks something like a cross between an armadillo and an anteater, with an armored coat of sharp-edged plates from the top of its head to the tip of its long tail. Although its tail is a helpful prop while breaking open termite nests as well as a weapon against attackers, the pangolin's main defense is to roll into a tight ball with only the tough armor exposed. This makes it almost impossible for anything to get at them.
Pangolins usually sleep all day, the small varieties on tree limbs and the larger in deep burrows. God has well equipped them to hunt at night. He has given them sharp beady eyes to penetrate the darkness and a keen sense of smell to lead them to their food, which is almost entirely ants and termites. The larger varieties use their long, strong claws to break into ant hills and cement-like termite nests where the insects live. When their homes are disturbed the ants or termites race furiously about. The pangolin pushes its head into the opening of the nest, flicks out its long, sticky tongue, and laps them up, a quart or more at a time.
Termites and ants bite viciously, but that doesn't bother the pangolin. Special provisions given to him by the Creator include transparent eyelids too tough for these insects to bite and openings in his nostrils and ears that automatically shut to keep the insects out. Even those furious ants that get on his body, looking for tender spots to bite, are flicked off the scales by a shake of his body.
Another interesting thing about these strange animals is that they have no teeth, but keep pebbles in their stomachs which grind all food swallowed into a digestible form, We might wonder why God made this odd creature. Adapting all His creatures to their place in nature is often referred to as "the balance of nature," but it is really "God's order." He has created each for their special place on earth. Even ants and termites are included, and He has arranged for them to recover rapidly from raids and to rebuild quickly their large colonies. At the same time the work of the pangolin keeps such insects from multiplying too fast and doing much damage to forests, buildings and farmer's crops. In the coming millennial time all life will be in harmony and no killing of one another will take place, but meanwhile we see His wisdom in putting all things into proper balance.
But His plans for you are greater than that. The Lord Jesus said to those who loved and trusted Him, "I go to prepare a place for you. And... I will come again, and receive you unto Myself, that where I am, there ye may be also." John 14:2,32In my Father's house are many mansions: if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. 3And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also. (John 14:2‑3). Does that promise apply to you? It does if you have accepted the Lord Jesus as your Savior.