The Wonders of God’s Creation
Once there were millions of beer in streams, lakes and ponds throughout the United States and Canada, but to meet demands of fashion for its lovely fur, trappers killed them mercilessly, nearly wiping them out. Fortunately, the fashion designers changed their designs to other things so that the beaver was spared to gradually rebuild its colonies. Should you be visiting some of the mountain areas of the West or lakes in the North, you might get a glimpse of this fascinating creature.
Water is a prime necessity to it and God has provided it with adaptability to its wet surroundings. A full-grown animal will be three and a half feet long, including a flat tail about five inches wide and a foot long. This tail is most important, being (with its paws) the means of plastering its home and dams with mud. It provides a rudder for this excellent web-footed swimmer and also serves as a support while standing on shore or while gnawing on trees and shrubs. When it slaps that flat tail hard on the pond’s surface, it is a warning for its companions to seek cover from an enemy getting too close for comfort.
This animal is a remarkable engineer, building watertight dams, some a half mile long, to form ponds. It also builds a house or lodge, as much as eight feet high and thirty feet in dieter. Several families may live in these lodges and have rooms in which to store food for winter and other rooms for raising their young. Here they are safe from their enemies, for their entrances and exits are all under water, although the living quarters are always high and dry.
A beaver’s most prominent feature is its teeth, large, sharp and strong. It uses these teeth to cut down trees and have them fall just where they want for use in building dams, homes, or for food. Incidentally, these teeth never stop growing. To keep them from getting hopelessly long they must keep busy cutting trees.
The amazing skills of the beaver didn’t come about by any trial-and-error method. God provided them with every feature and ability when He created them, just as He did for every creature.
God puts a responsibility on all mankind to recognize His Son as the Creator of all things and one who denies this can never draw near to Him. But, more important yet, He has been made known to the world as the Saviour to those who trust in Him, or as the judge to those who refuse Him. “He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life: and he that believeth not the Son shall not see life; but the wrath of God abideth on him.” John 3:3636He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life: and he that believeth not the Son shall not see life; but the wrath of God abideth on him. (John 3:36). How solemn the warning: “Take heed... lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief, in departing from the living God.” Heb. 3:1212Take heed, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief, in departing from the living God. (Hebrews 3:12).
ML-06/15/1980