Unusually high tides reach Southern California beaches from March through July each year. When these extreme tides are due in the third or fourth night of the full moon, schools of grunion, a small edible fish, swim into the surf and allow themselves to be washed ashore on a sandy beach—but not until the highest wave of the incoming tide has passed.
Ashore on the bare sand, females scoop out shallow holes with their tails where they lay hundreds of eggs. The males follow quickly and fertilize the eggs, and then the females give a final swish of their tails to cover the eggs with sand. This all has been accomplished within thirty seconds! Then they all wriggle down the beach to be swept into the ocean by the next wave.
But how about the eggs? How can they hatch in such a hastily made and strange nest? The grunion have been well directed by their Creator in their timing, for no wave will reach the eggs until the next extremely high tide in another two weeks. This amount of time in warm, moist sand provides ample incubation. When a high wave finally reaches them, the eggs pop open, and the little fish are washed into the sea to begin their lives.
This annual event is so reliable that the hour and minute can be foretold. People flock to the beaches to witness it, some of them catching the fish in their hands.
Is there an alarm clock that tells the grunion just the precise moment to ride in on the highest wave? And how do they know where the sandy beaches are? If any mistakenly went to a rocky one, they would be pounded to pieces. Their instructions come from their Creator, and there is no possibility that this pattern will change. How carefully God watches over all His creatures.
After sin came into the world, all things were affected, so that today we do not see anything in perfection, but we do see something of His might and wisdom even in lowly creatures like the grunion. A time is coming when all will be made right again: “Behold, I create new heavens and a new earth” (Isaiah 65:1717For, behold, I create new heavens and a new earth: and the former shall not be remembered, nor come into mind. (Isaiah 65:17)). But before that takes place, there must be God’s judgment on this sinful world and all in it who have not had their sins forgiven through faith in Jesus Christ “who gave Himself for us, that He might redeem us from all iniquity” (Titus 2:1414Who gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works. (Titus 2:14)). How important it is to listen to the warning: “Remember now thy Creator in the days of thy youth, while the evil days come not” (Ecclesiastes 12:11Remember now thy Creator in the days of thy youth, while the evil days come not, nor the years draw nigh, when thou shalt say, I have no pleasure in them; (Ecclesiastes 12:1)).
ML-09/03/2017