The mother snake will lay her fertilized eggs in the nest and then abandon them, never to return. Baby snakes hatch with the ability to take care of themselves.

The mother alligator will remain with her young alligators for up to a year. She protects them from would-be-predators up to a year. Many animals hunt alligator hatchlings, but few are bold enough to mess with them when Momma is near.

A number of years ago, I preached for the funeral of one of our members who died at a relatively young age. Many years before her death, she had suffered a severe stroke. In her funeral sermon, I preached, “There was no specific sin that caused [her] stroke, but because she was a sinner in an imperfect world, a stroke happened. There was no specific sin that caused [her] to die young, but because she was a sinner in a sinful world, death happened.”

Peter, James, and John had the awesome privilege of being eyewitnesses of the event that we call the transfiguration of our Lord. On the holy mount, the divine glory of the Christ burst forth. Christ’s face shown like the sun, and His clothes became as white as daylight. Jesus began to glow with the brightness He always had as the only Son of God.

Have you ever had someone criticize your Christianity? They charge that you must not be a Christian because you don’t act or speak or dress or behave in a certain way.

Let me give you some examples. A few weeks ago, our two dogs attacked a raccoon that was in our cul de sac. Our neighbor charged us with not being Christian because the dogs were fighting a racoon.

Imagine that you are looking for a church home. What are you looking for in a church and a pastor?

Would you go to the church down the block if you knew that the pastor is an ex-con? Would you attend the church a few streets over, knowing that the foreign mission pastor had once denied Jesus to escape persecution in his home country? Would you want to attend a church knowing that both associate pastors have trouble controlling their anger?

When your children were little, they held your hand, called you “Mommy” or “Daddy,” and gave you butterfly kisses in public. But something happens when children become teenagers. They want you to drive them around and pay for their meals, but they don’t really want to be seen with you anymore. You’re not quite as cool as you used to be.

I don’t suppose God is too thrilled with the children He adopted by faith into His royal family think that God is no longer cool enough to identify with Him in public. How that disdain must hurt His fatherly heart!

When God created light on the first day, He didn’t banish the darkness entirely. He established the regular cycle of night and day, darkness and light. This framework gave us time to work and play, as well as time to rest and sleep. But even in that time of darkness, God provided lights to shine in the darkness by creating the moon and stars on the fourth day.

I visited Tim in the Sturtevant Prison. One of our members had asked me to visit her grandson, Tim (not his real name), while he was there.

Tim told me that he had attended Epiphany many years ago, as a child. But he had long since fallen away from the church. He said that during his teenage years he became rebellious and defiant. He got involved in drugs and alcohol. Then, to pay for his addictions, he stole money. He admitted that he even stole from his grandmother.

Why did Jesus travel so far? Why did Jesus leave His mansion in heaven to journey to earth? Why did Jesus remain God but also trek to earth by taking on the baggage of human flesh and blood?

Those are the questions we tried to unravel recently in our 6th grade confirmation class.

To help us understand the relationship of God to humans, we discussed the relationship of humans to ants. Caleb volunteered to be our resident “ant-lover.”