Inside Story for Friday 16th of January 2026

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An outbreak of baby cobras alarmed Beulah Fernandez, director of Sunshine Children’s Home and School on a Seventh-day Adventist campus in Bangalore, India. She had good reason to be worried. Five years earlier, a boy had been bitten by a cobra while chasing a calf through a mango grove. Even though he had been rushed to the hospital, he had ended up undergoing several operations and a year of complicated treatments before recovering.

Now baby cobras seemed to be everywhere on the 10-acre campus: on the road, in the garden, under the car, and even outside the door of Beulah’s house.

“O Lord!” she prayed. “This is supposed to be a safe place for children. Please help!”

Snake catchers were called, but they were accustomed to catching snakes in city buildings and closed spaces.

It was a difficult task to find the baby cobras on the large campus of trees bearing mangos, bananas, jackfruit, sapota, papaya, custard apples, avocados, coconuts, guavas, figs, passion fruits, and soursop.

Staff members and children prayed earnestly.

Then a staff member spotted a peacock on the campus. Could it be? A peacock on the campus in the middle of a big city? Peacocks are known to eat venomous snakes.

A short time after that, another staff member saw a second peacock.

A few evenings later, staff members and children were treated to a majestic display of a peacock and his female counterpart, a peahen, majestically strutting around the garden.

Everyone watched in wonder as the shiny blue peacock fanned out its long, brilliant tail feathers marked with eye-like designs.

After that evening, the baby cobras disappeared.

Even though the snakes were gone, the peacock and peahen remained on the campus like stately guardians to the children and staff members.

Even today, someone screams out almost daily, “Peacock!”—and the children run out to look at a beautiful bird.

Beulah believes that the peacocks were the answer to their fervent prayers. In the 45-year history of the school and children’s home, no peacocks had ever before visited the campus.

“We believe that God sent the peacocks,” she said. “God indeed does love and care for His children and can still amaze us with beautiful solutions to all our troubles.”

Source: https://ssnet.org/blog/26a-03-inside-story-peacocks-to-the-rescue/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=26a-03-inside-story-peacocks-to-the-rescue

Daily Lesson for Friday 16th of January 2026
Further Thought:

“From the rack, the stake, the dungeon, from dens and caves of the earth, there falls upon his ear the martyr’s shout of triumph.

Image © Stan Myers from GoodSalt.com

He [Paul] hears the witness of steadfast souls, who, though destitute, afflicted, tormented, yet bear fearless, solemn testimony for the faith, declaring, ‘I know whom I have believed.’ These, yielding up their lives for the faith, declare to the world that He in whom they have trusted is able to save to the uttermost.”—Ellen G. White, The Acts of the Apostles, p. 512.

“Never was there so great a diversity of faith in Christendom as at the present day. If the gifts [of apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, and teachers (Ephesians 4:11-13)] were necessary to preserve the unity of the primitive church, how much more so to restore unity now! And that it is the purpose of God to restore the unity of the church in the last days, is abundantly evident from the prophecies. We are assured that the watchmen shall see eye to eye, when the Lord shall bring again Zion. Also, that in the time of the end the wise shall understand. When this is fulfilled there will be unity of faith with all whom God accounts wise; for those that do in reality understand aright, must necessarily understand alike. . . . From considerations like these, it is evident that the perfect state of the church here predicted is still in the future; consequently these gifts have not yet accomplished their purpose.”—R. F. Cottrell, “Introduction,” in Ellen G. White, Early Writings, p. 140.

Discussion Questions

<–Thursday

Source: https://ssnet.org/blog/26a-03-further-thought-life-and-death/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=26a-03-further-thought-life-and-death