Thankful For The Animals

 Genesis 1:28  28 Then God blessed them, and God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply; fill the earth and subdue it; have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over every living thing that moves on the earth.”


Have you ever owned a pet that you loved so much that you considered it family.  Maybe it was more than considered, it was family.  Animals are precious to humankind and have been since the very beginning.  God gave them to man at the very beginning to be companions.  While Genesis 1 tells us that God gave us the animals to subdue and manage, Genesis 2 goes into even more detail.


In verses 18-20 it says,


18 And the Lord God said, “It is not good that man should be alone; I will make him a helper comparable to him.” 19 Out of the ground the Lord God formed every beast of the field and every bird of the air, and brought them to Adam to see what he would call them. And whatever Adam called each living creature, that was its name. 20 So Adam gave names to all cattle, to the birds of the air, and to every beast of the field. But for Adam there was not found a helper comparable to him.


So no wonder man can have such an attachment to an animal!  God created them to be companions to us.  He gave them to us and we should be thankful for that.  The Bible has so much more to say about the animals though.


Besides Scriptures that tells us about the variety of animals used in God’s purposes such as the dove with Noah, the donkey with Balaam, and even the horse that Christ rides on in His triumphant return, the Bible gives us a strong admonition on how we are to treat animals.


Proverbs 12:10 says,


10 A righteous man regards the life of his animal,

But the tender mercies of the wicked are cruel.


God placed us as stewards over the animal kingdom and we must be righteous as we treat them.  We should treat them with love and respect for again, they were a gift given to us by God.


Now some may ask me, “Do you think there are animals in heaven?”  While there are no direct answers, I will share my opinion.  Again, this is my opinion and I really don’t have a definite answer on this.  My opinion was yes, there are animals in heaven.  My basis of thinking is because of the imagery that is given to us in the book of Revelation and specifically where it says that Christ will be coming to Armageddon upon a white horse.  Now, if you ask, will we know our past pets in heaven and if they will be our pets again, I don’t believe that.  I don’t believe that because of the same answer Jesus gave the Pharisees when it came to husbands and wives.  Jesus stated that we will not be given in marriage in heaven, so I feel the same would be with pet ownership.  Again, the purpose of animals was for companionship to man, so again, I think the rule would apply.


Again, that is strictly my opinion and this is really not a strong theological subject.  


However, let us be thankful to God for giving us the animals in our lives which bring us so much joy and let us be thankful to Him for thinking of us so much to give us those blessings.

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