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So Long Teddy, See You in Heaven! Teddy was seven. Throughout his life, I asked God to put His Spirit on Teddy, like Balaam's donkey (Nu.22:21-31) or the Legion Christ put on the swine, or the lion God used to kill the disobedient prophet (1Kings 13:24-25). God answered that prayer, and Teddy always seemed to be not only a reminder of God's love and presence but also a little messenger for Him. Do you know what God tells us about our pets? The Bible says that pets can be like children to us, and appears to recognize that this relationship is, indeed, a spiritual relationship. In 2 Sam. 12, the prophet Nathan tells King David a story about a poor man's pet lamb to convict David of his sin with Bathsheba. The poor man nourished the lamb up with his real children, and it ate of his food, drank of his cup, laid in his bosom, and became like a daughter to him. When a rich man killed the lamb, King David decreed that the rich man must not only pay compensation, the Mosaic law penalty, but should also be put to death. We no that David's judgment was in accordance with God's will because Nathan told David the story so that David would reach that conclusion, because David was the rich man in the story. The death penalty is specifically commanded by God for killing humans (Gen. 9:6) because humans are made in God's image. David's decree of the death penalty for the murder of the poor man's lamb equates the value of a human life with the life of an animal that is loved by a human. The rich man deserved to die because he did not respect this relationship - he did not pity the loss it would be to the poor man to loose his sheep-child. By equating the life of an animal who is loved by a human with the life of a human, the Bible seems to be telling us that our relationship with our pets can have the same spiritual character as a relationship with a human being. The obvious implication is that our fellow creatures, like us, are spiritual beings - they are souls. Hebrew scholars recognize that some animals received the breath of life from God in the same way that God made Adam a living soul. Gen. 2:7 records "And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul." Gen. 7:15 tells us that animals also became souls in the same way Adam did: "And they went in unto Noah into the ark, two and two of all flesh, wherein is the breath of life. The Hebrew word used for breath in these passages does not refer to air moving in and out of the lungs, it means the way God creates souls. C.S. Lewis reminds us we do not HAVE souls, we ARE souls, we have bodies, but only until we die. Ps. 146:4 tells us that the meaning of death is that the soul - God's breath - leaves the body. It says "His breath goeth forth, he returneth to his earth; in that very day his thoughts perish." But perhaps Ecclesiastes is most direct. Ec. 3:19 says "For that which befalleth the sons of men befalleth beasts; even one thing befalleth them: as one dieth, so dieth the other, yea, they have all one breath; so that a man hath no preeminence above a beast: for all is vanity." This great truth is important in our nation's founding. Our Founders knew the Bible, so they understood that God had given a single nature to animals but had given both a Godly nature and a sin nature to man. Animals can not sin, because God made them in such a way that they are always true to the nature God created in them. Man, by contrast, is "free" to disobey his Godly nature and follow his sin nature. Death, remember, entered the world because of the sin of man, not the sin of an animal. This understanding is the reason Sir William Blackstone, from whom Thomas Jefferson took the ideas of the Declaration of Independence, tells us man can only pursue his true happiness when he follows his Godly nature. If man can only pursue his true happiness when he obeys God, it follows that Jefferson's use of the phrase "the right to the pursuit of happiness" in the Declaration has a particular political meaning. As a political right, the right to the pursuit of happiness means the right to be free from a government that commands - or just allows - us to do what God forbids, or that forbids us to do what God commands, or what God simply allows. If we needed more explicit proof that we will see the creatures we love again in Heaven, God Himself tells us this is so. Rev. 5:13 says that all creatures, both in heaven and on earth, will Bless God and Jesus at the Day of the Lord: "And every creature which is in heaven, and on the earth, and under the earth, and such as are in the sea, and all that are in them, heard I saying, Blessing, and honor, and glory, and power, be unto him that sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb for ever and ever." Thank you God, for the wonderful gift of Teddy Bear. Loosing Teddy showed me a little of the grief You must have felt at being separated from Your Son, Jesus, but thanks to His sacrifice, I know I will see Teddy in Heaven! |
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