Church bulletin for September<\/p>\n
Not that long ago we didn\u2019t have any, now we have five. I am referring to pets. Two bearded dragon lizards (Cromwell and Scout), one blue tongue lizard (Geno), one long neck turtle (Frankie), and one Pug cross Cavalier puppy (Rhino).<\/p>\n
Animals are fascinating and can bring a great deal of pleasure. Obviously God had a purpose in creating animals; it is clear that He cares for the welfare of animals. Deut 25:4, <\/span>\u201c<\/i>You shall not muzzle an ox while it treads out\u00a0the grain.\u201d <\/i>Jonah 4:11, <\/span>\u201c<\/i>And should I not pity Nineveh, that great city, in which are more than one hundred and twenty thousand persons who cannot discern between their right hand and their left\u2014and much livestock?\u201d <\/i>Prov 12:10, <\/span>\u201c<\/i>A righteous\u00a0man regards the life of his animal, but the tender mercies of the wicked\u00a0are cruel.\u201d<\/i><\/p>\n With these thoughts in mind, can we expect to find the likes of Cromwell (the lizard not Oliver) in the new heavens and the new earth? I\u2019m sure Oliver will be there, but what about the horses and dogs he loved? It\u2019s hard to say, but scripture doesn\u2019t discount the possibility. Isaiah 11:6-9, <\/span>\u201c<\/i>The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb, the leopard shall lie down with the young goat, the calf and the young lion and the fatling together; and a little child shall lead them. 7 <\/sup>The cow and the bear shall graze; their young ones shall lie down together; and the lion shall eat straw like the ox. 8 <\/sup>The nursing child shall play by the cobra\u2019s hole, and the weaned child shall put his hand in the viper\u2019s den. 9 <\/sup>They shall not hurt nor destroy in all My holy mountain, for the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the\u00a0Lord as the waters cover the sea. \u201c<\/i><\/p>\n Redemption involves the whole of the created order. While Isaiah is most likely referring to the effect of the Gospel in symbolic terms (Isaiah 11:1 \u2013 Rom 15:12), there is no reason why it will not also have a literal fulfilment at the consummation. The Garden lost through sin, will be the Garden restored through Christ. Our final state will not be spent as disembodied spirits floating in the clouds, but as physical beings on a physical earth in the presence of the physical Christ. Will animals be present? I would like to think so; they are magnificent examples of the creative power of God. If they give us pleasure now, why not on the new earth? If they are not there, it won\u2019t matter as we will have Christ. Something to ponder. \u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Church bulletin for September Not that long ago we didn\u2019t have any, now we have five. I am referring to pets. Two bearded dragon lizards (Cromwell and Scout), one blue …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-909","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-articles"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sdreformedbaptist.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/909","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sdreformedbaptist.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sdreformedbaptist.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sdreformedbaptist.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sdreformedbaptist.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=909"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/sdreformedbaptist.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/909\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":910,"href":"https:\/\/sdreformedbaptist.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/909\/revisions\/910"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sdreformedbaptist.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=909"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sdreformedbaptist.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=909"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sdreformedbaptist.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=909"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}