Bonus Lesson from Jonah: God loves animals!

 

 Those of us with animals in our life often love them as family members. I can assure you that my two little black dogs are my babies. I miss them when I go on a trip, and I care about their needs and wants. I snuggle with them during a nap or in the evening while watching TV. They make me laugh. They make me cry. Occasionally they make me scream! What I'm getting at is that I care about them.


 I'm so assured to read that God cares about animals too! Do all dogs go to heaven? That's a theological debate for another day, but what I learned today is that God counts animals in with people when it matters. I've been studying the book of Jonah for a week and they keep popping up. In chapter 3, the king of Nineveh proclaimed that the animals would participate in their fast before God. What surprised me, I'll admit it made me giggle a little, was that he even decreed that the animals wear sackcloth! Here I am picturing the cows and sheep walking around with mourning clothes on. This makes sense though as I don't think I've ever seen an animal look happy while wearing clothes!


 In Chapter 4, while God is talking with Jonah about his lack of concern for Nineveh, God points out both the people who do not know right from wrong as well as the animals. It's like He's saying to Jonah, "I get it, you're mad at the people, but how could you want this cute little sheep to die?" I'll admit, I'm a bit desensitized to seeing people die in movies. It happens so much, and you know its not real, so... yeah. But you should have seen me in the theater watching Ant Man when they zapped the sheep! My son was sitting next to me, and he had seen it before but not warned me. Let's just say he felt my wrath! Literally. I pounded on his arm. Don't worry, by then he was over six foot and well filled out. He could take a little pounding from his puny mom!

Here's the Thing: I love that God loves animals as much as I do, even more! It warms my heart that He cares for them and counts them as those affected by judgement of people. Just an awesome bonus lesson!

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