Ask almost anyone, and they will tell you that wild animals especially large
carnivores are dangerous. You cross paths with them, and they will kill you.
Hollywood portrays wild animals as ravaging killers.
The belief that animals are dangerous is completely contrary to the Bible. This
is where you put your faith to the test. If you are hiking and come across a
large animal, what do you do? Base your action on Hollywood or the Bible? It
could save your life.
Let’s look at the changing role of animals in the Bible. Genesis 1:26,
the verse after God said be fruitful and multiply, He said man have dominion
over all animals. Animals at that time only ate plants. However, that was before
the eating of the fruit of knowledge of good and evil. After the fall of man,
many things changed.
Seven chapters latter, it was Noah and the flood. When Noah came out of the
ark, God said be fruitful and multiply the second time. This time, he also said
something relevant to us today each time we go into the wilderness.
Genesis 9:2 :
The fear and the terror of you will be on every beast of the earth and on every
bird of the sky; with everything that creeps on the ground, and all the fish
of the sea, into your hand they are given.
“Every moving thing that is alive shall be food for you; I give all to
you, as I gave the green plant. “
Only you shall not eat flesh with its life, that is, its blood. “
Surely I will require your lifeblood; from every beast I will require it.
This is a wonderful provision God has given
us. Too bad even many Christians do not believe it. Let’s look at what
it does and does not say.
1. The rule applies to every single animal from birds to deep sea creatures.
2.It did not say animals will never eat humans. Instead,
it said it has a fear, and not just a fear but dread, which emphasizes great
fear.
3 . Humans can eat animals for food, not just plants.
4 . You cannot drink an animal’s blood.
5 . Animals will be held accountable for killing of humans. So is not that it
never happens, but God's punishment keeps it from happening regularly.
The fifth point is interesting in that animals will be accountable for killing
humans. We think of animals as robotic creatures. Their spiritual perception
is actually beyond our comprehension. In Numbers 22:21, it was the donkey that
saw the angel of the Lord, which was Jesus, with a sword. It suggest animals
may have more spiritual perception than many humans. The donkey immediately
stopped while Balaam kept hitting the donkey. If animals can talk, this is what
they would say. The donkey was given the ability of speech. It said why did
you hit me three times. So it actually counted. It said have I ever done this
to you all your life? The donkey remembered past years, and was able to give
a character defense for itself.
Animals are held accountable which by definition
means they know the rules. They know how they will be judged. Animals unlike
humans have no problem believing in God, so perhaps they have knowledge of God
in ways that we don't.
We often hear sharks take a mistaken bite out of human and let go. You wonder
if is like a dog that chews up the owner’s belonging as the person walks
in, and it quickly lets go. In the case of sharks, it must sense the all-powerful
creator, and the shark knows it should not have bitten a human.
This provision God has given humans has been a great assistance to humanity
for centuries. The fear of man means we can train animal for work. Animals are
much more powerful than humans. They help us farm and transport goods. Animal
meat has high energy content. The fear of human has given us safety. The last
is an important point to remember latter in the book of Revelations
Hollywood and evening news shows animals to be mindless aggressive killers. Good thing for the internet, you can see actual animal behavior:
Video of native stealing meat from cheetah.
Video on swimming with sharks. More in depth Video discussion.
Video of man chasing away bear.
Photographer shooing polar bear away
Neelim Kumar Khaire spent 72 hours with 72 venomous snakes, and not a single bite.
The infamous Australian Eastern Brown Snake do not really chase after people.
Man swimming with a trained wild gator.
As a matter of fact, nobody has yet found an animal in the entire planet earth that runs and chase after humans to hunt them down. Given how slow humans are, we would make for an easy snack.
Some say polar bear actively hunt humans. Is that true? Here is one website that said from 1870-2014, there were only 73 attacks on humans. Another website to confirm that.
God Gives Food to Animals
“They all wait for You To give them their
food in due season.
You give to them, they gather it up; You open Your hand, they are satisfied
with good.
You hide Your face, they are dismayed; You take away their spirit, they expire
And return to their dust.
You send forth Your Spirit, they are created; And You renew the face of the
ground.” Psalm 104:27–30
Hard to believe, but animals wait for God to give them food. There is a bond between God and the anmals. When God turns away, animals are dismayed. We human instinctively know to give food to animal to get them to come to us. We have to wonder what animals sees in us. We are made in the image of God. Animals fear humans. Animals almost see us as gods when we give them food.
My own story: Over 10 years ago in Fairbanks Alaska we visited a sled dog place outside of town. The owner said the other side of the yard was the alpha. It was the closest to a wolf they have. Is a wolf hybrid. They would tie a female outside when is hot to get the good strong gene. It gave it strength, and made it a natural leader. Like an alpha, this dog had an attitude. It was standing proud and tall. I thought it made for a very good picture. I walked away from the group to get closer, but not close enough for it to growl at me. I thought good thing it was on chains because it could probably tear me up from limb to limb. It probably knew that too. While standing pround, it happen to turned to look at me. It realized I was there, and as if in embaressment, it lowered its head immediately. I lost the good picture. That greatly perplexed me. Why did a fierce wolf dog have to lower its head at me a weakling? It was not until latter I came across Genesis again and remembered that incident, and put it together to realize it is true. Animals do fear and dread humans.
While animals fear man, and all animals are given as food to us, we in return need to be kind to animal.
Proverbs 12:10 "A righteous man regardeth the life of his beast; but the tender mercies of the wicked are cruel."
A good person naturally knows to be kind to animal.
Deuteronomy 22:6 "If a bird's nest happens to be before you along the way, in any tree or on the ground, with young ones or eggs, with the mother sitting on the young or on the eggs, you shall not take the mother with the young; you shall surely let the mother go, and take the young for yourself, that it may be well with you and that you may prolong your days.
If you find a nest on the ground, the mother must be in distress. She is risking her life to be still caring for the youngs, so let the mother go, but you can keep the young or the eggs.
Deuteronomy 25:4 "You shall not muzzle an ox while it treads out the grain."
Animals are under our rule. We still need to treat it with care while they are helping us. The ox is grinding the grain, it must want to eat some as work makes it hungry. Let it eat.
We are in the period of grace. As with all periods, it does not last forever. The next period is Revelation, and animal behavior will change once again.
Revelation 6:8 “
…behold, an ashen horse; and he who sat on it had the name Death; and Hades was following with him. Authority was given to them over a fourth of the earth, to kill with sword and with famine and with pestilence and by the wild beasts of the earth.”
The last few words gave a brief mention of many killed by wild beasts of the
earth. As usual, Bible condenses a lot of information into a small space. You
have to sense the that it is portraying. This is a drastic change in animal
behavior. Large wild animals are incredibly powerful, but they fear humans now.
If they lose that fear, they can easily attack humans. The verse suggests that
their behavior is now aggressive where they initiate the attack. If you think
for a moment, the large wild animals may not be the biggest problem. We have
weapons to eradicate them. Is the little ones that may be much more problematic.
There are plenty of black widow spiders and rattle snakes where I live. They
run away, and don’t bother you. If their nature changes to where they
initiate the attack, life would be dangerous. You sleep at night, and a black
widow or a rat crawls up to bite you. As Proverbs 20:28 said “a lizard
can be caught in your hands, yet It lives in king’s palaces.” These
small animals are everywhere. Aggressive small animals can be very dangerous.
If you ever find yourself at the wrong side of Revelation, do not go into the
wilderness or the ocean. Get a netting to surround the bed!!
Lastly, not all is doom and gloom. At the end of Revelation, animals once again
change nature.
Isaiah 11:6 “And the wolf will dwell with the lamb, and the leopard will
lie down with the young goat…”. There is not only peace between
nations, but peace settles over all of nature as well. Animals will no longer
kill each other. “The lion will eat straw like the ox.” Humans will
be friends again with animals “the nursing child will play by the hole
of the cobra, and the weaned child will put his hand on the viper’s den.”
“For the earth will be full of the knowledge of the Lord”
The knowledge of God is of course love as God
is love. The presence of His love brings peace over all the earth.
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