Why do animals do suffer?

[CrystalDragon]

I would personally believe that your prayer was answered just as you asked. There are many assurances in the NT that believers' prayers are answered but you have to remain in faith and not be concerned that the answer come on your time schedule. After making your petition known then rejoice that it is already done.

But it seems like prayers aren't answered more often than they are.

 

[RaymondG]

But it seems like prayers aren't answered more often than they are.

It seems that way....but this isn't the case. All prayers are answered......Man is even held accountable for every "idle" word spoken.

 

[Rescued One]

You asked a poster when they last went to heaven to viewed the emotional atmosphere present there. Have you experienced the ability to go to heaven, now, and therefore wanted to see if the poster had the experience as well? Or do you believe that heaven is for after death like most people? If the latter, how can your question have been serious?

Also, I did not find it disrespectful, nor did I try to read into what you felt or were trying to make someone else feel. I read words and laughed, so I marked it funny.

Are you being defensive? I didn't criticize your reaction.

 

[AlexDTX]

This book,
THE PROBLEM OF PAIN
by
C. S. LEWIS,

posted by AlexDTX is actually a good read.

(Thanks Alex)



The Problem of Pain, by C. S. Lewis

Even just the chapter on animal pain:

IX. ANIMAL PAIN

I don't know if the author is correct, but he's smarter than me, and has a comforting theory for those who have lost an animal. He seems to think that the animals that we have had as tame pets could live on through us. Plus the book is free, and that's just my kind of price.

Snip:

"Now it will be seen that, in so far as the tame animal has a real self or personality, it owes this almost entirely to its master. If a good sheepdog seems “almost human” that is because a good shepherd has made it so. I have already noted the mysterious force of the word “in”. I do not take all the senses of it in the New Testament to be identical, so that man is in Christ and Christ in God and the Holy Spirit in the Church and also in the individual believer in exactly the same sense. They may be senses that rhyme or correspond rather than a single sense. I am now going to suggest—though with great readiness to be set right by real theologians—that there may be a sense, corresponding, though not identical, with these, in which those beasts that attain a real self are in their masters. That is to say, you must not think of a beast by itself, and call that a personality and then inquire whether God will raise and bless that. You must take the whole context in which the beast acquires its selfhood—namely “The-goodman-and-the-goodwife-ruling-their-children-and-their-beasts-in-the-good-homestead”. That whole context may be regarded as a “body” in the Pauline (or a closely sub-Pauline) sense; and how much of that “body” may be raised along with the goodman and the goodwife, who can predict? So much, presumably, as is necessary not only for the glory of God and the beatitude of the human pair, but for that particular glory and that particular beatitude which is eternally coloured by that particular terrestrial experience. And in this way it seems to me possible that certain animals may have an immortality, not in themselves, but in the immortality [128] of their masters. And the difficulty about personal identity in a creature barely personal disappears when the creature is thus kept in its proper context. If you ask, concerning an animal thus raised as a member of the whole Body of the homestead, where its personal identity resides, I answer “Where its identity always did reside even in the earthly life—in its relation to the Body and, specially, to the master who is the head of that Body”. In other words, the man will know his dog: the dog will know its master and, in knowing him, will be itself. To ask that it should, in any other way, know itself, is probably to ask for what has no meaning. Animals aren’t like that, and don’t want to be.​

That was good! It has been years since I read the book. I forgot how good it was. I need to read it again. Thanks.

 

[LovebirdsFlying]

If animals don't have eternity then heaven won't be heaven.

You may have said something I can almost agree with. I choose to trust God's judgment, that He will do the right thing when it comes to animals. At the same time, I'm not sure who it was that said, "If dogs don't go to Heaven, I want to go wherever they went." Was it Will Rogers?

 

[AlexDTX]

All prayers are answered.

All prayers are heard, not answered. God does not answer prayers of iniquity.

 

[AlexDTX]

If animals don't have eternity then heaven won't be heaven.

Many have replied to this statement. Two things unsaid I might add. Heaven is not our home. It is a temporary dwelling place until we are glorified in immortal bodies. We will live on the Earth, not heaven forever, although I think we will have the freedom to go back and forth between the two.

Isa_11:9 They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain: for the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the LORD, as the waters cover the sea.
Isa_45:18 For thus saith the LORD that created the heavens; God himself that formed the earth and made it; he hath established it, he created it not in vain, he formed it to be inhabited: I am the LORD; and there is none else.

Years ago a sister showed this to me. Her interpretation may be wrong, but it is certainly food for thought regarding what God does with animals after they die.

Psa 104:24 O LORD, how manifold are thy works! in wisdom hast thou made them all: the earth is full of thy riches.
Psa 104:25 So is this great and wide sea, wherein are things creeping innumerable, both small and great beasts.
Psa 104:26 There go the ships: there is that leviathan, whom thou hast made to play therein.
Psa 104:27 These wait all upon thee; that thou mayest give them their meat in due season.
Psa 104:28 That thou givest them they gather: thou openest thine hand, they are filled with good.
Psa 104:29 Thou hidest thy face, they are troubled: thou takest away their breath, they die, and return to their dust.
Psa 104:30 Thou sendest forth thy spirit, they are created: and thou renewest the face of the earth.

She thinks the psalmist is saying that God takes their spirits when they die and reuses them to make new animals. As I said, food for thought.

 

[stavros388]

Here's a concern of mine regarding the suffering of animals: the Fall could not have happened literally in the way the Bible tells us it did. This we know because of all of the evidence for a billions of years old earth, and the gradual evolution of biological species, with each individual creature spreading its genes and then dying (and probably suffering to various degrees, too). This would suggest to some that God is the author of death and has been from the very beginning (on Earth, that is).

Now even though the Fall of Adam and Eve could not literally have occurred as some people believe it did, how can we reconcile the idea of some kind of Fall and the redemptive action of God with the suffering and death of animals that has been going on for many more millions of years than humans have even existed?

 

[Adstar]

Nope, "Satan" here was simply being used to mean "adversary". Not literally the devil. That's where the word "Satan" comes from "ha-Satan". Because rather than speaking for and supporting Jesus's teachings, Peter was expressing the opposite of what Jesus was teaching, therefore was Jesus's adversary.



Of course not. The Babylonian king refered to as Lucifer has nothing whatsoever to do with Satan. "Lucifer" is simply a translation of "Morning Star", which was used for many kings at the time. That includes Jesus. The person who tempted Jesus was explicitly the devil/Satan, but that has no relation whatsoever to the king of Babylon. Claiming otherwise is taking things out of context and projecting your own nonexistent one simply it's because what you've assumed without looking into it.



The writer of Revelation explicitly said it was just a message for the church leaders. And we can't be sure about the Gospels because they were written by anonymous authors for the most part, and Luke even says he wasn't there, but what he writes of in his Gospel was all hearsay. And why is it that when people say "inspired" when it comes to the Bible, they give it a completely different meaning than the word in any other context? The Bible was compiled over centuries. Some books were added, some taken out. The Trinity doctrine came together over 300 years after Jesus left the earth. The views on God, Satan, the possibility of other gods, etc. all changed explicitly throughout the Bible.

Well i think you are totally lost.. If you have no solid scripture to stand on because you think the Bible is faulty then you don't have anything solid to stand on.. You can be shifted by the thoughts of men into any vain doctrines that you heart desires to believe.. For me i will have Faith in God who can protect his message and preserve it..

 

[Hank77]

The writer of Revelation explicitly said it was just a message for the church leaders. And we can't be sure about the Gospels because they were written by anonymous authors for the most part, and Luke even says he wasn't there, but what he writes of in his Gospel was all hearsay. And why is it that when people say "inspired" when it comes to the Bible, they give it a completely different meaning than the word in any other context?

Not just inspired but inspired by God. That is the difference. Would God inspired false writings; I don't think so.

 

[RaymondG]

All prayers are heard, not answered. God does not answer prayers of iniquity.

What is a prayer of iniquity?

 

[RaymondG]

Not just inspired but inspired by God. That is the difference. Would God inspired false writings; I don't think so.

How do you know God inspired it? Did someone tell you He did? Did it say in the book that he did?

When did he stop inspiring books? Can you accept a new(recent) gospel as being inspired by God...if the writings say it is inspired, and a group of people you respect states that it is as well?

 

[CrystalDragon]

Not just inspired but inspired by God. That is the difference. Would God inspired false writings; I don't think so.

Why is it that "inspired by God" seems to have people give a definition of inspired that's completely different from any other context where the word is used? It makes no sense.

 

[AlexDTX]

What is a prayer of iniquity?

Any selfish prayer that violates the commandments of God. Prayers are made to God by Christians and pagans alike. There are many prayers by Christians that are wicked. One Christian radio commentator told the story of a believer who committed adultery saying that it was to make his wife more spiritual. Jesus said that many will think they are doing God a favor when they were serving themselves. Not all prayers are answered.

Also, even when the prayers are according to the will of God, if they are not prayed in faith, they are not answered. A double minded man can expect nothing from God. God hears all prayers, but he does not answer all prayers.

 

[RaymondG]

Any selfish prayer that violates the commandments of God. Prayers are made to God by Christians and pagans alike. There are many prayers by Christians that are wicked. One Christian radio commentator told the story of a believer who committed adultery saying that it was to make his wife more spiritual. Jesus said that many will think they are doing God a favor when they were serving themselves. Not all prayers are answered.

Also, even when the prayers are according to the will of God, if they are not prayed in faith, they are not answered. A double minded man can expect nothing from God. God hears all prayers, but he does not answer all prayers.

These are good words to speak to a crowd to keep them faithful to a doctrine. The bible states that anything asked in His name shall be given. When this fails, you can state what you just said as a reason for failure while keeping the crowd believing all the other parts of the doctrine. The most successful doctrines are the ones you cant verify until you are dead..... For the ones that can be verified now.....excuses must be made for failure if the doctrine is not truth. Truth never fails

Tell me, do you see selfishness in this statement: I believe in you Jesus, Please save ME from Hell, and I will do all that is written in the bible to save MYSELF from Hell?

How about this: Lord I feel sick, Please heal ME so I don't feel sick anymore?

Can you give me a prayer that you can pray for yourself that wont fit into your idea of selfish?

"Ask and you shall receive that your JOY may be full" Should this be taken out the bible? since asking for something, for myself or others, simple because it makes me fill joy, sounds selfish?

I assure you, all prayers are answered....most don't know how to pray, however.....and even more are too proud to ask " Teach us how to pray, Father" They would rather believe they are doing it right and give reasons, outside of themselves, for failure.

 

[Hank77]

All prayers are heard, not answered. God does not answer prayers of iniquity.

Sometimes the answer is, no.

 

[RaymondG]

Sometimes the answer is, no.

"No" is only an excuse for the ones who don't know how to pray....a very good one, I might add.

 

[Hank77]

Why is it that "inspired by God" seems to have people give a definition of inspired that's completely different from any other context where the word is used? It makes no sense.

It is not being used in a different context. 'Inspired' means in inspired. Whether something is inspired by the creativity of man's thoughts, inspired by what man sees, such as nature, etc.
i.e. "The artist was inspired by the beautiful sunset when she painted this picture."
i.e. "The veterinarian and author, James Herriot, was inspired by the animals he met in his practice."

Christians believe that the writers of the Bible were inspired by God speaking to their hearts and minds, to write what they saw and heard, what they and others experienced, what God told the prophets, etc.

 

[Hank77]

"No" is only an excuse for the ones who don't know how to pray....a very good one, I might add.

Well sometimes just like our own children we want something that is not good for us or someone else. It may be forever or only for a time.
If you have a child are you always going to answer them with a yes, or sometimes is it necessary to say no.
If we ask for what we want and then end that request with 'if it is your will God' or 'your will be done, Father', then we can consider that our prayers are always answered in the 'positive'/affirmative/yes'. Which is what Jesus did.

 

[RaymondG]

Well sometimes just like our own children we want something that is not good for us or someone else. It may be forever or only for a time.
If you have a child are you always going to answer them with a yes, or sometimes is it necessary to say no.
If we ask for what we want and then end that request with 'if it is your will God' or 'your will be done, Father', then we can consider that our prayers are always answered in the 'positive'/affirmative/yes'. Which is what Jesus did.

I would actually liken this situation to that of a child walking. We know that our children will be better off walking, so we would never tell them to stop trying to walk, no matter how many times they fall. We show them the example of walking....tell them in words "place one foot in front of the other." Then we leave them to trail and error. Some learn quickly, other fall many times before walking correctly....some start walking slow and steady, others try to run first....to their own dismay. But after they have learned....There is no where in the world they cant go.

Likewise, God gave us the laws/commandments(word) to follow, and a perfect example. Now it is up to us to try to walk until we get it right. But us adults make excuses for our walking failures. We say, maybe it is not his will or her will. Maybe I walked amiss, maybe it wasn't good for me...or it would have hurt me.....maybe walking is wrong! Some become content with just crawling along.... A child would never do this.....and except we become as little children.......

Once we learn how to pray, nothing will be impossible. And the thought of hearing "NO" will cease.....which, in turn, will make us more cautious and attentive to the words of God when asking for anything.......because we will know that we will have the deal with the consequences of our prayers, whether good or bad, and there is no "filter", blocking bad prayers and letting through good ones (a thought process, that has many people not understanding why they are blessed or cursed)....