World Animal Day

Happy world animal day! I do hope you're enjoying this special 24 hours. Personally, I'm reeling slightly from the disappointment that my place of work hasn't made today the suggested "bring your pet to work day". Instead I have had to leave my furry creatures at home and make do with Algenon the warehouse spider as my sole non-human companion. Such are life's challenges(!)

But leaving aside, for a moment, my personal traumas... It does occur to me that evangelical Christians rarely give much thought to the place of animals in the world. Which, considering the first job given to humans at creation was to "rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky, over the livestock and all the wild animals, and over all the creatures that move along the ground" (Genesis 1:26) is an omission that we could do with addressing.

As far as I'm aware, the mandate to care for God's creation stands firm. We are called to rule the earth in ways that reflect God's character. And we need to know what that means in practice. So what does the Bible say? 

• God made animals and he saw that they were good (Genesis 1:20-23)
• God is still active in sustaining animals, clothing even the birds of the air (Matthew 6:26)
• God is caringly sovereign over animals, knowing when they die (Matthew 10:29)
• God expects his people to treat their animals well (Proverbs 12:10, Deuteronomy 22:4)

Though that doesn't mean we should over-value animals, after all:

• They can't provide us with meaningful relationships (Genesis 2:20)
• It is ok to eat them (Genesis 9:3) and in the past it was ok to sacrifice them
• It's permissable to keep them as property (Deuteronomy 22:1-3)

So, where does that leave us? At least with some questions to ponder in our hearts, questions like:

Are we in danger of under-valuing animals by tacitly condoning unwise farming practices when we buy cheap meat? Are we in danger of over-valuing animals by seeing them as substitute family, the source of pleasure and companionship? Are we ducking our role as stewards of the earth by not speaking out against destruction of  habitats or  hunting to extinction? Or are we simply forgetting our role as stewards because we've somehow convinced ourselves that these things don't matter any more?

Do please spare a thought for the furred, scaled and winged-ones on world animal day ... please just make sure it's a biblical one.