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geej
Registered Member

Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 93

Posted 9/3/2001 1:40 PM (GMT -6)

Perhaps this is a bad time to ask since I just lost one of my dogs to cancer today but...what do you think? Are there any theological reasons why one should not believe in the possibilty that their pets will be in heaven? This isn't something that was discussed during my stint at Bethel.
GJ

Lee Merrill
booted

Date Joined Jun 2001
Total Posts : 723

Posted 9/3/2001 2:43 PM (GMT -6)

I'm sorry to hear of your loss, though, I don't believe that animals have spirits (due to Isaiah 31:3, and Ps. 104:29 should probably be read "breath," not "spirit"), that is no reason to believe that pets cannot be in heaven, if they are flesh, then God can certainly remake that flesh.

PS 84:11 For the Lord God is a sun and shield; the Lord bestows favor and honor; no good thing does he withhold from those whose walk is blameless.

God bless you,
Lee

==================================================
"What we love, we shall grow to resemble" (Bernard of Clairveaux)
==================================================

Edited by - Lee Merrill on 09/03/2001 7:46:07 PM

GregBoyd
Registered Member

Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 1818

Posted 9/3/2001 3:47 PM (GMT -6)

C.S.Lewis speculated somewhere (perhaps problem of pain, in his treatment of animal suffering) that animals may receive eternal life by virtue of their relationship with humans.

In any event, we have reason to believe animals will be in the kingdom of God (lion lays down with lamb etc... plus, our original mandate including caring for the animals) so I see no reason why particular animals we love couldn't be there. At the very least, if heaven would be less heaven for a person because a certain pet was absent, I am certain Lee is right and that God would resurrect your pet to be there.

By the way, this is not a trivial question to pet lovers. I know of two people who lost their faith as children because their question "will boe boe be in heaven" was answered with an "of course not, animals don't have spirits." For both these people, coming back to faith (in one case, thirty years later!) included embracing the idea that their dear pets will indeed be with them in the Kingdom of God.

I'm sorry to hear about the loss of your pet, but you can take comfort by picturing your pet in heaven as far as I'm concerned.

Doc

"Three is the magic number, oh yes it is, it's the Magic Number" - De La Soul

trosie
Registered Member

Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 550

Posted 9/3/2001 5:09 PM (GMT -6)

GJ, I am sorry for the loss of your dog. I am sure it must be so sad.

I am not "theologically up" on this topic BUT I am an animal lover who feels totally confident that since God created animals to serve humans and bring them pleasure, in order for heaven to be paradise these dearly loved creatures will indeed be part of heaven. It makes no sense to create something that we find pleasure in on earth and then not allow us to have that same pleasure in heaven. Plus, God must find a lot of value in animals because they are used quite often as analogies throughout the scriptures.

Doc stated:"if heaven would be less heaven for a person because a certain pet was absent, I am certain Lee is right and that God would resurrect your pet to be there"

I say AMEN! Heaven would not be heaven without experincing the enjoyment of the awesome creatures that God created for us to enjoy on earth!

That's my belief in this matter

trosie

PotOnWheel
Registered Member

Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 9890

Posted 9/3/2001 6:20 PM (GMT -6)

Please forgive how this might at first seem off track. I'm aiming, though, right for the "center."

Paul talks about "that God may be all in all." Lets relate that (eventually) to pets.

God made man in a certain place in the Creation for a certain reason; man is between creation and God, sharing traits of both, and given a unique job within creation. Making animals into pets is part of that -- a special part of the "Cultural Mandate" in Genesis. Christ would have been born incarnate even without sin, because the gap between creator and creature (man) is too great for the kind of relationship God intended to have and enjoy with us. I like the Lewis idea Doc mentioned about pets being in heaven by virtue of the relationship they have with humans. So, here are a few quotes that draw a line around these ideas.

Showing our distinct uniqueness, which makes us distinctly different from our pets, but which also makes us a mediator (small M) between Creator and creation -- by divine mandate -- is this by Palamas: "For that which is in the image resides not in the body but in the intellect, which is the highest aspect of human nature. If there was something else still higher, that which is in the image would reside in that." The cultivating of relationships with animals, and the unfolding of those potentialities (I just really like these two words together!) is part of the overall plan. It didn't stop with the fall -- it goes on.

But just as man's elevation within the creation did not make us separate from it, Palamas has some words about the relationship of Christ, us humans, and the angels. (I like the way he says these.): "...since He became Son of man and took on mortality; to show how human nature was created in the image of God above all other created things, for it is so kindred to God that it can form a single hypostasis with Him, to honor even this moral flesh, so that the proud spirits should not think themselves divine because of their bodiless and seeming immortality; to unite what is separated by nature, mankind and God, since He became a mediator both human and divine nature."

Pulling it all together now, there is no call for elevation of spirit as distinctly a superior thing within Creation. The angels are not the honored with animals as no-count write-offs! Flesh was assumed by God himself. We sing at Christmas time, in "Joy to the World" "...far as the curse is found." That's in all creation, cursed through mankind's sin. But the creation groans waiting salvation same as us. Christ died for your pet. I know that my Redeemer liveth. What form we take, I don't know. I also don't know anything specific about my pets. But the relatedness of mankind and animals, I'd bet, is part of how we are.

Christ will unite redeemed Creation, mankind included, into the fellowship of divine Trinitarian Love. All in all.

'Hope this all came round together.

PotOnWheel

Triskal
Registered Member

Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 198

Posted 9/4/2001 5:43 AM (GMT -6)

My family has had a little Shih Tzu now for 11 years. That dog has pretty much become the love of our entire family. All my aunts, uncles, cousins, and the rest of my family are going to be very sad the day that dog dies. I definately do believe that pets will be in heaven. God would not deprive us of something we love that he has created.

In His Grip,
Matt

"In Him we live and move and have our being" - Acts 17:28

geej
Registered Member

Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 93

Posted 9/4/2001 12:55 PM (GMT -6)

Well, I must say, I've always felt that God would let pets...particularly dogs...go to heaven but your arguments have given me specific reasons ..rather than reasons of the heart/emotion... for believing this. Believe me, after being up all night last night caring for another violently ill dog...thinking I was going to lose another dog....this has been comforting. Luckily my Samoyed who became ill..will be better soon. My vet said that she was sick because of the stress of losing our Maltese. Sorry to bring personal stuff into this but dab gummit, pets in heaven IS PERSONAL to me. : )
Thank you, you guys, very much for your patience and thoughtful answers.
GJ

Springs
Registered Member

Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 636

Posted 9/4/2001 5:53 PM (GMT -6)

I'm sorry to hear about your loss.I hope your
samoyed is okay.

Here’s an excerpt from CS Lewis’ book, The Problem of pain.

"If nevertheless, the strong conviction which we have of a real, though doubtless rudimentary, self-hood in the higher animals, and specially in those we tame, is not an illusion, their destiny demands a somewhat deeper consideration. The error we must avoid is considering them in themselves. Man is to be understood only in his relation to God. The beasts are to be understood only in their relation to man and, through man, to God.

Man was appointed by God to have dominion over the beasts, and everything a man does to an animal is either a lawful exercise, or a sacrilegious abuse, of an authority by divine right. The tame animal is therefore, in the deepest sense, the only "natural" animal - the only one we see occupying the place it was made to occupy, and it is on the tame animal that we must base all our doctrine of beasts. 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.

…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 in which the beast acquires its selfhood – namely “The goodman – and – the good woman – and - their – beasts – in – the – good – homestead.” That whole context may be regarded as a “body” …in the Pauline sense; and how much of that “body” may be raised along with the goodman and the goodwoman, 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 of their masters.

…In other words, the man will know his dog: the dog will know its master and, in knowing him, will be itself.”

Hope you find comfort in the God of all comfort, our Lord.
Springs

"Tell, is there a man who dares to raise his hand and throw a stone,
I’d hang him high and laugh to see him die alone." –Notre dame de Paris

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