davidbowerkingwood

God’s Image at Work in You

You are a very special creation of God; as a human being you are descended from a line that was breathed into existence by the breath of God and made in God’s image. Of all creation only mankind was created in this fashion; all else was spoken into existence. In the beginning we are told of man’s responsibility to the animals; in Genesis 1:26 it is written:

“26 Then God said, “Let us make mankind in our image, in our likeness, so that they may 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.”

Today vestiges of that rule, despite the fall, may still be found as we seem to see in many a desire to love and care for animal life. What has always amazed me about animals is how each of them are truly, independently unique creations. Each of them have personalities that are one of a kind and never to be repeated; God is so extravagant in his creative process!

Abby Cat in a pensive mood

I’ve often reflected on the significance of our love for these dependent creatures; to my thinking this love gives us a picture of God’s love for us. We love them, feed them, clean up after them and delight in their presence as they sleep on whatever seems comfortable at the time or play with wild abandon. If we can love them as much as we do then God’s love for us is truly possible too since God is love.

Over the years we have been blessed to share the lives of many precious animals; I still remember the names of most of them and recall the joy they brought into our lives. When we were first married I was not a cat person so for several years we had no cats in the house; I was a dog person so we had dogs but no cats.

The Cat Invasion

There came a time when I decided a cat might be a good idea so we started looking for a cat to adopt into our family. Surprisingly there seemed to be a shortage of kittens wanting adoption and we had trouble finding one we could adopt. One day our family was driving down a back road near our house and we say a very small black head sticking up out of the weeds along the side of the road. We stopped and found a small black and white kitten that was all alone and took him home to his new forever home. We named him Charlie and he became the feline member of our family.

Charlie was one of the most remarkable cats I have ever known; he became a big tom and would insist on going out at night which we permitted. In the morning he would be back a little the worse for wear and we would take care of him. One of the most amazing things about Charlie was his amazing patience with our daughter; he would let her get away with anything and never scratched her. She would stack wooden blocks on him and then lay on top of the blocks on him; he would howl for rescue but would endure the indignities until my wife or I came to his rescue.

Charlie was the inspiration for this artwork. © Adele Bower

On other occasions our daughter would dress him in doll clothes and push him around in a little doll baby buggy she had and he would patiently sit there and endure it. Charlie’s patience did have its limits however; once we were all sitting on the front porch joined by some neighbor children and a dog had the nerve to walk down the sidewalk in front of our house. Charlie took one look at the dog and ran after it and chased it off down the street. One little neighbor boy was shocked and said, “I thought dogs chased cats!”

Charlie was with us when we moved from the Dallas area back to Houston and seemed to adjust to his new location with no problems. His nocturnal roaming’s continued, at his insistence, and we would let him back into the house the next morning. One morning he was not at the back door and we wondered where he might be; it was a Saturday morning and I had to go to work as a salesman for a home building company.

I drove down our street to a major street near our house and just happened to see a small black and white clump in the street about a half block down and knew I had to check that out. Sadly it was Charlie, he had been hit by a car and killed; I picked up his body and drove back to the house, sobbing as I returned home and told the family what had happened; we decided to bury him in a safe place. Since then no cat of ours has ever been allowed to leave the house, lesson learned!

Years have passed but cats are still a big part of our lives; we now have two cats, Abby Cat and Tomboy who are members of the family. Abby Cat was found on a used car lot and Tomboy wandered into our backyard and from there into his forever home.

Notice the smudge on Tomboy’s jaw; the picture was taken in January of 2013 while he was still an outdoor cat.

The Moral of the Story

In his grace, God has given us wonderful creatures to love and enjoy; creatures to appreciate and care for as he intended from the beginning. After Adam’s disobedience everything changed; fear and death came into God’s creation and marred the relationship man was to have had with the animals. Mankind, in his fallen state, would all too often fail to rule the animals with God’s love and as a defense, God gave animals a fear of man to help protect them from the fallen nature that had become a part of man.

In spite of the fall the vestiges of man’s rule over the animal’s remains in some as they lovingly watch over and care for the animals that have been entrusted to their keeping. As we express this love we are permitted a glimpse of God’s love for us, as his creation. The ultimate expression of that love was revealed by the human birth of God, the Son, to take on the form of a servant and die as the sacrifice for the sins of the creation.

Today, as we watch over the precious lives entrusted to our care, we are given a sense of God’s unconditional love for his children. If we, with our flawed sin natures, can love these dear lives then we can better understand God’s love for those of us who have the righteousness of Christ imputed to us as the free gift of faith in Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord.

³⁸ And I am convinced that nothing can ever separate us from God’s love. Neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither our fears for today nor our worries about tomorrow—not even the powers of hell can separate us from God’s love. ³⁹ No power in the sky above or in the earth below—indeed, nothing in all creation will ever be able to separate us from the love of God that is revealed in Christ Jesus our Lord. Romans 8:38-39