Sunday 23rd March

I read a very touching story today about a 54 year old Zoo worker with learning difficulties who was in the final stages of terminal cancer.  His last wish was to be able to say goodbye to the animals with which he had worked for most of his adult life.   A make -a-wish- charity organised for him to be able to visit the zoo in his hospital bed and when he was wheeled into the giraffe enclosure this is what happened.

Animals are very special arent they?  Not only are many of them majestic and beautiful and amazing but they hold a special fascination for us humans.   We keep them as pets, we animate them in films, we write about them in epic tales and we quite often consider them to be better friends to us than our fellow men.

One of the things that we lost in the fall was that fellowship with the creatures God gave us with which we were supposed to live in harmony.  When the animals came to Adam to be named, the bears and lions and tigers didnt consider him as a potential meal.  Adam didnt cower in terror from the scorpions or the pumas or the alligators.  Man and animal lived in harmony because that was what God intended.

But then of course Adam and Eve sinned and ruined everything.  Not just between man and God but between man and the creation over which he had been set to rule.   Because Adam and Eve were now naked and ashamed God had to kill animals in order to give them skins to cover their nakedness.  This was the first ever shedding of blood and it was an animal which was sacrificed in order to pay for Adam and Eves sin.   Ever since that moment mankind and the rest of God's creation have had an uneasy relationship. 

This is my lovely Molly.   She is a seven year old lab. She is daft but devoted to me and we love each other dearly.  She likes nothing better than sitting in the passenger seat of the car with her head on my knee whilst I am driving. When she sees me after Ive been out or away ( even if its only for half an hour) she leaps about like a nutter and cant wait to make a huge fuss of me.  She is loyal and loving and great fun. And despite the fact that she was supposed to be a ' family dog' she is mine.   She gets on fine with everyone else, but Im the one she adores.  We understand each other do Molly and I.  :-)  

I think that our relationship with our pets and with wildlife and even the animals we watch on the television harks back to those days in the Garden  before the fall when there was harmony and peace.  When the lion lay down with the lamb and we could walk with wolves.  Something deep within us misses that - we were originally created to live in total harmony with the earth and we long for that oneness with nature.   But because of sin and selfishness we are now not only not in harmony with creation we are systematically

destroying it.  We slaughter animals for food and for sport.  We throw so much rubbish in the seas that we dont know if a 24 meter long piece of debris in the ocean is a missing plane or just a swirling raft of plastic and junk.  We chop down rainforests and destroy habitats and drive species to extinction through greed.    What a mess we are in.  Who can save us from this wretchedness?

 For the creation waits in eager expectation for the children of God to be revealed. 20 For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope 21 that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the freedom and glory of the children of God.

22 We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time. 23 Not only so, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption to sonship, the redemption of our bodies. 24 For in this hope we were saved. (Romans 8)

Lord, it is not only mankind which will benefit from your salvation plan but the whole of creation will be brought into the same freedom and glory on the day You return.  Thank you that You have a plan to redeem everything which was ruined in the fall.  Your death and resurrection have purchased freedom for the whole of creation.  Oh how we long for the time when we can once again walk with you in the cool of the day in the peace and harmony of the garden.  Forgive us for how we treat the beautiful planet You have made.  This Lent help us to be much more careful with the piece of this earth You have set us upon to tend.  Amen