PETS IN HEAVEN

I find it interesting that two of the most common remarks I have heard people make when the subject of heaven comes up are: “I hope my old pet will be there also” and “I expect my deceased father, mother, husband, etc. to be there to greet me.” It seems to reveal that we have not yet really set our sights on heaven at all if these are the things we are looking forward to the most.

We need to recognize right off the bat that no matter what popular writers and preachers might say regarding the subject of heaven, the Bible itself is strangely silent on the subject. Jesus was especially vague whenever his followers wanted to know details about life there. So probably the first question to tackle is whether any animals at all will be in the afterlife, let alone our deceased pets.

If you look at the visions of the present heavenly realm found in Revelation, the only animals there are the Lamb of God and the four heavenly creatures that are found around God's throne, who are described as being nothing like any animals we would recognize on earth. And on earth we encounter a dragon and weird composite creatures combining characteristics of locusts, scorpions, and horses. Obviously this is not the place to find any answers to our question.

Arguably, the only possible biblical evidence indication we have concerning the subject is found in Isaiah 11:6-9. This passage is known to many through the many paintings the Quaker preacher Edward Hicks produced in the 19^th century entitled “Peaceable Kingdom.” My own feeble attempt to illustrate this passage in collage is shown in my post on the same subject. This is the passage that contains the famous prophecy of various animal predators lying down in peace with their usual prey.

If that is true, then we may have an indication here that animals will be present in the afterlife. But even in that case, it is a far stretch to say that our dead pets will be resurrected to keep us company there. That may possibly be true, assuming that they have spiritual identities, but that would be pure speculation. As the author of Ecclesiastes says in 3:21: "Who knows whether the human spirit goes upward and the spirit of animals goes downward to the earth?"

The first time I was exposed to the concept of an interim millennial period on earth was when I visited an American Baptist congregation. The Sunday school class began worrying about how in the world carnivores could live without meat and about the horrible overpopulation of animals filling the earth if there was no death during the Millennium. They could have saved themselves the time and worry by accepting either of the two more plausible explanations:

1. As with most OT prophecy, it is written as poetry, not prose. Therefore it is filled with as much figurative as literal language. So the description in Isaiah 11 may just be a figurative way of saying that peace will reign everywhere.
   

2. Even if it is to be taken literally, then the order of events in Isaiah 11 should also be taken literally, and that means that the events in verse 6-9 will happen after the Last Judgment, not afterward. They will occur in the New Earth and New Heaven when all the rules of space and time that we now experience will no longer apply.
   

But if the passage is to be taken literally and if it refers to conditions on the New Earth, then we may have an indication here that animals will be present in the afterlife. But even in that case, it is a far stretch to say that our dead pets will be resurrected to keep us company there. That may possibly be true, assuming that they have spiritual identities, but that would be pure speculation.

The second issue is in regard to the future relationship we will have with our relatives in heaven. Parenthetically, the popular conception is that we will leave earth and live in heaven. But the concept described in Revelation 20-21 is just the opposite: heaven will come down to earth instead. God will dwell with us, not we with Him. Getting back to our family in “heaven,” there are at least two NT passages that may give us some guidance here.

Matthew 22:23-30 describes the occasion where some Sadducees try to get Jesus to admit to the impossibility of an afterlife by asking who a man will have as his heavenly wife if he had been married seven times on earth. Jesus cuts to the heart of the matter by stating that (a) they don't understand God's power to accomplish anything He wants and (b) the whole concept of marriage in the afterlife will be drastically redefined.

This same complete future redefinition of what we now perceive as family relationships is also hinted at in Mark 10:28-30. In that passage, also discussed in my post “Call No Man Your Father,” Peter wants to know what the Apostles will get in return for leaving their families to follow Him. Jesus replies with a three-part scenario. In the past, they left their family. In the present time, they have gained a much more extensive spiritual family. And in the future, they will gain eternal life.

Notice that Jesus pointedly did not say anything at all regarding the identity of our family in the future life. I would expect that just as our present church family is almost totally different from our biological family, our true family in the afterlife will be even further transformed and redefined.

Much of what I have said above may disturb you. But keep in mind that however we define heaven, it certainly will not be a place where we have less that what we possess now; we will have infinitely more, and we just have to trust God that he will provide whatever we need. The problem is that in our present condition we can only see what we now consider to be indispensable for a happy life in eternity.

My first supervisor at work confessed to me one day that he had been trying for years to get promoted into a management position, only to realize that he would have been better off remaining a researcher instead. If we look back at our lives, all of us will realize that our wants have changed drastically over the years. Sometimes we receive what we have longed for but soon tire of it and and take it for granted. Other desires are never ours, and yet we find something even better instead. So we just need to be prepared for another large paradigm shift in the afterlife when all our immature desires will become meaningless in the light of God's abiding presence and whatever He has in store for us.