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All Creatures Of Our God And King (#2)
This song, “All Creatures Of Our God And King,” has a long history and originated with Saint Francis of Assisi. The inspiration for this song came from Psalms 145 and Psalms 148! Saint Francis used to “preach” to the animals of the forest! There’s a famous painting of that, which you can find in the link below, along with more of the history of the song: https://fbchurch.org/resource/hymnology-all-creatures-of-our-god-and-king
Since this song is mostly a direct praise to God, I will do a whole verse at a time. But before we start with the verses, I will give you a Bible study on references to animals in general. This will be one of the most extended articles I’ve ever written! And you will need your thinking caps, so strap them on now! I don’t know if you’ll need a box of tissues—maybe not—but this will be thought-provoking and interesting!
We can all easily tell that there will be no killing in Heaven! All one needs to do is look at Genesis chapters 1 and 2 to know that Adam and Eve ate a vegan diet!
No Killing In Heaven!
“And there shall come forth a rod out of the stem of Jesse, and a Branch shall grow out of his roots: and the spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the Lord; and shall make him of quick understanding in the fear of the Lord: and he shall not judge after the sight of his eyes, neither reprove after the hearing of his ears: but with righteousness shall he judge the poor, and reprove with equity for the meek of the earth: and he shall smite the earth: with the rod of his mouth, and with the breath of his lips shall he slay the wicked.
And righteousness shall be the girdle of his loins, and faithfulness the girdle of his reins. The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid; and the calf and the young lion and the fatling together; and a little child shall lead them. And the cow and the bear shall feed; their young ones shall lie down together: and the lion shall eat straw like the ox. And the sucking child shall play on the hole of the asp, and the weaned child shall put his hand on the cockatrice’ den. They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain: for the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea”.
Isaiah 11:1-9 KJV
I want you to read Isaiah’s chapter 65 but in the Message Bible. Please look up the KJV version of Psalms 65 and compare!
So, what is our only logical conclusion? There will be NO killing in Heaven!
Now, let’s ask ourselves if we see any similarities between what God is saying in this chapter about the Jews and what He might say about SDAs! Do you think He might say something similar? What do these two chapters have in common? Did you see it? “They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain”! When God takes the time and effort to say a complete sentence twice, anywhere in His Word, you can be sure it is VERY IMPORTANT!
What happens when a fisherman takes a fish out of the water? That’s right, the fish cannot breathe! The poor fish begins to literally “suffocate” to death! Is this going directly against this twice-repeated sentence? I have news for you: there will not be ANY hunting or fishing in Heaven! There won’t be any “meat eaters” in Heaven, either humans or animals! So, if you want, you can find justification for eating meat in the Bible…yes! But do you want to make it difficult to “get used to” your new diet in Heaven? Why not “go vegan” now and get used to the diet you will have in Heaven?
And by the way, how would you like it if one of your friends put you in an air-tight tank and pumped in pure nitrogen to suffocate you, and then cooked you for their “barbecue”? Sounds like fun, right? Should that particular “friend” go to Heaven? Well, should someone who was “hired by God” to manage the animals on this Earth be going to Heaven after needlessly torturing the defenseless animals he or she was hired to protect? (Crickets chirping) Yeah…I didn’t think so!
Why do people mistreat animals? Anger, stress, pets pooping and peeing in the house, killing for food, witchcraft (sacrifices), and general psychopathic behavior. In general…sin! Gandhi rightly observed, “The quality of a nation can be measured by how it treats its animals”! This quote is written on a plaque on the wall of Mary S. Roberts Pet Adoption Center, where we take feral cats to get “fixed” quite often! I’ve often mulled this statement over in my mind…and I think we’re not doing so well these days!
Some friendly people are around; we’ve met most of them there at Mary Roberts! Most of the people we meet, standing in line, end up spending anywhere from $50 to $150 per dog or cat that they bring, and many of them keep coming back, week after week, with more feral cats to “fix”! But I often see newly abandoned dogs roaming the streets because somebody can no longer afford to care for them!
And then there’s all the “sportsmen” (another name for a hunter) and the lavish store chains they visit! They spend thousands of dollars on fancy equipment to enhance their camping and hunting experience! You should see the size of some of these stores! The parking lot can hold well over 1,000 cars! And the parking lot is usually full! My question is, why? What is it that motivates a person to spend over $1,000 (literally the average ticket total for the store) on themselves to more fully enjoy killing some of God’s creatures?
There’s a movie I would recommend to any hunter called “Powder. ” It is about a boy with special powers who was given them when his mother was struck by lightning before he was born. My favorite scene in the movie is when the boy “mentally connects ” the hunter with the deer he just shot, as the deer is dying!
The hunter goes crazy with fear! He has an extensive rifle collection at home, which he immediately sells! The town Sheriff wonders what happened to this guy who used to be a “real gun collector”—he’s completely different!
And this is what people will think of us when someone joins the SDA church! They will think, “What happened to this person…they are completely different”!
Sometimes, people who don’t know much about the SDA church wonder why we talk about the old “sanctuary service” with all of the animal sacrifices! And why would someone like me, an animal lover, want to talk about such things? Great question!
Animal sacrifices began with Adam, Eve, and their sons and daughters! When Adam and Eve first left Eden and saw the first leaves turn brown and fall from the trees, they felt as sad to see those leaves die as people today would mourn for the loss of a son or daughter! God wanted them to find it very difficult to make their sacrifices! Why? To help motivate them to STOP SINNING! And God does the same thing today by helping us better understand what happened on the cross and what Jesus suffered to pay for our sins!
Unfortunately, by the time Jesus appeared on the scene, the Jews were so “used to” the sacrificial system that they automatically made weekly sacrifices to “assure” themselves of salvation and not for specific sins! It became just a hollow ceremony without any deep meaning! Consequently, the value of each animal’s life drained away, and they became insensitive to the pleading of the Holy Spirit! We may not be making animal sacrifices anymore, but we have a similar “insensitivity” to the value of the sacrifice that Christ made for us!
In several of the best-loved “love stories” we see in movie theaters, a hero or heroine often lays down his/her life for the one they love! But in Jesus, we have a TRUE love story about Our Creator, who loved us enough to lay down His own life, not knowing if He would ever see His heavenly Father again!
In “becoming sin for us,” Jesus could not “see beyond the portals of the tomb”! As far as His human feelings were concerned, His death on that cross was going to be “eternal death”! And yet He was loving enough to make that sacrifice for each of us, as insensitive as we might be! He could have easily removed Himself from that cross!
If He had not loved us…even in a brief moment of weakness…He could have stopped His own sacrifice, yet He chose to remain there and die! It was not nails that held Jesus there, but love for you and me! He paid the price of the “second death,” or “death without hope,” which those who reject Him will have to pay! There is NO HIGHER PRICE that Jesus could have paid!
Those who appreciate this Gift will, by how they live, show an appreciation to God for giving us His Son! They will also appreciate the beautiful animals that God has given us to enjoy…not to hunt! Are we clear? “SDA hunters” are a contradiction in terms…an oxymoron! There’s as little honesty in them as in those who disregard the 10 Commandments (which they ARE disregarding)!
Then what about the “SDA meat eaters”? Well, they may not be killing any animals themselves. Still, they are “condoning” and “supporting”(with their money) the killing of animals by other people who make money by killing domesticated animals that have no chance of escaping their doom! Tell me…how are they better? And besides, what kind of example are they setting for the rest of the world? Are they not “advertising” that it’s OK to condone and financially support murder?
At this point, I know I will get some of my SDA brothers and sisters very angry! I’m not very happy about that, but I’m OK with it! At least I’m saving some of you from getting cancer!
Did you know that eating ANY meat, regardless of the “quality” of the meat, ALWAYS eventually causes cancer? There’s a straightforward explanation for how this happens! God designed the human immune system to identify blood and tissue cells we ingest as “foreign invaders”! So, for at least 8 hours after eating any meat, your entire body is very “inflamed”! This inflammation wreaks havoc on the health of your body! It breaks down many of the normal functions of your body and exposes you to many health dangers besides cancer! Didn’t know that?
Perhaps you need to know your Creator a little bit better. (By the way, meat eating does the same thing to animals, but to a lesser degree, depending on the length of their intestines; the longer the intestines, the worse the effect)! If you’ve never read the book “Little Tyke,” you must do so!
I can hear somebody now saying, “But my doctor says I cannot get enough protein on a vegetarian/vegan diet.” Baloney! They are “misinformed”! In a small raw spinach salad, there’s enough “complete protein” to cover your body’s need for protein for the rest of the day! There’s also enough easily absorbed iron for the rest of the day! And if you’re concerned about protein, then either for breakfast or lunch, have a small serving of brown rice and any cooked beans! This combination will also give you more than enough complete protein for the day!
Did you know that any doctor in the USA who is foolish enough to warn you of the dangers of eating meat or of the dangers of drinking milk can lose his/her license to practice medicine because of the AMA (American Medical Association)? And guess who got the AMA to do that? You guessed it, the Dairy Association and the meat industry! In other words, not everything is “as it seems”!
And what else is not “as it seems”? Didn’t Jesus eat fish Himself and prepare fish for the disciples? Yes, He did! Does that mean we’ll all be eating fish in Heaven? Nope! Jesus did these things to develop a close friendship with the disciples, which was more important to Him than killing a few fish!
And remember that for most of Jesus’ life, here on Earth, He had not yet sacrificed Himself on the Cross! So, the people still sacrificed animals much of the time! They were “used to killing” and, for the most part, never recognized the One to whom all the sacrifices pointed! When Jesus died, an angel tore the veil between the Holy Place and the Most Holy Place, which signified that the heart of God had been torn by grief and that the “way to God” had once again been “restored”!
Jesus’ mission was to form a love relationship with the disciples that would last for the rest of their lives, a relationship that was stronger than death and could never be broken! And it was precisely this that Jesus accomplished! Peter, James, and John were all fishermen by trade, and Jesus created that bond with these men by using the fish they felt were “so important” to their lives! But this does NOT mean that fish are part of a healthy diet!
With all the scientific knowledge we now have about health, we have a much greater responsibility to use that information for the benefit of mankind!
If you’re “seething mad” right now at me, your anger is misdirected! You need to have a very personal conversation with God! He gave me these words to write, so you must take up this issue directly with Him! God is not afraid of a “good argument”! And remember, there’s no killing in heaven!
OK, you can take off your armor…sermon’s over! Let’s focus on the words of the song now!
“All creatures of our God and King, lift up your voice and with us sing: Allelujah! Allelujah! O burning sun with golden beam, and silver moon with softer gleam: Oh praise Him! Oh praise Him! Allelujah! Allelujah! Allelujah!”
Those whose hearts are in tune with God will have every reason to include the animals in their praise of God, their heavenly Father! And the animals will have reason to rejoice with them because they have reason to trust these followers of God!
In the study of “sonoluminescence,” you will find that the energy released is exactly the same kind of energy released by the sun! And this indicates exactly “how” Jesus was able to “speak” things into existence and also how He ignited the sun! And by the way, if the moon was not hollow and “designed by God” that way, then the Apollo astronauts would never have made it back to the main capsule from the surface of the moon! The moon would have had too much gravity! A little mistake that God planned for way in advance…at least close to 6,000 years in advance! Even more evidence that you can NEVER catch God “off guard”!
“O rushing wind and breezes soft, O clouds that ride the winds aloft: Oh, praise Him! Allelujah! O, rising morn in praise rejoice, O light of evening, find a voice. Oh, praise Him! Oh, praise Him! Allelujah! Allelujah! Allelujah!”
Being a scientist at heart, I still cannot understand why the clouds work the way they do! To me, it makes no sense that water can stay up in the air until God chooses to make it rain! But the clouds work just as God has designed them to work! When you see clouds in the sky, you are witnessing a great miracle of God! Yet many people wonder why “we don’t see any great miracles today”! But we DO! We see one of God’s best miracles almost every day! Clouds!
“Praise ye him, sun and moon: praise him, all ye stars of light. Praise him, ye heavens of heavens, and ye waters that be above the heavens. Let them praise the name of the Lord: for he commanded, and they were created. He hath also stablished them for ever and ever: he hath made a decree which shall not pass”.
Psalms 148:3-6 KJV
I believe that before the flood, there was a homogeneous layer of clouds that rested about 25 miles above the Earth and that this is one of two major sources of flood waters! The other source was water under the ground, in the form of “God-designed” underground rivers! I have seen evidence of these underground rivers in natural rock formations in the high Sierras near Lost Meadows!
There’s Just No Sound Like Water!
“O flowing waters, pure and clear, make music for your Lord to hear. Oh, praise Him! Allelujah! O fire so masterful and bright, providing us with warmth and light, Oh, Praise Him! Oh, praise Him! Allelujah! Allelujah! Allelujah!”
There’s just no sound (at least on this Earth) nearly as soothing and beautiful as a natural stream flowing over rocks! Scientists now know that the Earth is just exactly the right distance from the sun in order to maintain a “livable” temperature for the Earth! If the distance were just a “tiny bit off,” then the Earth would be either too cold or too hot to support life!
“Let all things their Creator bless, and worship Him in humbleness, Oh, praise Him! Allelujah! Oh, praise the Father, praise the Son, and praise the Spirit, three in One! Oh, praise Him! Oh, praise Him! Allelujah! Allelujah! Allelujah!”
“Praise the Lord from the earth, ye dragons, and all deeps: fire, and hail; snow, and vapours; stormy wind fulfilling his word: mountains, and all hills; fruitful trees, and all cedars: beasts, and all cattle; creeping things, and flying fowl: Kings of the earth, and all people; princes, and all judges of the earth: both young men, and maidens; old men, and children: let them praise the name of the Lord: for his name alone is excellent; his glory is above the earth and heaven. He also exalteth the horn of his people, the praise of all his saints; even of the children of Israel, a people near unto him. Praise ye the Lord”.
Psalms 148:7-14 KJV
Yes, Amen! We need to have more faith in our Creator. We know that scientists cannot be trusted—they have clearly proven this point over and over again! But the Bible can be trusted—and so can the God who wrote it through human hands!
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