I wanted to write something brief that would be a short
abridgement of my lengthier articles on the Hosea 2:18 covenant
that while being an abridgement wouldn't lack any of the
essential details for those who might find my much lengthier
articles a very difficult read.
I figure that if I can give it to you in a nutshell that that
might help some readers to go back and work their way through my
more tediously detailed articles. After all, a lot of people
have very busy lives and while at an earlier time in their lives
they might have had more time to consider everything that I've
said on this website point by point, right now with their jobs,
kids, financial woes, obligations, and planning, and other
matters that take up so much mental and emotional energy, it can
be a real challenge to draw them into a tedious study. Phones
are ringing, kids are screaming, dinner's burning in the oven -
the lives of so many people give them very little free time for
in-depth Biblical or philosophical inquiry. People even go to
church with an unintentional attitude of "give it to me quick!"
This will hopefully help to meet that kind of need for a lot of
people, that even if they never have time to ever read through
my whole website - they can still "get it" - all of it - by a
carefully planned "Reader's Digest" version of it.
First of all, in your Bible, in the book of Hosea in chapter 2,
verse 18 it is promised that God would include animals in His
redemptive covenant with mankind.
Romans 8:21 and
Mark
4:30-32 are verses that indicate that this covenant would come
to the forefront of Christianity when the Body of Christ was
starting to reach maturity in the milk of God's Word and Kingdom
purposes.
I see in taking Mark 5:1-13 as an allegory and in an
obscure prophetic passage in Isaiah 30:23-26 a further
implication on the timing of what you might call the
inauguration of this covenant as happening within this
particular first decade of the 21st century.
For those who
would try to make animals in prophetic promise Scriptures out to
be a type and shadow of God's redemptive work in the lives of
Gentiles, the book of Jeremiah 31:27-28 - in the same general
context as the New Testament is being outlined - promises that
God would sow the house of Israel and the house of Judah with
the seed of both man and beast. So, the Scripture here
indicates that in addition to adding the rest of mankind to the
covenant provision, that a redemptive "way" would be opened for
animals.
Psalm 104, Joel 1:20 and other passages express a
reliance upon God on the part of animals and enough of an
"awareness" of Him to where they cry out to Him.
Jonah chapter
3 and the Levitical law of the Old Testament indicate a limited,
but genuinely present accountability of animals to God: if an
animal killed a man, it was to be put to death; clean animals
were to atone for unclean animals, etc. Many passages in the
Bible refer to animals in a way where some theologians have been
led to believe that God was strictly using them as an allegory
for His dealings with fallen man, but many if not all of these
passages can be taken quite literally in talking about
redemptive compassions and mercies on the part of the Lord
towards animals.
When the plain sense of a text makes sense and
isn't contrary to the character of God, even if it humbles or
humiliates mankind, it may well be looked to in it's literal
sense. There are ancient Christian interpretations of the Levitical food laws, such as is documented in the General
Epistle of Barnabas, that allegorize the so-called "food laws"
and they relate the Levitical dietary requirements where animals
are concerned to the types of people that one would fellowship
with or abstain from the general, common company of. It's a
pretty intricate allegory that was deduced from such Levitical
passages that are worthy of your most careful and prolonged
investigation and consideration.
The animal covenant honors God and Jesus Christ. Covenants
take precedence over historical precedence. As an example, if
two feuding families had been at each other's throats
for innumerable generations, a marriage between representatives
of those two families would still be regarded as valid,
regardless of all previous [and perhaps ongoing] family "bad
blood." Covenants renegotiate priorities and establish the
value of individuals as well as priveleges. The Biblical
history of covenants shows us that God's Covenants can be
dishonored but not invalidated by unbelievers. Though the
foundation was laid for the completion of our redemption through
the finished work of Jesus Christ on the cross and the
interpretations of the Apostle Paul, it is not necessary to
interpret Paul's comments on the eating of meat as necessarily
the Lord's expressed will against this Hosea 2:18 covenant.
Had St. Paul openly opposed the eating of flesh, it would have
put him in the same sort of predicament as if he'd opposed human
slavery deliberately, directly, and forthrightly. Persecution
against Christians would have been increased to the tenth power,
creating a blood bath that Christ didn't want to see happen on
the scale that it would have indeed happened. But the seeds of
compassion and suggestiveness were laid nonetheless in Paul's
writings for the abolishment of slavery and the liberation of
animals from their exploitation and consumption by human kind.
The same St. Paul that on a surface level reading of some of his
writings seems to call vegetarianism demonic can also be lightly
and superficially interpreted as having endorsed human slavery.
But if one were to take St. Paul's writings in a very strict
sense on the basis of how they're presented to us in the King
James Bible, it would still be clear that though his views on
human slavery might have been potentially questionable that
wouldn't have made a culturally based unconscious observation or
difference to the practice the express will of Jesus Christ.
The same can be said of so-called proof texts of St. Paul's
against the Hosea 2:18 covenant that the Holy Spirit is bringing
to light in this hour.
The whole Bible should be interpreted
consistently with Jesus Christ as it's Personification. As
illuminating as St. Paul is - perhaps more than any other writer
in the New Testament - in Philippians 3 and other passages in
his Corinthian letters, he expresses an awareness of not knowing
all of the mysteries of Christ and the plan of God. He was
still being transformed from glory to glory as much as anyone
that he was writing to and preaching to was or would ever be
through the Work of the High Priestly Ministry of Jesus Christ
through the Biblical texts that are addressed to each of our
hearts. Therefore, we may freely look to the rest of the Bible
and the guidance of the Holy Spirit for anything consistent with
the glory of God and the finished work of the Cross that Paul
may not have written letters to the Church expressing the
spiritual fullness of.
It should satisfy us to take notice of
Romans 8:21 and to
conclude that Paul either didn't recognize the full depth of
what the Holy Spirit was revealing through him in that passage
or that he may have chosen to cloak his insights into this
behind the veil of his comments on Christ reconciling all things
in the heavens and in the earth in
1Corinthians 15:22-28,
Ephesians 1:8-10,
Philippians 3:21, and
Colossians 1:15-20.
Again, not every Gospel dispensation could be fully expressed
with clarity at the time because of Christian immaturity
(1Corinthians 3:1-3, Galatians 4:19, Ephesians 4:14, Hebrews
5:11-14) and because of the intolerant political and religious
climate that would have multiplied persecutions without end had
he boldly opposed slavery, subjugation of women, and other
things nullified by the Cross of Christ. It was enough for him
to drop hints in his writings of a fuller plan of redemption
than would ever, in that life time, be embraced by the Judaizers
or many of the political leaders of his day.
When judgments and great tribulation are mentioned in the
context of God's mercy towards animals, then we may freely
conclude, as in the cases of Isaiah chapter 11,
Psalm 104, and
other passages that the specific wickedness of harming animals
is being mentioned in the context of the Lord's harsh dealings
with the wicked. The context for the Lord's judgments should
always be sought in the passages that mention judgments. This
is especially true when we're talking about the glad tidings of
great joy which is for all animals. There isn't a doctrine of
the Scriptures that doesn't at first glance have so-called proof
texts from the same Scriptures that are thought by someone
somewhere to speak very emphatically to the contrary. Many
Bible teachers wrestle to understand and to present the proper
Biblical balance, and sometimes on what they consider to be a
proper Biblical tension, on a great many subjects. Four
examples of their difficulties on harmonizing other areas of
Biblical truth would be:
- Biblical law verses God's grace in the Scriptures are
repeatedly thought to be in irreconcilable conflict by
scholars;
- a spiritual faith and grace that's independent of a works
system for justification and good fruits seems to be held up by
the same Scriptures with a faith that emphatically works out
things in the natural realm with good old "elbow grease" and
godly "fear." This seems to indicate a form of justification
by faith through a kind of self motivated means of obtaining
God's grace, in the minds of some scholars;
- in the case of free will verses predestination, again, this
is thought to be in conflict, in doubt, or in a deliberate state
of paradox by some scholars, as these subjects are presented to
us in the Bible;
- and in the case of very clear passages of the final,
ultimate annulling of all sinners from God's Creation. God's
judgments are thought by some to nullify or amend [and
abridge] God's promises of universal salvation through Jesus
Christ for all of Creation.
There are [apparent] doctrinal tensions when trying to harmonize
the whole Bible on most any subject. These can be a matter of
context; translational issues; semantics, dogmatics, cultural
issues, and punctuation; or merely present light or lack of it
on the subject in question.
Previous allowances on the part of
God because of the particular hardness of heart in the people
that God was initially addressing regarding certain matters, or
because at the given season God had other primary things in mind
that He was seeking to address or remedy is not an indication
that God was setting those allowances for the hardness of the
human heart in stone.
God saw fit to bring great harm and
tragedy into the lives of countless Gentiles in Old Testament
times in the behalf of His Jewish nation. But that didn't keep
Him from promising through the Jewish prophets that He was going
to eventually enter into a different relationship with the
Gentiles as a result of the sacrificial work and mediation
ministry of Jesus Christ. Animals receiving God's mercies tend
to be in the minds of many modern Bible teachers the same
stumbling block that the Gentiles receiving God's mercies was to
the first century Jewish theological mind.
Though it is set
clearly in Scripture there are countless traditions of
interpretation and cultural baggage that are opposed to it, and
not a short supply of books calling it a doctrine of demons.
Therefore, each person must make up their own minds as to how
faithful they'll remain to the Holy Spirit of the Scriptures and
to new light that He would seek to bring forth from the very
same exact Scriptures to remedy deeper parts of the hardness of
man's heart and to bring greater manifestations of His mercies
to light to the Glory of God the Father in Christ Jesus our
Lord!
New Biblical light isn't necessarily suspicious if it proceeds
from the Holy Spirit and it's aims are clearly the glory of God,
the glory of the Blood of Christ, and the restoration and
wholeness of God's Creation.
The right questions for potential critics to bare in mind about
this aren't about it's apparent novelty, but about whether or
not there's a segment of mankind that would find it to be Good
News of God's Goodness in Christ and a motivation to repentance,
sanctification, and good works. People aren't the worse for
believing that God's love and provisions in Christ extend beyond
themselves. On the contrary, this multiplies glory to God in
the Highest and is a tremendous basis for peace and good will
towards [and among] mankind.
There's been such a debate on the means and methods of our
salvation that too many Christians haven't thought enough upon
the sense of orderliness that St. Paul indicates that our
salvation flows to us through in terms of God's timing for the
salvation of each of us. 1Corinthians 15:22-28 is one such
passage among others that indicates what Jesus said about the
growth of the Word of God:
"first the blade, then the ear, then the full corn in the ear."
As redemption is promised but not immediately [beneficially and
tangibly] incorporated into every life at once, we may safely
assume that not all of God's purposes have fully come to light
yet - though they're each contained in the Scriptures of the
Judeo-Christian Bible. And we may each receive each new step
from the Holy Spirit through the Holy Bible when it's time for
each new step in God's grace.
The same Biblical methodologies that have been used by many for
inheriting the Biblical promises of health, prosperity, wisdom,
wholeness, and intimacy with God - through the atoning work of
Jesus Christ - are the same steps to be taken upon these
exceeding great and precious promises by which the Creation
enters into the liberties of the children of God. Faith and
prayer that's grounded and settled through careful
consideration, in-depth study, and meditation growing from the
hope inspired by these promises of God's Word [properly]
expressed through compassion, giving, fasting, and serving as an
ambassador of Jesus Christ and of His Gospel will bring to light
many marvelous signs, wonders, miracles, and gifts of the Holy
Spirit for the benefit of animals everywhere.
Our "dominion" as the book of Genesis puts it, over the rest of
the Creation is manifested/revealed spiritually and not through
exertions of the flesh. We are the gate keepers that inherit
the promises of God for all of Creation and that manifest God's
provisions through the power of the Holy Spirit in the behalf of
all life everywhere. Genuine Biblically sanctioned "dominion"
functions through our lives as we understand the plan of God for
our lives and flow in the particular age of God's grace that
we've been birthed into. We have to obey the Holy Spirit in our
day and not drown ourselves in pointless considerations of
previous epochs that we don't have complete knowledge or
understanding of, and that are totally irrelevant to God's
purposes in Jesus Christ for our day.
The lifestyle of love, courage, and bold declaration of these
promises of the Gospel once the heart is properly illuminated by
these particular promises by sincere prolonged time with God
over these sacred truths will bring great acts of deliverance
from the Hand of the Lord just the same as meditation,
submission, obedience, worship and open declaration of any other
Biblical Gospel Truth will bring it's marvelous spiritual
provisions, flavors of wisdom, and powers of deliverance and
sanctification to light. There is no such thing as spending too
much time in any particular Biblical truth so long as the
heart's been pricked and convinced that God wants you to devote
yourself to the in-depth knowledge, application, and consolation
of the particular promises of God's Word that are involved.
If it's Biblically based, Cross of Christ centered, to the glory
of Jesus Christ, and works towards a denial of self while
ministering wholeness to someone else or something else, then on
what basis would God oppose it?
Animal Gospel
