One of my best investments of late has been renewing our annual zoo membership and taking my girls and our grandchildren to the zoo their parents visited as children. Some of the exhibits are different. The elephant enclosure now houses rhinos, there’s a splash pad in the garden during summer, and there is an aquarium, but the landscape is largely unchanged from three decades ago. For one dollar a day, we get free admission and activity bands good for feeding the birds and giraffes and riding the train and the carousel. We’re also allowed a certain number of guests each year.
Reading about animals in a book is interesting but learning new facts while observing a
feeding or training is quite another. Observing meerkats tussling, river otters frolicking, a brown bear burrowing or siamang monkeys howling up close and personal is not something you soon forget. The staff is knowledgeable and always willing to answer questions, even from curious toddlers. Though they’ve visited many times, the grandchildren are always eager to go again, and as my daughter says, we don’t feel like we have to do everything in a day. We can go at the baby’s pace and leave in time for naps on the drive home.
It just so happened that my daily Bible reading on the night before our most recent visit included a beautiful passage from Job rebutting one of his so called friends, Zophar, who, though he came to comfort Job in his great suffering offered little more than insult and injury. Job’s reply issued a challenge to his comforters.
““But ask the animals what God does.
They will teach you.
Or ask the birds in the sky.
They will tell you.
Or speak to the earth.
It will teach you.
Or let the fish in the ocean educate you.
Are there any of these creatures that don’t know what the powerful hand of the Lord has done?
He holds the life of every creature in his hand.
He controls the breath of every human being.
Our tongues tell us what tastes good and what doesn’t.
And our ears tell us what’s true and what isn’t.
Old people are wise.
Those who live a long time have understanding.
Wisdom and power belong to God.
Advice and understanding also belong to him.
What he tears down can’t be rebuilt.
The people he puts in prison can’t be set free.
If he holds back the water, everything dries up.
If he lets the water loose, it floods the land.
Strength and understanding belong to him.
Those who tell lies and those who believe them also belong to him.
He removes the wisdom of rulers and leads them away.
He makes judges look foolish.
He sets people free from the chains that kings put on them.
Then he dresses the kings in the clothes of slaves.
He removes the authority of priests and leads them away.
He removes from their positions officials who have been in control for a long time.
He shuts the mouths of trusted advisers.
He takes away the understanding of elders.
He looks down on proud leaders.
He takes away the strength of those who are mighty.
He tells people the secrets of darkness.
He brings total darkness out into the light.
He makes nations great, and then he destroys them.
He makes nations grow, and then he scatters them.
He takes away the understanding of the leaders of the earth.
He makes them wander in a desert where no one lives.
Without any light, they feel their way along in darkness.
God makes them unsteady like those who get drunk.”
Job 12:7-25 NIRV
https://bible.com/bible/110/job.12.7-25.NIRV
I am reminded of Jesus’s words recorded by Matthew, once a despised tax collector. Before he met Jesus, Matthew betrayed his own people extorting money for Rome and more for himself. After Jesus called him, he persuaded souls to seek God’s kingdom and he used his skill with a stylus to keep track of and record the movements and teachings of Jesus in the gospel bearing his name.
““You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor. (Leviticus 19:18) Hate your enemy.’
But here is what I tell you.
Love your enemies.
Pray for those who hurt you.
Then you will be children of your Father who is in heaven. He causes his sun to shine on evil people and good people.
He sends rain on those who do right and those who don’t.”
Matthew 5:43-45 NIRV
https://bible.com/bible/110/mat.5.43-45.NIRV
We are born into life under the sun and we depart for eternity either into the presence of God or separate from Him. The Way is set and the choice is entirely ours. The time we spend on the earth is a limited currency. Every day of our lives was written in His book before one of them came to be. (Psalm 139:16) In order to make the most of every moment in these evil days, we must know what the Lord wants. (Ephesians 5:16-17)
“Don’t live the way this world lives.
Let your way of thinking be completely changed.
Then you will be able to test what God wants for you.
And you will agree that what he wants is right.
His plan is good and pleasing and perfect.”
Romans 12:2 NIRV
https://bible.com/bible/110/rom.12.2.NIRV
God’s Word, the Bible, has been called an instruction manual but it is so much more. John called Jesus the Word who existed with God and became flesh to dwell among us. (John 1:1,14) The Word of God is alive and active. (Hebrews 4:12) God breathed life into all of scripture so that it is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting, and training in righteousness so that the people of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work, works that He planned in advance so that we should walk in them. (II Timothy 3:16, Ephesians 2:10) Knowing what God wants means knowing God by knowing His Word.
“As God’s obedient children, never again shape your lives by the desires that you followed when you didn’t know better.
Instead, shape your lives to become like the Holy One who called you.
For Scripture says: “You are to be holy, because I am holy.”
Since you call on him as your heavenly Father, the impartial Judge who judges according to each one’s works, live each day with holy awe and reverence throughout your time on earth.
For you know that your lives were ransomed once and for all from the empty and futile way of life handed down from generation to generation.
It was not a ransom payment of silver and gold, which eventually perishes, but the precious blood of Christ—who like a spotless, unblemished lamb was sacrificed for us.
This was part of God’s plan, for he was chosen and destined for this before the foundation of the earth was laid, but he has been made manifest in these last days for you.
It is through him that you now believe in God, who raised him from the dead and glorified him, so that you would fasten your faith and hope in God alone.
Now, because of your obedience to the truth, you have purified your very souls, and this empowers you to be full of love for your fellow believers.
So express this sincere love toward one another passionately and with a pure heart.
For through the eternal and living Word of God you have been born again.
And this “seed” that he planted within you can never be destroyed but will live and grow inside of you forever.
For: Human beings are frail and temporary, like grass, and the glory of man fleeting like blossoms of the field.
The grass dries and withers and the flowers fall off, but the Word of the Lord endures forever!
And this is the Word that was announced to you!”
1 Peter 1:14-25 TPT
https://bible.com/bible/1849/1pe.1.14-22.TPT
“In the beginning the Word already existed.
The Word was with God, and the Word was God.
He existed in the beginning with God.
God created everything through him, and nothing was created except through him.
The Word gave life to everything that was created, and his life brought light to everyone.
The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness can never extinguish it.
So the Word became human and made his home among us.
He was full of unfailing love and faithfulness.
And we have seen his glory, the glory of the Father’s one and only Son.
No one has ever seen God.
But the unique One, who is himself God, is near to the Father’s heart.
He has revealed God to us.”
John 1:1-5, 14, 18 NLT
https://bible.com/bible/116/jhn.1.1-18.NLT
“From his abundance we have all received one gracious blessing after another.”
John 1:16 NLT
https://bible.com/bible/116/jhn.1.16.NLT
“And from the overflow of his fullness we received grace heaped upon more grace!”
John 1:16 TPT
https://bible.com/bible/1849/jhn.1.16.TPT
“We all live off his generous abundance, gift after gift after gift.
We got the basics from Moses, and then this exuberant giving and receiving, This endless knowing and understanding— all this came through Jesus, the Messiah.
No one has ever seen God, not so much as a glimpse.
This one-of-a-kind God-Expression, who exists at the very heart of the Father, has made him plain as day.”
John 1:16-18 MSG
https://bible.com/bible/97/jhn.1.16-18.MSG
When you know what we know and you know Who we know- Jesus- it’s in our very DNA to make Him known! Just ask the animals.
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