Do Animals (i.e. Domestic Pets) Live On After Death?

by Kirk Hastings (1/29/2010) According to the Bible, humans are a triune mixture of body, soul and spirit. Higher animals are apparently a combination of body and soul only. Is having a soul (i.e., possessing an individual personality and feelings, which animals obviously have) enough of a reason for God to preserve animals after death? Domestic animals are also often very loved by their human owners. If they are important to us, wouldn't that make them important to God too? Does not having a "spirit" necessarily qualify them for extinction? They obey God's plan for them instinctively, and have no sins to pay for. Thus God has nothing against them. Then why would He want to "extinguish" them after creating them?

Psalm 36:6 says, "O LORD, Thou preservest man and beast." It also says in Proverbs 12:10:

"A righteous man has regard for the life of his beast." If a righteous man cares for his "beast", is it a stretch to assume that a righteous God would too? Does God ever essentially waste life that He has created, allowing it to exist for a little while and then disappear forever? If there are animals in the new heaven and new earth (and the Bible describes that there certainly will be), then why couldn't they be the same ones that began their existence here? Why would God create new animals for the new heaven and earth when He could simply preserve the originals He has already created? God created animals even before He created human beings and He had Adam name all of them (Genesis 2:19-20). It is strongly implied that Adam gave them personal names, instead of just naming their species (after all, we still tend to give animals, especially pets, personal names). If animals are expendable, and relatively unimportant, then why did God bother to have Adam name them and treat them as individuals? During the great flood, God went to a great deal of trouble to preserve all the different animal species that he had created (as well as Noah and his family), by causing a pair of each creature to come into the ark. This strongly implies that God values animals as well as humans. Why save them, if He could just eradicate them and just re-create new ones later? It is often assumed that animals do not have spirits that can communicate with God, as humans do. But we must ask ourselves the question: how did God communicate to the animals when He told them to come to Noah and his ark (Genesis 6:20)? Also, how was Balaams donkey able to speak to Balaam (Numbers 22:28-30) after God opened her mouth? Animals were used as sacrifices in Old Testament times to cover mens' sins until Christ came. If they have no intrinsic value, then how could they be valuable enough to count as a legitimate sacrifice for human beings? (After all, Christ Himself, Who was a man and God, became the final sacrifice in their place!) We instinctively recoil when animals (especially domestic ones) are killed (run over by a car, physically abused, etc.). If we are made in God's image, then is it reasonable to assume that God recoils at this kind of thing too? If there is nothing essentially wrong with animals killing each other in the wild, then why will it be different in the new earth, when the lion will lay down with the lamb instead of killing it for food? Animals were originally created in Eden to live forever too, just as man was. And they didn't kill each other back then. God described that situation as "very good". According to the Bible it will be that way again in the new earth. Why not with the same animals? Revelation 22:15 is sometimes used to infer that animals will be excluded from heaven. But it is strongly implied in the context there that it is not referring to actual animals when it says

"outside are the dogs"; it is referring to men who act like dogs. The word "dog" is often used in scripture to refer to men who behave in a despicable way (Psalm 22:16; Isaiah 56:10; etc.).