Pet loss is a deeply personal kind of grief. And it’s easily overlooked or dismissed by anyone that isn’t in the immediate family. But for that family, the reminders of the cherished life of your pet are all over the house and yard. It’s hard. It might be one of the harder parts of parenthood–to see your own kids grieve over a pet.
I had two big loves before I left for college, and they were both dogs. One was a stray I took in for a year in kindergarten before he was hit by a car and the other was the puppy my parents bought for me after him. And that one saw me through the rest of my childhood until two weeks before I moved out.
Up until this week, I thought I was not a pet person. I was mostly apathetic when my friends or family lost pets. Then our bunny was attacked by a stray cat in our yard and died 24 hours later, and it. wrecked. me, y’all. I didn’t think I had it in me to lose a whole night of sleep grieving over a bunny, but I sure did. I spent the rest of the week avoiding our backyard (where she lived out her happy life) and shedding tears over the little things that reminded me of her.
This is my first pet loss since I’ve been an adult. I also happen to be a parent, so the memories of the delight she brought to my kids feel like scrapes against my mama heart. The dynamics between adult and child pet grief are different, but the gaping hole left is still the same. Sure, time will heal this wound. There will be other pets to own. But right now, it just hurts.
What isn’t a comfort that used to be is the notion of Pet Heaven. “All pets go to Heaven,” we always like to tell the kids. Humans have always found comfort in thoughts of an afterlife during times of suffering and death. It’s fluff theology when it’s not rooted in anything but a state of emotion and a comforting thought. I know a little better than I used to, and now I want something absolutely true to hold onto–cut the fluff.
I believe in the authority of God’s holy Word: the Bible, where we learn that only humans were created in God’s image and only God’s redeemed image-bearers are made for eternal life. Animals don’t have souls.
(No matter how much we loved them and wished they did.)
And while that may be a difficult reality to grapple with, especially for our sweet kiddos, here is the best response I’ve ever heard someone give to a teary eyed child asking if their dog will be in heaven:
God knows exactly what or who you’ll need to have complete and perfect joy in Heaven. If your dog is needed, he will be there.
Isn’t that a beautiful truth? For real, the Bible isn’t explicit about what happens to animals. We are promised a New Heavens and New Earth, and if God sees fit to redeem all parts of His Creation (including animals), He will surely do it! We just don’t know how exactly it will all work out, but we can trust that He will give His children complete joy in their eternal life paid for by blood of our Savior, Jesus Christ. Not a doubt in my mind about that.
Can I share the most redeeming thought I’ve been able to dwell on in the wake of our bunny loss? Bunnies are a prey animal and they die all the time; it’s why God created them to reproduce so quickly and exponentially! So what made our bunny’s life and death so significant, then? The answer is simple: because of who loved her. Save that she was loved by us, her coming and going wouldn’t have made much of a difference in this world. Animals live and die all the time without anyone to grieve their loss. But not our bunny; no–many tears were shed, a burial was given, a slideshow was made, a popsicle stick cross dotted with azaleas marked her grave, and she is missed.
And if that isn’t just as true about us as humans: save that we are loved by our Creator Father God, our coming and going wouldn’t matter. We would have no significance. Many wander purposelessly through this life because they haven’t realized Who they were created for. But because we as His children are loved, because He knew us before we were formed in our mothers’ wombs and ordained all the days of our lives thereafter, He saw fit to send His son to live a holy life, pay the price for our sin that we could never, ever pay ourselves, and then raised Him from the dead. And that resurrected Son, Jesus, is seated at the right hand of our Father, and He’s praying for us by name even now. We are made to matter because we are so fiercely, irrevocably loved by Him.
So go on and love your pets. See that love as reflection (full of imperfections, for sure, but a reflection nonetheless) of our Father’s love for us. Share something real with your kids as they encounter grief, and don’t discount the way the Lord may use it to draw them to Himself, how He may just clear out the fog in their minds about the finality of death and sharpen the need in their hearts for the hope and assurance found in Christ alone.
The Lord is close to brokenhearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit. Psalm 34:18
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