Animals in the News: Whale Rescued then Thanking Humans, Dogs Protecting, Bears Swimming, Leopards Attacking

Leopards' habitat problems? attack story HERE -- Paco the chihuahua: very funny and cool HERE.  Polar bears swims 426 miles nonstop? HERE 

Amazing whale rescue story, found whale pics HERE.  excerpt:

 "Three whale watchers ...found themselves in the throes of an hour-long struggle to free a humpback whale from a tangled mass of fishing nets. The dramatic scene, captured on film, happened off the coast of California.

Michael Fishbach ...said: “As I swam alongside the animal our eyes met.

There were no words we could share but I wanted to let the whale know that we were there to help.

It took some effort to stay focused given the great emotion of the moment.
The sight of this large and beautiful creature trapped and so close to death was almost overwhelming.”
‘I must admit I was a bit scared because I knew the whale was frightened and fatigued but could still kill me with one panicked movement.’

... the whale was so entangled its body was weighed down by about 15 feet but with elbow grease, the trio eventually untangled one of the fins. Apparently, the whale then sensed its fin had been freed and swam away, pulling the boat with it! Soon after it returned and the men were able to work on cutting away the remaining nets until the whale was completely free.

What came next was a sweet reward I‘m sure even the whale watchers weren’t expecting:

For the next hour they watched the whale breach around 40 times and then dive down waving its tail above the water.

Michael said: ‘We all believed it was a least a show of pure joy, if not thanks. ..."

snopes on whale rescue HERE

paco!

more bears HERE

more Leopards HERE

when animals attack: HERE

Sad excerpt re: the Leopard:

...The cat died within hours, ...the people are recovering from their injuries, mostly swipes from the cat's claws.The Times of India reported on its website that villagers needed to be made more aware of how to deal with animals that strayed out of forests. It said that, in this case, villagers had not paved a way for the leopard to return to the forest. "We found that its four paws were injured as it had climbed on to a wall with glass shards. Afraid and desperate to return to the forest, it was attacking the bystanders," a forester told the paper.

"If we had insisted on providing a safe passage to animals, public wrath would have fallen upon us. In such circumstances, people are in no mood to listen to us."

The website reported that leopard lynching in the tea belt of India was common.

respect animal

quotes HERE

Predictions and prophecies

I wrote this article in early June 2008. We all know what happened in September 2008: the collapse of multi-national financial institutions and the government admission that we, um, er, had been in a recession after all since December 2007. Hmmm, what a surprise. It was an even greater surprise when I was laid off in June 2009, and in September 2009 a financial expert declared that the Great Recession was over. Well, at least HE has a job.

June 2008– Some in-the-position-to-know newsmakers, pundits, and government spokespeople look at financial indicators and say that the economy is strong, to spend your tax refund on big-ticket items, and not to listen to the pessimistic forecasters--there will be no recession in 2008. Others say that not only is a recession predicted, it is already upon us. The local newspaper has changed its editorial format to reflect the many pages of legal notices about foreclosures and bankruptcies. Many newspapers have closed their operations for lack of advertising revenue and subscription losses. Two months ago, we heard that US gasoline prices might rise as high as $4 per gallon. In California, $4 is a dimming, distant memory. We've been there and done that.

On Sunday, June 1 [2008], a religious program predicted that Fred Thompson and Hillary Clinton would receive their party nominations, and battle it out for the 2008 US presidential election (must have been taped last December before primaries!), and that people should invest everything in precious metals against the coming economic meltdown. In 2001, the Iraq war was predicted by the Secretary of Defense to last no more than five months. Geologists predict that southern California will suffer a 7.8 earthquake in our lifetime. This hurricane season will be more terrible than others because of worldwide climate change. Every time the doorbell rings, my dog predicts that very dangerous people have come calling.

With all the alarms and hype, it’s easy to sink into a funk about how awful the world is. We Christians say to each other that surely, Jesus is coming "soon." But Jesus said that two millennia ago, and it doesn’t seem particularly immediate! Meanwhile, it’s definitely more difficult to make the income stretch to meet the expenditure, and the “bad guys” work even harder in myriad ways to steal your earnings.

How was it possible that in the midst of a hurricane of several days’ duration, and the impending doom of the ship carrying him, the apostle Paul was able to have peace, and tell his fellow sufferers that all was well, to have a meal, and they’d all be saved? How could Jesus’ disciples, experienced fishermen, be expected to know that their slumbering Master would calm their raging tempest with His spoken word?

Hebrews 13 has interesting prepositions and conjunctions. The writer exhorts us to keep loving both our spiritual family and the aliens among us; to cultivate hospitality because we may be honored with the presence of the angels; to honor marriage vows (even if you’re not married, be faithful to your future spouse); and then – “Don’t love money; be satisfied with what you have. For God has said, ‘I will never fail you. I will never abandon you.’ So we can say with confidence, ‘The LORD is my helper, so I will have no fear. What can mere people do to me?’” Hebrews 13:5-6 NLT.

How do those statements track? For? So? Surprising little words. Paul used the same little words at the end of the two-week gale that threatened 276 lives on the ship. “So take courage! For I believe God. It will be just as he said.” Acts 27:25 NLT

This part of the story holds a huge surprise: cut loose your only hope and security, let it drift off and sink, and watch what God will do to your situation. 

Then the sailors tried to abandon the ship; they lowered the lifeboat as though they were going to put out anchors from the front of the ship. But Paul said to the commanding officer and the soldiers, “You will all die unless the sailors stay aboard.” So the soldiers cut the ropes to the lifeboat and let it drift away.  Acts 27:30-32 NLT

LET GO?? Be relaxed? Have peace? Put your hands down and stop struggling? That’s a lot like saying during the Force-Five tornado, “Peace, be still.”

A song lyric by Steven Curtis Chapman says, “Sometimes His voice comes calling / Like rolling thunder, / Or like driving rain; / And sometimes His voice is quiet, / And we start to wonder / If He knows our pain. / But He who spoke peace to the water / Cares more for our hearts than the waves…” *

We often attribute troubles and storms to the enemy. To the devil. But sometimes it’s God Himself in the raging hurricane or the earthquake or the fire. His voice, the same voice that created the heavens and earth, the same voice that declares our salvation, comes in a whisper, and it comes in a roar. Sometimes His glory and grace can best be revealed in what we perceive as trouble.

How was God’s glory revealed in Paul’s storm and shipwreck? Everything happened as Paul’s angel had said. No one even lost a hair in the ship’s breakup and the swim to the island. But better than that, when the poisonous snake struck Paul's hand, people witnessed God’s miraculous healing power and became believers in Jesus Christ.

Just by reading the news, we can see how predictions played out as the months and years pass, and we can make educated predictions of our own. But some predictions are not of this world: they’re spiritually discerned. That’s how we can predict with confidence during a crisis of finance or war, during a life-threatening natural disaster, that we trust in the Lord and have submitted all we are and have to Him, SO He is in control and we will have no fear FOR He is God alone.

We have faith. We trust that God’s glory will be revealed, and that we are His servants, His instruments to make peace where there is war, to create prosperity from disaster, to encourage and lift up the terrified and hopeless and abused.

We know that this world is the unreal, and that the kingdom of God is the ultimate reality. It’s all upside down and backward from what we’ve always known. The first is the last. The peace is found in the eye of the storm.

Predictions. We will have NO FEAR. All we have to know is that God will never leave us or forsake us. Ever. Because He is Immanuel, God With Us.




* His Eyes, by Steven Curtis Chapman, c. 1988.

Greater love hath no dog

Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends. You are my friends if you do what I command. John 15:13-14
This is my command: Love each other. John 15:17

When I was five, my parents adopted a miniature poodle from the Humane Society shelter. We named her Gypsy. She was gunmetal gray, with soft, wavy hair—not curly, like a poodle. Sometimes, her hair grew out all shaggy, as you see in the photo.

Although only about 25 pounds, Gypsy was a giant in spirit. She knew about 70 phrases and commands, learned with graham cracker treats. She came along on every vacation between Phoenix and northern Minnesota, where my grandparents lived. Gypsy would stick her head out the window and her pink tongue would fly in the Rambler’s slipstream. When we arrived at the lake cabin in Minnesota, Gypsy snuffled around the lake shore while we frolicked in the water.

My teenage cousin Debbie had a similar hairstyle and coloring to my mom. When Debbie flew by the dock on water skis and released the tow rope, Gypsy thought Debbie was Mom, and Mom seemed to be drowning. Gypsy, at full tilt, launched herself from the dock and paddled to Debbie to save her life. When Debbie turned around to swim back in, Gypsy discovered her mistake, gave up on the rescue, and headed back to shore, but her long fur dragged her down in the water. My dad ended up rescuing the struggling dog. Thirty years later, we still laugh at the memory.

Another time, my family was playing on a hand-pulled mono-rail car, crossing the Verde River in Arizona. My younger brother shouted with laughter, and that was enough for the mighty poodle to launch from our elderly friend’s care, diving into the swift river to save us. Again, Gypsy had to be rescued from her heroic mission.

God gave us domestic animals for love, companionship, to assist us in many ways, and to teach us lessons about our relationship with and obedience to our Master. The prophet Nathan used a pet ewe to teach David about his sin (2 Samuel 12). Many faithful animals love their masters more than their own lives, and their obedience is legendary.

Praise God for His wisdom and His gift of pets to brighten our lives and teach us about love, tenderness, obedience, and loyalty.

God in the ungodly

Richard and Ingrid are across-the-street neighbors. Richard’s mission in life is to rescue, help, feed, and protect the helpless. They captured feral cats from a junkyard, then neutered and released them. After work every evening, they took dry cat food to the junkyard and set it out for the wild cats. When the derelict fence was chained shut after the property sold, they recaptured five of the most-likely-to-succeed cats and brought them home to their other two pet cats. The frightened, feral cats are now sleek, groomed, friendly, playful, well-adjusted pets.

Puccini, a tuxedo cat, had feline urinary syndrome, and required several thousand dollars’ worth of microsurgery (50 miles away) and special handling for weeks afterward. But there was no question that Richard and Ingrid would do whatever necessary for their fur-child. Another neighbor works long hours, so Richard and Ingrid go every afternoon to let her poodle out for a walk around the block, followed by face time with them and their cats. Ingrid takes her ladder to a friend to help pick hundreds of peaches in 95F July heat.

My family always treated the autumn Thanksgiving holiday as a special “sabbath” celebration of gratefulness for God’s mercy and providence. But last year, we were not able to be together. So who invited me to share the feast with them? The neighborhood agnostics, Richard and Ingrid. Richard is a non-religious Jew from New York, and Ingrid was born and raised in Austria, so neither think of American Thanksgiving as anything other than “Turkey Day,” a time to share a meal with family, but not a time to think of God.

God is just a “good feeling” to some people. There’s the whole secular humanist, New Age, eastern philosophy touted on talk shows, bandying phrases like “the Universe will tell you what you need to know,” and “pay it forward.”

Or, as some people say on occasion, religion is just fairy stories or myths to teach great themes of human history. But the people who say that are the same people who make large donations of money and goods to charity, and willingly pay 50 percent taxes to finance social-welfare programs so that the elderly, mentally ill, and helpless can be taken care of. They often volunteer service and risk their lives to do compassionate care in refugee camps, orphanages, and AIDS clinics. They devote everything to working for peace.

This is not meant to be a political or social commentary. It’s a devotional article. So here’s the question to ponder: Can these people, who do not claim Jesus as Savior but have tender hearts, become citizens of the kingdom of God? They seem to be godless people to us, but they often exhibit the traits of one gracious God, who described His glory to Moses: “The LORD, the LORD, the compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness, maintaining love to thousands, and forgiving wickedness, rebellion and sin.” Exodus 34:6,7 NIV.

God's priorities are clear: “He has showed you, O man, what is good. And what does the LORD require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.” Micah 6:8 NIV.

Although they don’t consciously choose Jesus as Savior, those tender hearts beat with love for animals, children, the needy, the sick, the forgotten. They invite singles into their family circles. They participate in marathons for charity and sacrifice precious resources to help strangers. We should hesitate to call them godless, because we can actually recognize a spark of God-sourced, God-given, unconditional love in them.

Jesus surprised those who asked Him who would inherit eternal life. They were pretty sure that working for the church in God’s Name was sufficient payment for the chariot fare. Instead, He disappointed them by saying that some people they’d thought were surely goats, would actually be declared sheep!

“Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?’ The King will reply, ‘I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.’” Matthew 25:37-40 NIV.

Do you know agnostics? Atheists? Your own grown children who have left the church? Everyone has a passion. Everyone loves someone or something. Maybe it’s a liking for nature, expressed in hiking or camping or gardening. Perhaps it’s a love of animals or children. Or the compulsion from “the Universe” to help the homeless, the addicted, or abused. Those passions are signs that the Divine spirit is working on their hearts.

Use the entrée to build relationships. Let your witnessing and invitations to Christianity be your actions, long before your words. Be comrades with them. Be the cat-sitter, the dog-walker, the sharer of garden flowers or fruit. When their kids sell trinkets for a school fundraiser, buy something. Secretly pray for them, rescue their newspaper from the rain, and take them a plate of cookies. In doing so, you will fulfill Jesus’ commandment to love, and further bear witness that Christians aren’t fairytale kooks!

You’ve heard this statement, “Preach the gospel at all times. Use words if necessary.” It’s a modern construction of St. Francis of Assisi’s actual words, “Let all the brothers, however, preach by their deeds.”

You know a Richard or Ingrid, who say they don’t believe in God, but have merciful, generous hearts, the kind God “requires” of us. That’s the heart of flesh that the Lord can write His law and will upon. (Hebrews 8:10-12)

Recently, when I mentioned that I believed my life's course is in God's hands, Richard said he respected my statement because he's observed that I live my faith, unlike people who only "preach." Hmm, it's like he knew St. Francis's writings. And the Lord has a toe-hold on Richard!

We don’t know how God will judge them, or if He’ll lovingly reveal His grace to them in a special way before their time is up. But we’ll have made friends, grown happy relationships, and gently enhanced Jesus’ reputation among the unbelievers. That is evangelism.

You can do it without how-to books or traveling halfway around the world. And you’ll get back all the benefits you give. God is good!

Suburban Safari

Many, O LORD my God, are the wonders which You have done…If I would declare and speak of them, They would be too numerous to count. Psalm 40:5 NASB

On her back yard outings, calico cat Abby hunts for lizards and grasshoppers. When she does catch something, she brings it to me for inspection. Bugs get eaten, lizards released.

Late one night, I awoke to a shrill twittering. When I turned on the light, I saw a tiny gray field mouse cowering by the baseboard, with Abby ready to pounce. She’d caught him in the screen porch, and brought him inside to show me. The mouse looked exactly like one of Abby’s toy mousies, only this one had locomotion and a sound card!

Abby and I chased the mouse around and under furniture (with different purposes in mind). Somehow I managed to “herd” the mouse into the bathroom and stop up the space under the door. Abby wasn’t happy.

The next morning, I decided I’d better catch that mouse and put him outside. So I pushed the shower curtain over the closed shower door, and sure enough, there was a tiny thud when the mouse dropped onto the fiberglass floor. I let myself into the shower, and sat on the ledge, contemplating how to catch the mouse without hurting it. The mouse hoped his gray fur would blend with the white shower tile.

I wondered how I appear to God. God has a plan, and wants to rescue me and set me in safety, but all I can see is this moment, and this moment is frightening.

But back to the shower mouse. I sacrificed a tissue box, and slowly moved toward him. “No! No!” he squeaked. I moved in slowly. The box came down over the mouse, I tumbled him down to the bottom, and clapped a glass saucer over the top. I walked to the back yard corner and set the box down in the bouganvilla flowers. The mouse huddled in his new comfort zone, so I tipped him out of the box, into a deep pile of pink flower bracts. When I checked on him ten minutes later, he’d escaped to a world of blossoms. I saw the mouse again recently. Abby had him treed. The mouse still lives, and the cat is still frustrated!

The Lord’s thoughts toward us are of compassion and care for His children. We have nothing to fear from His rescue.