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Chapter 2 – About Stewardship

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Chapter 2

Our Stewardship

Last updated: 04/10/2016

One of the socially worst crimes we hear about is animal or child abuse. The way we, as a society, are wired in our brains pushes the giant red button of empathy. As a society there is something about the abuse of those that depend on us for their well being, whether it is a child or an animal that triggers a response that dwarfs all others in comparison.¹²

In our stewardship of the physical world that we live in, it does seem as if there is a hard wiring in our brains that triggers when we see, hear about or read instances of people who violate that stewardship. Indeed, there can be said to be a direct tie to our faith and stewardship even if you are not a Christian.

Our dominion from God

In the Bible, God gave man dominion over all the animals of the sea, sky and land as we read in the NIV Bible:

Then God said, “Let us make mankind in our image, in our likeness, so that they may rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky, over the livestock and all the wild animals, and over all the creatures that move along the ground.

In Genesis 2:15, God commands Adam to “work and keep” in the garden. Keep (Hebrew shamar) means “to exercise great care over.” In the context of Genesis 2:15, it expresses God’s wish that mankind, in the person of Adam, “take care of,” “guard,” or “watch over” the garden. A caretaker maintains and protects his charge so that he can return it to its owner in as good or better condition than when he received it. That kind of sounds to me like God has given them a spirit just as he has with us humans.

When we are stewards of our domestic animals – our pets, companions – our two or four legged or even slithering pets, can we not say that we should be good stewards of these animals? We have dominion over them to keep them healthy, care for them as members of our family, and we mourn for them just as we do humans that die. Sometimes even more!

Stewardship Extends Beyond Animals

Our pets and companion animals are rather like children. They grow, understand a certain amount about the world around them, can learn many words and phrases, seem to get into trouble a lot and need to have an eye kept on them. In my worldview, I view my pets as children that have a terminal disease or condition and won’t live more than a couple of decades.

Stewardship extends beyond our care of the animal companions that we collect as we go through life. There is also stewarship of our relationships with other people as well. Can it not be said that stewardship is the taking care of relationships as well? There are 5 times that I have mourned the loss of a life more than all the others that I have lost. They are in no particular order, an uncle-in-law, a neighbor, my former father-in-law, a friend of my step son, my dog and two cats. It’s an eclectic list but not surprising considering the number of deaths I’ve dealt with in my life. The stewardship of our relations with all things is also not a new concept – all of us that are Christian have heard it time and time again, the taking care of all things which includes relationships.³

Empathy and Stewardship

For some reason, I seem to have been chosen to experience far more grief than is normal. I know that I probably am affected more than the average person by loss and am putting this outlook upon myself. However, there is also a physical component to this as well. I took a medication in the early 2000s that there was an adverse reaction to in my body. This reaction damaged my brain and seems to have modified my emotional reponses to external stimuli, thus I am a very emotional person that has been confused by the life long drumbeat of men supposed to be stoic and stone-faced in the face of loss.

“As a man thinketh, so it be unto him” – Do you know what that means? It means that if you believe strongly enough about something, it will happen for you and possibly for others also, if your belief is strong enough.

– The Enlightenment, D. Alan Holmes

This adverse reaction has also allowed me to have a greater faith in God which I view as a gift that I am utilizing to write this book. In short, I choose to believe in God and have absolute faith about it. No questions asked.

Ships in the Night

I suppose that I should have started this book with some basic understanding between you the reader and myself. The way that I view the world is how this book is written. We exist in two separate worlds, the spiritual world and the “real” world.⁴ You know the real world and frankly it has nothing to do with this book. The real world is where we are tempted to do wrong, compromise our beliefs and do whatever it is that requires us to ask for forgiveness. Frankly, it is a sick, depraved place and I hate being in it. I prefer the world of spiritual love and unconditional trust that we get with our loved ones and our animal companions.

Our spiritual world is the one inside of us, the relationship that you have with whatever version of a creator that you have. In my case, I have a Christian worldview and I have the greatest faith that what I believe is true. My experiences tell me this, just like yours tell you what you believe. This is especially important when we’re dealing with our pets and how they relate to us. The ugliest animal alive can be a thing of beauty to us.

This book is a collection of short stories and remembrances about the pets I’ve known. I believe that I have been able to know some very special animals that have been my pets for a reason. Most people have that special companion, the one that no other can replace only once or twice in our lives. I’m up to 6. There has to be a reason for this. I believe that this book and whatever comes from it is the reason.

Each one of these special companions have been a part of the lives of myself and those I’ve loved over the years and have enriched everyone they came (and continue to) in contact with.

As such, what you’re reading is as much part of a healing process for myself as well as a tool to hopefully a help others that have lost their companion and are looking for answers.

The Bible, in the book of Exodus, in the covenant, says that animals, like humans, were / are required to rest on the Sabbath just as we humans do. As you read earlier, God gave us dominion over the animals of earth, being stewards for them. God also gave us that second rule. There has to be a reason for that – God doesn’t tell us things for no reason.

But, there are no specific directions on mourning the death of an animal that is a loved one, a member of our family, having experienced everything we do as a family, seen what we have seen – the birth of children, marriages, deaths. Those of us that know our pets know that they also mourn the loss of one of their own as well as human family members.

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