Pookie wasn’t here to greet me when I came home Tuesday evening after taking my wife to the airport. Pookie,a little flame point Siamese, showed up on our doorstep two years ago in fall, a feral kitten looking for a home. We didn’t need a third cat, but pretty soon he had captured our affection and we couldn’t think of letting him go. He is the Energizer bunny of the cat world, and is always there to give an enthusiastic greeting when he hears the car coming. This time he wasn’t there, and didn’t come when I called.

Finally, after dark, he showed up. He had wounds on his head between his ear and his eye and below his chin. He had been attacked a week earlier by some creature and we were giving him antibiotics to quell the infection from that. I hoped that the antibiotic in his bloodstream, plus the two remaining pills, would be enough to prevent any infection from this new attack. By Thursday evening I knew it wasn’t going to be enough, so I took him with me when I went to the Delisle vet clinic to work on their bookkeeping. He got one antibiotic pill there at the clinic and another that evening.

Our most lively cat had become lethargic and slow moving, yet yesterday morning he wanted to go out. I expected that he would only be out a short time, but the hours went by and no Pookie appeared. I finally called the lady on the farm next to our acreage and she said she had not seen Pookie, but that all their cats went into hiding during the day because of the dogs. Their son and his family are moving back from Alberta and the dogs are staying next door until they can move to their new home. But the dogs are penned up in the evening and then the cats come out to be fed.

Evening came, and still no Pookie. By this time I had worked through most of the grieving process, from denial to anger and finally acceptance that I probably would not see him again. Just before I went to bed, I decided to look once more. In my pyjamas, with slippers on my feet and a flashlight in my hand, I opened the door to go out . . . and in walked Pookie.

He must have found a safe place to sleep the day away and was moving  with greater ease than in the morning. I popped a pill in his mouth, made sure he had enough to eat, went to bed and slept peacefully.

I wondered about my feelings, is it right to be so emotionally affected by the supposed loss of an animal? We humans seem often to be unbalanced in our love. Some people are animal lovers, but have difficulty getting along with people. Some people profess a love for their fellow man, yet are very hardhearted toward animals. I don’t believe either extreme is pleasing to God.

Wasn’t it the shepherd’s love for his sheep that gave meaning to the Old Testament sacrifices? Shepherds knew their sheep, called them by name, took care of their needs, protected them, and loved them. God asked them to take the very best out of their flock and to offer it as a sacrifice for their sins. Don’t you suppose they were reminded again and again how serious their sins were when they had to take a sheep that they loved and offer it as a sacrifice to atone for their sins?

David went from tending his father’s flock as a shepherd to tending his heavenly Father’s flock as king. He never lost the heart of a shepherd. When he sinned by numbering the people and the death angel was sent among the people, David said: “Lo, I have sinned, and I have done wickedly: but these sheep, what have they done? let thine hand, I pray thee, be against me, and against my father’s house” (2 Samuel 24:17).
Isn’t this why David was a man after God’s own heart?

Finally, it took the sacrifice of Jesus, the only-begotten Son of God, the perfect Lamb of God, to bring an end to the slaughter of animals as atonement for sin. Don’t you suppose the Father’s heart was broken when Jesus cried out from the cross “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?

No suffering is pleasing to God, He knows every sparrow that falls. He has no pleasure in the death of sinners, yet the death of His own Son makes plain the terrible reality that sin separates us from God.