Genesis 2:18- 19 And the Lord God said; It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him an help meet for him. And out of ground the Lord God formed every beast of the field, and every fowl of the air; and brought them unto Adam, KJV.

I believe that man’s first help meet or companion, created by God for us, was the animals. Adam was the one that noticed the animals were paired off, but there was no one for him. Translation and interpretation of the text, is what we have to take into consideration to truly comprehend, what I am about to say. Is it possible that God’s intention was to be the companion that man needed, seeing that he was and is able to provide us with all of our needs even today. He provided man with every necessity that he needed in the garden of Eden including himself. He did created us in his image and likeness; God had the angels and he give us the animals.

I recall that it was a beautiful summer’s day when I heard the door bell ringing. “Who is it?” I asked and all I can understand is that someone was in the midst of crying frantically. I didn’t hesitate, I opened the door quickly and there stood my neighbour from across the street, weeping ever so devastatingly; she could hardly speak. ” What is wrong?” I asked and  she replied, “My cat, my eleven year old cat is sick. Could your husband take me to the vet; I have no money for a taxi?” In my ignorance, I paused and thought to myself for a second, “for real, is she really carrying on like this for an animal, I thought someone died.” Hon,” I called out to my husband, “can you take Alice to the vet, something is wrong with her cat?” Scriptures tell us judge not, that ye be not judge. For with what judgment ye judge, ye shall be judged: and with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you again, Matthew 7:1-2. That is how I felt about the situation now looking back.

It is not that I didn’t like animals, I lost my first pet at an early age of four and had done my first funeral service for our (my brothers sisters and cousin) one month old puppies, that died from several picks on the head from a hen protecting her chicks. I can remember thinking that the world was coming to an end, but the adults made it seem like it was nothing, just throw them away in the bush we were told, but instead we all held hands in a circle having never experienced death before, but knew God, and so we asked him to watch and protect our pets in heaven for us. That feeling of loss, although it not being addressed as though it was important, the life of an animal gone, made me never wanting another or even getting close to,” it is just an animal, stop the crying!”

I never thought getting married and having children would change my mind. We had dog, cat, fish, ferret and birds. It all made me understand the reason for Noah’s ark and why God didn’t only save the humans, but the animals also in the renewing of the earth. They play an important role in the lives of us human beings, they are our angels and the reflection of how I believe we are to be towards God. I say this because their love is unconditional, you can discipline them and they never hold a grudge or plot  revenge against you, they are not prejudice, they move on instinct not on feelings, they know more about the world and God than we do, they are very intuitive and sensitive to our needs.

It is now nine days since the loss of the second to last of our animals; our one and only Princess Nala our cat. I believe that my actions towards her death was far more worst than I could ever imagine over, (just an animal, as I had spoken of Alice, lol). Nala and all of our animals were like my family; my children. I never thought in a million years I could ever flel such love and be so loved. It is like a part of my heart has been torn out with their passing, as much as it would be the passing of my children, that is how much they meant to me.

The death of Nala, a year after one of the birds (one is still here), hit me the hardest, because now that all my children are grown and on their own doing their own things, I still had a child to take care of, my baby, Nala and Lucky the budgie(bird). Being brought up in a large family with thirteen siblings, I have this problem with being alone, and these animal brought me great comfort. I loved the fact that I could nurture them and they still had an independence about them and the unconditional love that they give, was like a reflection of God’s presence in them specifically for me and my family. Having them, I felt like we were protected from the seen and unseen evil, we were loved unconditionally and when we thought that we were the ones protecting them, actually they were protecting us and watching out for us. Through all my life, I’ve never felt love like what these animal gave not even from humans. I believe that they know God’s secrets and if we could communicate with them they could tell us some things, believe me.

After a while of being around us human I believe that the animal can speak our language and act just like us. Somehow our ways and likeness rubs off on them. Sometimes I use to have to remind my cat that she was a cat and not a human, whenever I took to long to come home after telling her I will be back soon, when I’d reach home open the door there she is sitting at the door speaking in her language like she was telling me off for taking so long to return and it was funny because I could understand her, she would even call my name. My home is three stories high and sometimes I’d  get up from bed and leave her sleeping and go downstairs to meditate and pray and when she’d hear silence in the house and she’d realize I’m not in the shower or the kitchen all you’d hear her saying when she is looking for a human is, “hello, hello,” and I’d have to be yelling, “I am down stairs pussy cat”, and all I would hear is the thumping of her paws coming down the stairs to me. My husband would come home from a hard days work, he wouldn’t let me massage his back because he says it tickles. He would lie down on the bed on his tummy and  she would jump on the bed besides him lick his face give him all the love in the world and crawl up on his back and start to massage his back with her paw, know it is said that cats do that so they could get comfortable to lay down on a position. Nala was declawed, her front paws and she would massage his back for minutes all over and he would say, “hon, it is as if she know exactly where I am hurting to massage, ” and she would be purring as she is working on him. It was just amazing to see. She always took the time to love on anyone who was in need of love, somehow she’d know; if you were happy or sad, sick, having a bad day, you were hurting, worrying about something, you could tell her all your concerns, secrets and just look into her eyes and it made you feel like she’s got your back. I’d call her mama, mimie, pussy cateau, my baby and when she got me angry,” Nala Girl-gee lamb.” My daughter got the cat into selfies and she was a professional at it, she knew when it was time to smile for the camera.

Sometimes I think that our animal stand in the gapes for us. They sacrifice themselves for us. Whatever’s suppose to hit us it hits them instead because they are more aware than us intuitively. Whenever I hear that saying of Jesus, “what greater love a man has that he would lay his life down for a friend.” (John15:13) All of our animals died of human diseases and illnesses, and the only thing that came to my mind especially Nala, with the cancer and rare for a cat to have is, it should of been me. She was so much closer to me than anybody else, because it was me who she saw and slept with twenty-four seven, practically.

There was this one story in the bible about Balaam’s prophet who would have been killed if it was not for his donkey who spoke to him and saved his life in the book of Numbers 22:23-33 Balaam was to go and curse the Israelites for the king of the Moabites and God warned him against it and he went anyway and there stood before him an angel of the Lord that stood before him with his sword drawn in his hand and the donkey saw the angel and moved out of the way of the angel and every time the angel came the donkey would move away even making Balaam crush his foot against a wall and Balaam smote the donkey. The angel of the Lord came after Balaam and the donkey and the donkey fell down under Balaam and his anger was kindled and for the third time he smote the donkey really bad and the Lord opened the mouth of the donkey and he spoke and asked what did he do that he would smite him and Balaam said, “that he the donkey was mocking him and if he had a sword he would of killed him.” The donkey explained to Balaam that never in the years that he has been with him has he ever disobeyed and Balaam agreed, “yes.” Then the Lord opened the eyes of Balaam and he saw the angel of the Lord standing in the way and his sword drawn in his hand . He bowed down his head and fell flat on his face and the angel said unto Balaam, “wherefore has thou smitten the donkey these three times? Behold, I went out to withstand thee because thy way is perverse before me and the donkey saw me and turned from me these three times unless she had turned from me surely now also I had slain thee and save he alive.

Whenever I think of my (ours, my family) animals, I think of the story of Balaam and his talking donkey. If God would only open up the mouths of our animals, pet, angel and our family, could you just imagine what they would say to us? Some of us wouldn’t even need to see shrink, or be on medications, lol. Pets are truly angels in the form of animals sent to us by God.