“How unsearchable are [God’s] judgments, and His ways past finding out!”
Romans 11:33
Have you ever asked, “Why does God allow lions to kill and eat other animals?” This is a good question. When God created them, shedding of blood, death and eating flesh were unknown (Genesis 1). But Adam and Eve were warned by God that if they disobeyed His instructions, death would result. As we know from the Bible, they did disobey, and immediately they saw an example of the penalty of sin — God killed animals to provide them with coats of skins.
After sin entered into the world and after the flood, God oversaw a change in many of His creatures, allowing some to become flesh eaters — carnivores — while others remained vegetarians. This certainly was an evidence to Adam and Eve, as it is to us, of how dreadful sin is in God’s sight. Yet, in His perfect way, He saw that the needed changes were made in the appetites of these animals which were to display the penalty of death through their activities.
Happily, in a coming day, the Bible tells us the original peaceful order will return. This will be after those whose faith is in the Lord Jesus Christ have been called into heaven and after God’s rightful anger against the world that has refused His love results in His terrible judgment on them. Then an earthly people pleasing to the Lord will come forth, and the animals will be changed to be as they were when God first created them. One Bible verse, in explaining this, says, “The calf and the young lion . . . shall lie down together: and the lion shall eat straw like the ox” (Isaiah 11:67).
However, all life now is dependent on the minerals, vitamins and nutrients provided in the soil by the Creator and supplied to us in vegetation, fruits, seeds and nuts. But how do lions and other carnivores that don’t eat vegetation now get this important nutrition? The answer is another wonder of God’s ways. As a grazing animal, such as an antelope or a zebra, eats vegetation, these important necessities are deposited in its flesh and blood and are carried into the body of the carnivore that eats it. Only the Lord God, the Creator, could make such a provision.
God has not overlooked the herds from which slain animals are taken. Most of those killed animals are sickly and weak. It is a mercy that they are killed quickly rather than lingering on weak and sickly to a slow death. Also, if the herds were not reduced this way, they would increase beyond the available food supply, and starvation would result. So we see God’s wisdom in all things.
“Touching the Almighty, we cannot find Him out: He is excellent in power, and in judgment, and in plenty of justice” (Job 37:23).
ML-11/10/2002