My God and the Dead Tom Cat

(January 27, 2010) This is only incidentally a story about a dead tom cat; it is a actually a message about how my God protects those who serve Him.

 

 

 

 

We learned about the attempted rape when Misty screamed as only a female cat who has been neutered and declawed can scream when about to be raped by a huge tom cat.

 

Rushing to the door, I opened it, saw the attacking tom cat, and immediately sicced my dog Kaiser on him.

 

The tom cat fled quickly and silently, leaving us to discuss how to prevent the tom cat from returning to terrorize Misty and perhaps damage the contents of the warehouse.

 

Then, yesterday, I saw the same tom cat dead on the side of the road about a hundred yards from my campaign headquarters.

 

I had to sleep on it before I realized that my God was doing more than protecting Misty and my warehouse from a libido driven tom cat: He--my God--was teaching me something important about death--and life--and my campaign for Governor of Georgia as well.

 

For many years I have understood that the devil once had the power of death; and even today the devil keeps the whole world in bondage by using the fear of death (Heb 2:14-15). But I never really grasped how totally God has delivered those who serve Him from the devil's power of death or the devil's fear of death. I never grasped it, that is, until I realized that God was using the dead tom cat pictured above to teach me about the relationship that exists between death and those who serve, who work for, my God.

 

To understand what I'm talking about you must realize that death would have never come to anybody in our family had God not cast Adam and Even from the Garden of Eden.  Had God not stationed an angel with a flaming sword to prevent Adam and Eve from returning to the Garden, they would have returned, eaten from the Tree of Life, and received Eternal Life even though they had rebelled against God.

 

The point is obvious to those who treat the Biblical narrative as Truth: It is God who always has had the power of death.  Nobody would die except God decreed it, and everybody--perhaps except Enoch and Elijah to date--would have to die.

 

It takes some serious Bible study to understand why God gave the devil the power of death until the resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ was complete.

 

For those who look at the preceding sentence with the eyes of faith, the joy and victory and exultation of the gospel can be found. Nothing preaches more powerfully and more fruitfully than the gospel showing why Satan no longer has the power of death on this earth.

 

But the world has the utmost difficulty in understanding what God has done for all who believe in Christ Jesus.

 

A lot of that difficulty can be traced to the fact that the world knows we all die just like that horny tom cat died. Again like the horny tom cat, no one can be found today who can creditably claim to be like Enoch or Elijah and to have walked with God in such a way as to be sheltered from having to die.

 

But those who are in Christ Jesus can know they have been delivered from Satan and from bondage to his fear of death.  This we can know because we can know that because we were baptized into Jesus Christ, we were baptized into His death.  We were therefore buried with Him into death so that just as He was raised from death to live a new life, we, too, can believe we will be raised from the DEAD to live a new life, with a new body like the resurrected Body of the Lord Jesus Christ.

 

All of these things, and more, were brought to my mind by the dead tom cat who tried to rape Misty.

 

What more was brought to my mind? This: for those who serve my God, death will not come one second before it is supposed to come. And it will come according to the decree of my God, not because of the will of the devil.

 

The image of the dead tom cat on the side of the road was given to me to remind me and all the rest of us about a very important truth germane to everyone who serves my God.. Anyone who tries to invade the security of people who serve my God needs to learn the lesson of the dead tom cat. Even if we don't know how it will happen, and even if we never even think about it happening, my God can bring death to anyone who tries to interfere with those who actually work for Him. The devil has no power over the death of those who serve my God. Try as he might, the devil has lost the power of death over us, just as surely as the devil has lost our bondage to his fear of death. We, like that cloud of witnesses who have gone before us, can hear John the Revelator say what he said in Revelations 2:10 and rejoice like nobody in this world can rejoice.

 

Now will that preach, or what?

 

Neal