People often ask me if it is hard to care for all of the animals on my hobby farm. My response is that the outdoor animals are easy. It is the indoor dogs who are the most expensive and labor intensive animals we own.
This is because our hobby farm is set up pretty nicely. We have automatic heated waterers and buy hay in thousand-pound round bales. The horses, donkey and goats just hang out in their respective pastures and do their thing. Their thing largely being wandering around and grazing. The same goes for the chickens, who just waddle around pecking at the ground. Chores are relatively quick … feed cats and chickens, check on pasture animals, done. We shovel manure from the run-in areas as needed and change out the bale every few weeks. Granted, any chores are brutal when it’s twenty below. But even then, the dogs force me outside and require more attention than the rest of the menagerie combined.
That is, until a farm animal gets sick.
I have experienced injury, death, and illness in every species I’ve owned. Lucky for me, my aunt is a brilliant vet who can triage and coach me by phone in most cases. Thanks to her tutelage, I have delivered goat kids who would have died without my assistance. I’ve rescued abandoned kittens on death’s door and forced their negligent mama cat to tend to them. I have drained nasty abscesses, coaxed a thousand pound horse to soak its injured hoof in epsom salts then wrapped it every day for weeks, pulled a bot fly worm from a wound, and stitched up a horse laceration the length of my arm. I have learned a lot and managed to nurse plenty of animals back to health. But sometimes, despite your best efforts, animals still die. Sometimes they drop dead for no good reason. It is always hard but it all goes with the territory of owning livestock.
Recently, I noticed one of my goats lying down instead of running to meet me at the gate. On close inspection, I discovered her backside was caked in diarrhea. (This is called scours in goat lingo.) I had been traveling a lot during the previous month and she had always seemed fine between trips, so I had no idea when her symptoms started. But scours can be dangerous in goats, so I separated her into her own stall and called my aunt.
Armed with my aunt’s instructions, I dispatched my husband to Fleet Farm to buy supplies. I read the directions, mixed up the remedies, called my aunt to clarify the instructions no less than five times and set out to save my goat.
This is how I found myself straddling an uncooperative goat, her backside covered in diarrhea, questioning my life choices. It took some coordination to keep my goat calm while avoiding both her poopy backside and the puddles of diarrhea on the ground as I gently administered warmed oral electrolyte solution one syringe at a time. Animals don’t necessarily appreciate your lifesaving efforts (neither do humans in the ER, but that is for another post) so she kept trying to turn her head away. The term “stubborn as a goat” is not without basis. But eventually, she seemed to understand I was there to help and quieted down.
There is something about animal illness that forces you to slow down and pay attention. There is no rushing the process when giving fluids in such small doses. And you have to hold the outcome loosely. I knew that despite all of my efforts, my goat may not make it.
Over the next week, I checked her and rechecked her. I gave medications. I gave fluids. I kept her pen clean and dry. I was told this was all I could do at this point – give supportive care and hope for the best. So that is what I did.
Once we got our routine down, she seemed to welcome my company. And in our moments together, she looked at me with trust. I know that I am anthropomorphizing by claiming she trusted me. But I am telling you, she was watching me. And something shifted in my soul.
Caring for such a vulnerable creature, helpless and totally dependent on me, called to mind essential attributes of God, my relationship with Him, and His call to care for creation and for each other.
I was reminded that God uses these little creatures to teach us. Animals can refine us and call forth our best and our worst sides. Believe me, I have lost my temper more than once caring for a belligerent animal. (I am looking at you, horse, when you kept kicking the bucket of epsom salts over when I was trying to save you.) But I also find that it brings out my best.
When I am caring for a sick animal, I access a part of my soul I sometimes neglect. The compassionate, patient, and gentle side. The quiet side. The side that depends on God and trusts Him completely just like this little animal depends on and trusts me. It is in caring for something so vulnerable and helpless that I am reminded that I, too, am vulnerable. And even when I am belligerent and ungrateful, I am cared for and loved by a patient God.
I found myself thinking about how Jesus isn’t afraid of our mess. This goat was literally covered in diarrhea and I did not recoil. (OK maybe I did a little bit.) We can approach Jesus filthy and He does not back away. He comes close, embraces us and gently cares for us. And he doesn’t leave us in our mess. He restores us, from the inside out.
We can deceive ourselves into thinking we are self sufficient. We can order our lives in predictable ways that make us forget that we are all dependent on God for everything. But we live in a broken world and, despite efforts to avoid it, despite doing everything “right,” calamity can befall any of us. And when it happens, God is there. He meets us in our need with mercy, compassion and grace. Even if our circumstances don’t change in ways we wish they would, we can trust God’s healing work.
It is no wonder that God is concerned with the relationship between humans and animals. They have so much to teach us.
Humans were commissioned to care for animals from start of creation. “Then God said, ‘Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth,’” (Genesis 1:26). But our charge extends well beyond dominion. God’s heart for animal welfare is evident throughout Scripture.
Know well the condition of your flocks, and give attention to your herds. Proverbs 27:23
Whoever is righteous has regard for the life of his beast, but the mercy of the wicked is cruel. Proverbs 12:10
God reveals himself to us in nature. Animals are an essential part of creation and help us better understand our Creator.
For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse. Romans 1:20
God’s character, power, protection and care is often described throughout Scripture using animal metaphors. Some examples include the power of a lion (Revelation 5:5, Hosea 11:10), the protection of an eagle (Exodus 19:4, Psalm 91:4), the sacrificial lamb (John 1:29, Psalm 23:1, Isaiah 40:11), and the nurture and shelter of a mother hen (Matthew 23:37). God also uses animal analogies and imagery throughout Scripture to teach us important truths about life and faith. It is such a gift that what we see, feel and understand about animals gives us a framework and language to better understand God’s kind heart, His power, His sovereignty over the rhythms of life.
Just ask the animals, and they will teach you
Ask the birds of the sky, and they will tell you.
Speak to the earth, and it will instruct you.
Let the fish in the sea speak to you.
For they all know
that my disaster has come from the hand of the Lord.
For the life of every living thing is in his hand,
and the breath of every human being. Job 12:7-10
Indeed, animals help us remember our vulnerable position before God. They allow us to marvel at God’s heart for companionship, creativity and whimsy in all of creation. They give us opportunity to reflect God’s affection and tender care. They let us bear witness to miraculous healing. And they teach us how to navigate deep sorrow.
I have grown even more fond of this gentle little creature and our quiet moments together. I am praying she recovers. I know she may not. Either way, I am grateful that she quieted my heart to reflect on the Lord’s kindness and love. I am glad God used to shape in me a heart more like His … more compassionate, more kind, more patient and more in love with all He has created.
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