THE MILLENNIAL KINGDOM PETTING ZOO AND A MENAGERIE OF OTHER THOUGHTS

Becky visiting with her gorilla friend, Louisville Zoo.

 Lions and tigers and bears! Oh my! 

And if we take Isaiah 11:6-10 as a literal prophecy, in God's Kingdom this is the petting zoo!

Becky and I have been to over 40 zoos, and we've had a lot of wonderful experiences with animals. For example: 

• The first time we went to the Cincinnati Zoo, we observed the Indo-Chinese tiger exhibit. As I often do, I speak to animals, and those who don't know me may not know I have a deep voice. The tiger rumbled back his reply. Note, I did not say roar. It sounded deep but friendly, and the tiger's expression echoed that observation.
• At the Nashville Zoo, we saw the caracal exhibit. One of the four caracals paced in front of me, and rubbed the fence in front of me, like a cat would rub your leg. I walked a little further down the exhibit, and the caracal extended his pacing route so he could rub the fence in front of me. (Note - when Becky and I lived in Nashville, TN, they had two zoos open about the same time: The Nashville zoo which was a 15-20 minute drive out of Nashville's city limits and Grassmere Park where they had North American animals (mostly) in the heart of Nashville. Since then, they merged the two into The Nashville at Grassmere. The zoo I'm talking about was the out of town one.)
• We visited the Potawatomi Zoo in South Bend on a fall day when there weren't a lot of visitors. Several animals that day seemed happy to see us. Most notable were a trio of alpacas, the equivalent of a blonde, a brunette, and a red head in coloring. When we walked around the back of the enclosure, they ran so they could see us.
• Becky and I started a tradition of kissing when we were under the waterfall at Opryland Conservatory. That tradition extended to being in front of waterfalls to fountains to any running water. At the Louisville Zoo, there was a waterfall in the mountain lion exhibit, where one was watching us. Well, we kissed because of the waterfall, then turned to look at the feline. He looked absolutely shocked! I guess he never saw people kiss before.
• In this case I was more of an observer, but at the Indianapolis Zoo they had small Asian otters. A mother was holding her infant daughter so she could see them. The otters looked up and started cooing at the baby.
• Speaking of otters, at the Cincy Zoo I walked by the river otter exhibit, where an otter was lying down. I spoke to it. He looked up, saw me, and immediately ran into the water, doing typical otter tricks, and looking at me as if to say, "Am I succeeding in being entertaining?"
• We've had several nice experiences with apes, especially gorillas. The best memory was at the Louisville Zoo where one of the females was sitting near the window. Becky sat down on the ledge and they just watched each other. It seemed the gorilla got more comfortable and sat with Becky like a pair of good friends.
• Becky thought about taking a camel ride once at the Warner Park Zoo in Chattanooga, but seeing how far she'd be above the ground, chickened out. The camel, named Bradley, turned her direction, as if to say, "Was it something I said? I'm disappointed you're not riding me!"

In the Kingdom of God, I believe that the fear that exists will be gone. The passage above talks about wolves and lambs lying down together, and about children being with lions and cobras. I know it isn't true now, but I long for the time when little birds don't fly off in fear when I walk to feed a feeder. When I could have a white rhinocerous to mow my lawns.