Why do animals suffer if they are innocent?

For why should not God bring back the creatures that He has made, and about which He takes a far greater interest than men suppose, to a state at least as good as that in which they were created? Why should not God root out all the evil consequences that sin has brought in, physically as well as morally? Because the sin of Adam had effects far beyond his own race: all that was put under his dominion got into ruin and disorder. And this is not a mere imaginative notion of ruin, nor a fanciful exposition of Old Testament prophecy. It is the doctrine plainly and positively laid down in Rom. 8. It is written there that "the creature was made subject to vanity, not willingly, but by reason of him that had subjected the same," in plain allusion to the fall of him that was over the creature. He fell; and creation, being under the headship of Adam, fell along with him. It was he who made it subject to vanity; misery and death came in through him. For there is no reason to suppose that death would have reigned with regard to the brute creation of the Adamic world, any more than with regard to man, if sin had not entered. I am aware that the wise men of this world often speak of fossil remains which show the death of animals before man was created. Into such disquisitions I do not enter, but would only say that there was not the same state of things under Adam. Supposing now the facts and inferences of geologists to be sound — whatever living creatures may have been made and destroyed in the earth before Adam was created, scripture is entirely silent about them; and so I desire to be in expounding it. They are questions of no moral importance, and therefore a Christian need not meddle with them. I add that these theories, if true, do not contradict scripture in the slightest degree. For there is no trace of man connected with that state of things which preceded Adam; and scripture passes over it, hastening to what is immediately connected with him. When the human race begins upon the earth, the moral dealings of God are gradually developed. But man quickly fell, and then creation was degraded through its fallen head. Death, as far as regards the Adamic world, entered through the disobedience of Adam — death directly as to men, and, as a consequence, its ravages spread throughout all the lower living creation.

First of all, "the whole creation" groans and travails in pain together. This was the case when the Apostle Paul wrote these words, and it certainly is so now. In these words the fist reference is to the lower creation, which has been dragged down by the fall of man. Dominion was given to Adam over all, and by his sin he ruined all. He was, so to speak, the top link, intelligently connected with the Creator, with all other links in the chain dependent on him. When he fell, all creation fell with him; animals became wild and destructive. We may not have ears to hear the groan of the lamb or kid as the leopard pounces upon it, or of the fly as, entangled in the web, it feels the spider's bite; but the groaning is there.

What we have to suffer now as waiting our true portion, given by God, is “not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us” (Rom. 8:18). We are not alone in our waiting for the coming day, “For the earnest expectation of the creature waits for the manifestation of the sons of God.” When Adam fell, the whole creation under him fell with him, and was “made subject to vanity,” sharing the sorrow and ruin of man. Yet there is hope for the lower creation, when the curse shall be removed, and Christ shall reign in righteousness. Then shall the creation “be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God.”

Until “the manifestation of the sons of God” in glory with Christ, “the whole creation groans and travails in pain together” (Rom. 8:22). God is not insensible to the groaning of the lower creation that has come through the sin and fall of man, and has no intention to allow the groaning to continue. If God has been dishonoured by man, and by the sin and ruin that marks His fair creation, He has intervened in His own Son to take away sin and all its dreadful effects in His creation. How great must be the sound of the groan that reaches the ear of God through the sorrows and sufferings of man and beast. What pain is suffered by man and beast through disease and death and over ravages of sin! but God has planned for the removal of the groan, and the deliverance of the creature that has suffered through the fall of man.

Verse 15 tells us that the same plague of verse 12 will affect the horses, mules, camels, donkeys and any other animals of the enemy. This reminds us of God's instructions to Saul in 1 Samuel 15:3, that not only was Amalek to be destroyed, but all their animals also. Since man's sin has badly affected all animate creation, that creation suffers with him (Rom. 8:20). On this smaller scale, the animals that people have identified with their own rebellion against God will suffer the same judgment as the rebels.

“By one man,” we read (Rom. 5:12), “sin entered into the world and death by sin.” And again (Rom. 8:20-22), “the creature was made subject to vanity,” and that “the whole creation (not merely man) groans and travails together in pain until now.”

God then blessed them and told them, "Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it; and rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky, and over every living thing that moves on the earth." This was said before sin entered the scene. Some have claimed that sexual union is sinful, but this is true only outside the marriage bond. At this time Adam and Eve were to rule over other animate creatures. By sin they spoiled this, so that man does not now have the same authority over animals, though Noah was told, "the fear of you and the dread of you shall be upon every beast" etc. (Gen. 9:2). This is a mercy of God, for otherwise animals could take terrible advantage of their superior strength to terrorize men.

As the result of this, peace will descend upon the earth, so much so that all antagonism and ferocity will depart, even from the animal creation. The creature was made subject to vanity, not of its own will but by reason of the sin of Adam, and it is to be "delivered from the bondage of corruption" (Rom. 8:20-21); but the Apostle gives us a detail not made known to Isaiah, for it will be the time when not only the Shoot of Jesse will be manifested, but also the manifestation and glory of the sons of God.

It is man who is of course responsible for the blight of sin upon creation — thus man, to have glory, must first be the subject of grace. But the creation did not of its own accord — “not willingly” — “become subject to vanity”: it was not a moral question, as with man, but because of man's sin all creation has suffered; it is “by reason of” man, “who has subjected it.”

Hence it is not grace that the creation needs, but the redemption of power. So there is waiting “in hope that the creation (creature) itself also shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the liberty of the glory of the children of God.” Then the creation, which was forced into corruption by man's sin, will be identified with the glory of the children of God. “For we know that the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now.” All of creation joins in the mournful dirge: every part has been affected.

The creation was not made (as it now is) in decay, degradation, suffering, death. That God originally designed that it should be in such confusion and misery would be hard to digest; but the scriptures teach the contrary, as it shows that, whilst subjected to its present disorder on account of man's guilt and ruin, it longs not in vain for deliverance, but awaits in hope His revelation in glory. The very struggle of everything for life and against sickness witnesses that it is fallen to rise. Thus not only is the riddle of what now is solved by God's account of the past, but His word casts its own bright light on the future; for, though subjected to vanity, it was "in hope that even the creation itself shall be freed from the bondage of corruption into the liberty of the glory of the children of God." It is only by faith that any enter into the liberty of grace; and this is the portion even now of God's children under the gospel. Creation cannot of necessity know such liberty, being unintelligent even where it is animate; but even itself shall exchange the slavery of corruption by which it is now held down for the liberty of glory when the children of God are glorified. Thus all will be vindicated on God's part, and all in due order. There can be no communion between us and creation in grace; there will be in glory when the power of God deals with all creation in honour of Christ's death, whose blood has bought not the treasure only but the field, the world which contained it, yea, all things.

The creation is in subjection to the bondage of corruption with its suffering and death. It has been made subject to vanity — unlike man, the fallen head — "not of its will, but by reason of Him who has subjected [the same], in hope that the creature itself also shall be set free … into the liberty of the glory of the children of God" (verses 21, 22 N. Tr.). Creation has no place in the glory of grace but it will have in that which glory gives.

The Creator would not have it that the creation have the ascendancy over man, and so He subjected it. The period of its subjection is limited, God has His own purpose and in His own time He shall glorify the many sons. In the meantime the whole creation groans and travails together in pain until now, and we groan too as linked with it in these bodies of humiliation. If the creation awaits its deliverance, we do also — we await redemption by power. We are redeemed by blood, every judicial question which could be raised has been settled to God's eternal and righteous satisfaction, we are waiting to be freed from the weakness of our present condition. We shall yet have bodies like unto Christ's body of glory — bodies suited to the treasure which they now contain.