Kinds
God gave us all kinds of animals and plants for our enjoyment, instruction, and sustainment. There is the giraffe kind, for instance—a kind of animal; the aardvark kind, another kind; and the horse kind, yet another kind. There is the rose kind; the daffodil kind; and the almond tree kind. The various kinds have been set by God, as we see in Genesis 1:11-12: “Then God said, ‘Let the earth sprout vegetation, plants yielding seed, and fruit trees on the earth bearing fruit after their kind with seed in them’; and it was so. The earth brought forth vegetation, plants yielding seed after their kind, and trees bearing fruit with seed in them, after their kind; and God saw that it was good.” (NASB) One thing I’ve noticed about Douglas Firs is that they all have the same seed, or cones. Douglas Firs are rather dogmatic, as it were, in producing only one kind of cone. They don’t produce the big, sharp, and heavy sugar-pine cones, but instead they have been made by God to produce a softer, more delicate variety of cone. Douglas Fir cones are quite exquisite to behold merely at the aesthetic level, but functionally speaking they also display an intricate structure that allows the cone to keep its seeds within until the proper time for propagation.
God made the sea creatures and the land creatures, after their kinds:
Then God said, “Let the waters teem with swarms of living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth in the open expanse of the heavens.” God created the great sea monsters and every living creature that moves, with which the waters swarmed after their kind, and every winged bird after its kind; and God saw that it was good. God blessed them, saying, “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the waters in the seas, and let birds multiply on the earth.” (Genesis 1:20-22, NASB)
Then God said, “Let the earth bring forth living creatures after their kind: cattle and creeping things and beasts of the earth after their kind”; and it was so. God made the beasts of the earth after their kind, and the cattle after their kind, and everything that creeps on the ground after its kind; and God saw that it was good. (Genesis 1:24-25, NASB)
Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; and let them rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and over the cattle and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them. (Genesis 1:26-27, NASB)
Thus the creatures were created by God, each after its kind, and only man was created in the image of God.
Before Noah and family entered the ark, God gave him instructions on how to take animals onto the ark in Genesis 6:19-21: “And of every living thing of all flesh, you shall bring two of every kind into the ark, to keep them alive with you; they shall be male and female. Of the birds after their kind, and of the animals after their kind, of every creeping thing of the ground after its kind, two of every kind will come to you to keep them alive. As for you, take for yourself some of all food which is edible, and gather it to yourself; and it shall be for food for you and for them.” (NASB)
James uses a series of metaphors—involving horses, forests, all kinds of animals and birds and reptiles and sea creatures, as well as fresh water and salt water, fig trees, olive trees, and grapevines—to give a crucial reminder on the importance of having a disciplined tongue. That’s a wide scope of examination to arrive at a statement about the tongue! Let’s read:
Not many of you should presume to be teachers, my brothers, because you know that we who teach will be judged more strictly. We all stumble in many ways. If anyone is never at fault in what he says, he is a perfect man, able to keep his whole body in check. When we put bits into the mouths of horses to make them obey us, we can turn the whole animal. Or take ships as an example. Although they are so large and are driven by strong winds, they are steered by a very small rudder wherever the pilot wants to go. Likewiise the tongue is a small part of the body, but it makes great boasts. Consider what a great forest is set on fire by a small spark. The tongue also is a fire, a world of evil among the parts of the body. It corrupts te whole person, sets the whole course of his life on fire, and is itself set on fire by hell. All kinds of animals, birds, reptiles and creatures of the sea are being tamed and have been tamed by man, but no man can tame the tongue. It is a restless evil, full of deadly poison. With the tongue we praise our Lord and Father, and with it we curse men, who have been made in God’s likeness. Out of the same mouth come praise and cursing. My brothers, this should not be. Can both fresh water and salt water flow from the same spring? My brothers, can a fig tree bear olives, or a grapevine bear figs? Neither can a salt spring produce fresh water. (James 3:1-12, NIV)
Now there’s a brother with a profound sense of the crucial relationship between man and the creation around him—that is to say, James keenly showcases how man can learn key godly principles from the very forests and trees and waters and animals and birds and reptiles and sea creatures that are around him. In other words, one of my favorite wildlife sightings occurred when a full-grown black bear (maybe 300 pounds or so) streaked at full speed (which looked to be about 30 miles per hour) across the road, through a meadow, and into the forest—all at a full speed that was so fast that I really couldn’t even focus my eyes on the massive and powerful creature. The bear was a blur of power and speed. On the one hand, my response was, Wow, that was neat, what a big and powerful bear! But it was James’s level of contemplation and openness to being guided by the Holy Spirit that yielded his wise words on the importance of controlling one’s tongue. To wit, in spite of the bear’s marvelous strength, man can tame it—and yet, even so, a man’s tongue often upends him. With the help of God’s Word, including James’s excellent admonitions, one can see something of God’s eternal power and divine nature (or Godhead) through His created things, so that the lesson is not only that “The bear was awesome and I wish I could pat him on the head for his great feat of running” but rather that “The bear can be tamed but my own tongue races headlong sometimes as a deadly poison.” It’s a bitter pill to swallow, but it’s true. People misspeak and they also speak badly. I have. Bad speaking can take off like a wildfire, or it can turn into a full-blown conflagration, much as a hellfire. The tongue is a “restless evil,” we learn from God’s Word. That’s probably one of the best reasons why we should speak more slowly.
As far a I know, James was not a zoologist or a botanist, but he was a keen observer of God’s creation and godly contemplation revealed to him, in the most eloquent terms, the importance of speaking carefully and not wildly. James made a sobering observation: Made in the likeness of the God of Israel, we exercise our tongues to praise God and curse men—men who themselves are also made in the likeness of the God of Israel. To draw James’s point out fully, we must see that as creatures of God, and even as ones made in His likeness, we need to let godly words out of our mouths that flow as fresh water (not poisonous words that flow as salt water). As creatures made in God’s image, we need to speak in a way that brings glory to Him, lest we ignore the creature-God relationship that we find ourselves in, and lest we bear strange fruit like a fig tree bearing olives, as it were!
Fig trees produce figs, which produce more fig trees—fig trees produce more fig trees after their kind! In the same way, we were made in the likeness of the God of Israel, and as such, we must endeavor to produce fruit that is pleasing to and consonant with the purposes of God.
In Matthew 13:47-52, Jesus spoke a metaphor that demonstrated that at the end of the age people would be sorted out for reward or punishment much as good fish and bad fish are sorted out at the end of a fishing expedition. In His words:
“Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a dragnet cast into the sea, and gathering fish of every kind; and when it was filled, they drew it up on the beach; and they sat down and gathered the good fish into containers, but the bad they threw away. So it will be at the end of the age; the angels will come forth and take out the wicked from among the righteous, and will throw them into the furnace of fire; in that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. Have you understood all these things?” They said to Him, “Yes.” And Jesus said to them, “Therefore every scribe who has become a disciple of the kingdom of heaven is like a head of a household, who brings out of his treasure things new and old.” (NASB)
Some fish are better eating than others, and the fishermen kept the good fish and threw away the bad fish. Similarly, God’s angels will take out the wicked people, throwing them into the fiery furnace of hell, where there will be “weeping and gnashing of teeth.” In this parable, we see the familiar physical sense of many kinds of fish, but more importantly, we see that there is a spiritual sense of kinds: the good kind of people and the wicked kind of people. And how does a person become one of the good kind? Follow Jesus, for He is the Lord of lords, King of kings, Redeemer, and Judge.