In a culture of pet lovers, it's not uncommon for us to ask "do animals go to Heaven?" In particular, we want to know if our lost cats or dogs will be there waiting for us? Sadly, while there are those who will give a solid "yes" or "no" answer, they have to be dogmatic to do so, because the Bible does not give an explicit answer. Nevertheless, although the Bible does not explicitly tell us one way or the other, I firmly believe the answer is yes, and I believe I can at least justify this with scripture.
Using deductive reasoning
For obvious reasons, I cannot simply cite a random verse to say "Yes, animals go to Heaven". But when it comes to studying Scripture, deductive reasoning is both valid, and is even exemplified by none other than Christ Himself. In Matthew 22:23-33, Jesus uses deductive reasoning to show the folly of the Sadducees, who coincidentally questioned Him on the afterlife. This shows that we can use deductive reasoning on such topics.
Furthermore, regardless of our position, we do have to use deductive reasoning to reach it, as once again, there is no explicit answer. The Bible neither says they do, or they don't, go to Heaven, and so those who say animals do not go to Heaven are equally required to use deductive reasoning (though in my admittedly biased opinion, theirs is significantly weaker). Even if we refuse to take a position, which is actually very wise, there is a correct answer. Furthermore, it is a yes or no question; the third law of logic (law of excluded middle) therefore demands that one side has to be correct. Thus, it all comes down to whose deductive reasoning is stronger?
The God of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and the cattle of a thousand hills
I actually believe a good place to start would indeed be where Jesus took the Sadducees. Let's read that passage: "The same day came to him the Sadducees, which say that there is no resurrection, and asked him, Saying, Master, Moses said, If a man die, having no children, his brother shall marry his wife, and raise up seed unto his brother. Now there were with us seven brethren: and the first, when he had married a wife, deceased, and, having no issue, left his wife unto his brother: Likewise the second also, and the third, unto the seventh. And last of all the woman died also. Therefore in the resurrection whose wife shall she be of the seven? for they all had her. Jesus answered and said unto them, Ye do err, not knowing the scriptures, nor the power of God. For in the resurrection they neither marry, nor are given in marriage, but are as the angels of God in heaven. But as touching the resurrection of the dead, have ye not read that which was spoken unto you by God, saying, I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob? God is not the God of the dead, but of the living. And when the multitude heard this, they were astonished at his doctrine."
Here, Jesus argues that since God is not the God of the dead, but the living, and is still the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, therefore Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, must still be alive. Their mortal bodies remain on this earth awaiting the day of resurrection, but their spirits reside in Paradise, worshipping God and enjoying His very presence. Scripture likewise speaks of God's relationship with the animals. Take, for example, Psalm 50:8-13:
"I will not reprove thee for thy sacrifices or thy burnt offerings, to have been continually before me. I will take no bullock out of thy house, nor he goats out of thy folds. For every beast of the forest is mine, and the cattle upon a thousand hills. I know all the fowls of the mountains: and the wild beasts of the field are mine. If I were hungry, I would not tell thee: for the world is mine, and the fulness thereof. Will I eat the flesh of bulls, or drink the blood of goats?"
Here, God makes a point of telling the Israelites just how truly worthless their sacrifices are. His reasoning? It's all His anyway! The animals they offered to God on the altars were already His. Every animal, whether it resides in the forest, on the mountain, on the hills, even among our own livestock, is His. And so if Jesus can ask if the dead do not rise, can God be their God, we can likewise ask if dead animals do not rise, can God still own them?
Much cattle in Nineveh
And it seems He takes this ownership very seriously. Note, first, His response to Jonah. When Nineveh repented, Jonah was angry. He had hopes Nineveh would receive due penalty for its errors, but because they responded to his message by repenting, God spared them, so Jonah was angry. In response, God raised a plant to give him shade, but killed it in the night, making Jonah even more angry. However:
"And God said to Jonah, Doest thou well to be angry for the gourd? And he said, I do well to be angry, even unto death. Then said the Lord, Thou hast had pity on the gourd, for the which thou hast not laboured, neither madest it grow; which came up in a night, and perished in a night: And should not I spare Nineveh, that great city, wherein are more than sixscore thousand persons that cannot discern between their right hand and their left hand; and also much cattle?"
Though they are a mere side note, God notes the livestock of the Ninevites among the reasons for Him to spare them, using the plant as His example. Jonah was annoyed for this plant he didn't work for, so why wouldn't God consider it a tragic waste to destroy a great city He had raised? And yes, we can conclusively say that God raised it, for the Scriptures hammer this point to death. Psalm 127:1: "Except the Lord build the house, they labour in vain that build it: except the Lord keep the city, the watchman waketh but in vain." Acts 17:26: "And hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth, and hath determined the times before appointed, and the bounds of their habitation;" Proverbs 16:4: "The Lord hath made all things for himself: yea, even the wicked for the day of evil."
So the Lord labored over Nineveh. It exists because He made it so. Every brick in every building stood on top of the other because God ordained it. The people? God loved them. The cattle? Yes, even the cattle, because we see that God considered them as at least a part of the reason to not destroy Nineveh. And not just because they represent its wealth. Does He care as much about gold, silver, precious gems? No, why on earth would He? But He seems to care enough about these cattle to mention them as a reason He doesn't want to destroy Nineveh.
Worth more than many sparrows
We don't even have to imagine that God would have cared for those cattle, for Christ tells us quite explicitly Himself. In Matthew 10:29-31 and Luke 12:6-7, Jesus preaches the same message. Let's look at the Matthew quote: "Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing? and one of them shall not fall on the ground without your Father. But the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear ye not therefore, ye are of more value than many sparrows."
Fear ye not therefore, ye are of more value than many sparrows. The reason this is comforting? Not one sparrow shall fall on the ground without your Father. Lacking this element of divine care, it wouldn't be entirely comforting. "Fear ye not, for you are worth more than many grass blades!" Well, ok, but grass blades aren't exactly valuable. People tread on them, animals poo on them, God doesn't even see fit to give them the breath of life. They're worthless, so being told we're worth more than many grass blades wouldn't be all that comforting. But "fear ye not, you are of more value than these things God cares about" is quite comforting. God cares for these things, I'm worth more than them, so God cares for me when I fall too.
It's worth noting, though I confess that at this time I am not convinced by any rapture position, that there is a similar argument used to defend the pre-tribulation view of the rapture. In 1 Thessalonians 4:18, Paul says "comfort one another with these words", and yet only a pre-tribulation view is really comforting. Believing in the pre-tribulation rapture is comforting, because we know we escape the worst time in the history of the earth. "You're going to live through literal Hell on Earth" is not so comforting. I thought this was an interesting side note to throw in, especially as at least in the eyes of pre-tribbers, it may give credibility to this argument for animals in Heaven. Take this with a pinch of salt, and do with it as you will.
Righteous men care
In Proverbs 12:10, we are told "A righteous man regardeth the life of his beast: but the tender mercies of the wicked are cruel." From this, we see that caring for animals is indeed a good thing. We don't get to treat them like inanimate objects, they have rights, from the moment they come into our care to the moment they leave. Now, here's a profound statement: The Lord is more righteous than we are. Well, ok, not that profound. Even a child of the devil knows God is more righteous than we are. But what are the implications of this statement of the obvious? If the righteous man regardeth the life of his beast, and God is more righteous than the righteous man, God regardeth the lives of His beasts. As a reminder, that means all the beasts.
When we regard the lives of our beasts, we often do so permanently. We don't just stop caring when they die. To this day, I still tear up remembering my dearly departed staffies, both of whom were prematurely taken by cancer. Occasionally, I will even ask the Lord, if they are there, to give them a hug for me. I have no doubt that the Lord is more righteous than a wretch like me, and so it seems odd to think that He would regard their lives so little that they would suffer such painful deaths (well within His control, by the way), yet He would bar them from some form of afterlife. They even had great mercies. They had wonderful lives before the cancer, and even in their sufferings, they had me and my family looking after them. We even made the difficult decision to end their suffering, euthanising them when it was clear the fight couldn't be won.
Other animals receive no such mercies. Their lives are wrought with suffering. They may have abusive owners, they may be born with sickness that cannot be overcome, even their death may be at the hand of a remorseless predator. Watch any wildlife documentary and tell me most of those animals found the end of their lives enjoyable. Does the righteous God merely watch and not care? Does He ordain their torture with no plan to make things right?
Ecclesiastes and the afterlife
Indeed, a similar argument is made for our own afterlife. Ecclesiastes is an interesting book. Unlike most Scriptures, it doesn't place a heavy emphasis on the spiritual side of things. Personally, I think it reads as if it was written by an atheist, which might explain why even Richard Dawkins says it's his favorite book of the Bible. I am not alone in this opinion. Critics of the Bible, and even heretics within Judeo-Christendom, point out that it seems to deny the afterlife.
The simplest answer to this is it seems so worldly because it is. It repeats the phrase "under the sun", which of course God is not. At least, not in the sense of Ecclesiastes. Spiritual things are transcendent, not being limited to our tiny planet, as a corpse is. When man and beast die, their corpses stay on the earth, and that is why "...the living know that they shall die: but the dead know not any thing, neither have they any more a reward; for the memory of them is forgotten." (Ecclesiastes 9:5).
But another answer is to look to the end of Ecclesiastes, where we read "Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter: Fear God, and keep his commandments: for this is the whole duty of man. For God shall bring every work into judgment, with every secret thing, whether it be good, or whether it be evil." (Ecclesiastes 12:13-14). From this, there are only two logical conclusions.
The first is that God is unjust. This conclusion, which is of course repugnant, can be drawn from the apparent absence of justice in the world. Every work is not brought into judgment here. The wicked often prosper, sometimes because of their wickedness. The righteous suffer, sometimes even because of their righteousness. If God will bring every work, and even secret things into judgment, the only logical conclusion is He doesn't do it here. When the wicked die, they receive due penalty in Hell. When the righteous die, they receive due reward in Heaven. How different is this argument from the one I made earlier? Animals suffer injustice too, so is it not logical that they should receive justice in the afterlife? And since they technically cannot sin, does logic not dictate there is only reward available?
The fall and its reversal
Further evidence of this logic comes from God's promises to make all things new. In the beginning, God declared His creation, as yet undefiled by sin and thus devoid of death (Romans 5:12), "very good" (Genesis 1:31). Everything ate plants, and only plants (Genesis 1:30 cf. 9:3). During the millennial reign, this order will be somewhat restored, as predator and prey will peacefully coexist. "The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid; and the calf and the young lion and the fatling together; and a little child shall lead them. And the cow and the bear shall feed; their young ones shall lie down together: and the lion shall eat straw like the ox. And the sucking child shall play on the hole of the asp, and the weaned child shall put his hand on the cockatrice' den. They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain: for the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea." (Isaiah 11:7-9). "The wolf and the lamb shall feed together, and the lion shall eat straw like the bullock: and dust shall be the serpent's meat. They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain, saith the Lord." (Isaiah 65:25).
And this is just as history comes to a close. This will not be the end. As Peter tells us, the very elements will melt in a fervent heat (2 Peter 3:10-12). After that? God will make all things new (Revelation 21:5). Now of course, we know this doesn't cover everything. Marriage, for example, will not be in Heaven (Matthew 22:30; Mark 12:25; Luke 20:35-36). We know this because we're explicitly told as much. But we can figure out the reason for this: Why would we even need marriage, since we will all have a very deep relationship with each other, and with God? And we would have no need to reproduce, either. So marriage is logically redundant, even being made hopelessly complicated by questions such as the one posed by the Sadducees.
But we are not explicitly told there will be no animals. In fact, given that Christ Himself will be returning on a horse (Revelation 19:11), it seems all but explicit that there will be. I even feel it would be particularly poetic if this white horse was either the very first stallion to rise from the dirt in Eden, or the resurrected colt upon whom He rode. But let's not be too speculative.
Nevertheless, we are not told there will be no animals, we see no reason to remove the animals, we have umpteen other reasons to believe God cares for, and would likely raise, the animals, the animals are called "very good", and were initially immortal prior to the fall. With all of this in mind, why would we assume "I make all things new" would not include the animals? Why would He not restore such an integral part of His original creation?
Crumbs for the dogs
And why indeed? For Scripture tells us the whole creation was affected by the fall, and the whole creation waits for the restoration! "For the earnest expectation of the creature waiteth for the manifestation of the sons of God. For the creature was made subject to vanity, not willingly, but by reason of him who hath subjected the same in hope, Because the creature itself also shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God. For we know that the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now. And not only they, but ourselves also, which have the firstfruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body." (Romans 8:19-23).
Now pay attention to an encounter Jesus had with a gentile woman, whose daughter was possessed: "Then Jesus went thence, and departed into the coasts of Tyre and Sidon. And, behold, a woman of Canaan came out of the same coasts, and cried unto him, saying, Have mercy on me, O Lord, thou son of David; my daughter is grievously vexed with a devil. But he answered her not a word. And his disciples came and besought him, saying, Send her away; for she crieth after us. But he answered and said, I am not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel. Then came she and worshipped him, saying, Lord, help me. But he answered and said, It is not meet to take the children's bread, and to cast it to dogs. And she said, Truth, Lord: yet the dogs eat of the crumbs which fall from their masters' table. Then Jesus answered and said unto her, O woman, great is thy faith: be it unto thee even as thou wilt. And her daughter was made whole from that very hour."
When it comes to the restoration, it is clear that we are the primary beneficiaries. But why should that mean animals do not "eat the crumbs", as even this Gentile woman did when Christ was sent primarily to the lost sheep of the House of Israel? I find it strange to assume that God would care so much as to restore the heavens and the Earth (Revelation 21:1), Jerusalem (Revelation 21:2), even the tree of life (Revelation 22:2), and yet would overlook something as precious as animals in His Kingdom.
Conclusion
Using all of the reasoning above, I believe we can safely and reasonably conclude, even lacking explicit statements, that yes, animals have some form of afterlife. And given that Scripture only describes two realms, Heaven and Hell, there's a good shot that their afterlife will be enjoyed in the Kingdom of Heaven, with us. We cannot be dogmatic, but in the end, I believe the reason Scripture is silent on the topic of animals in Heaven is the same reason it is silent on many other Heavenly issues: We don't need to know until we actually get there. God never told us we would drive cars, fly planes, walk on the moon, or put robots on Mars, so why would He tell us the more intricate details of Heaven? At the end of the day, the point of Scripture is to bring us into a restored relationship with the God who got us there. Thus, just as Ecclesiastes seems to speak only of the Earth and say little about an afterlife, the Bible seems to speak only of mankind and say little about animals. But through what little it says of them, it seems more than reasonable to extrapolate that we will share the Kingdom with them as we share the Earth now.
With that being said, there is a final issue we should not leave unaddressed. Just as in the Sadducees' marriage dilemma, our pets often go through more than one owner on the Earth. Thus, there is a difference between "will my dog go to Heaven?" and "will it be my dog in Heaven?" Ultimately, this would require even more speculation, and I don't think we really need to dwell on it. One thing we can absolutely guarantee is that whatever God, in His great wisdom, decides to do with His animals, it will be perfect. Therefore, whether we ever regain possession of our deceased pets, our joy will be complete.