Gospel.com Blog

Today is Earth Day. Even just a decade ago, many evangelicals would have shied away from commemorating this date, due to its perceived association with extremist activism and politics.

But today, the significance of “creation care” is something that Christians of all stripes recognize. Christians, after all, have a unique understanding of creation—one that has nothing to do with partisan politics or extremist ideologies. We believe that God has given us stewardship over the Earth and its resources, and that as stewards, we have both authority over and responsibility for the flora and fauna around us.

A ThinkChristian post from a few years ago offers a good look at the steadily growing engagement of environmental issues by Christians individuals and organizations, as well as many links to Christian stewardship organizations. Of particular interest to Christians should be the social justice aspect of environmental care, since it is often the case that the people most directly affected by environmental problems are those living in the poorest and least developed parts of the world.

Is your church marking Earth Day this week? Whether or not your church community commemorates Earth Day, do you have any stories about how you or your church have acted out the role of “creation steward”?

Does “creation care” have a place in the Christian life? Evangelical Christians in particular have a reputation for neglecting environmental stewardship—a stereotype that has some truth to it, traceable perhaps to Christians’ belief that the Earth will pass away when the Lord returns. But today is Earth Day, and Mart De Haan has written a blog post specifically about this question of Christians and creation care:

I’ll admit that I used to argue that this earth is timed to self-destruct and that followers of Christ need to be far more concerned with things that last than those that will pass away.

I’d talk about what Paul said about worshiping the creation more than the Creator.

But Dean would quote the first part of the chapter where Paul talks about the way God uses the natural world to point to the wonder of his own existence and character.Then he’d talk about Psalm 19 that describes how God not only speaks to us through his written word, but through creation itself.

He’s referring to the Wonder of Creation blog, where Dean Ohlman writes diligently about how Christians can and should better understand the place of Creation in our spiritual lives. His post “Earth Day confessions” sums up much of his approach, and challenges the church to understand its general failure to promote Earth stewardship as a sin and a deviation from a Biblical worldview.

What’s your reaction to these posts? Have you or your church thought through the question of how environmental stewardship does (or doesn’t) fit into Christian theology? How might the church best approach this issue?

What does it mean to be stewards of God’s creation? It’s a hard topic to discuss these days. The question of how to care for Creation has been all too often co-opted by partisan politics and extremist activists.

The Genesis account of Creation makes it clear that humans live in relationship with the Earth around them—not in the New Agey “Mother Nature” sense, but in the sense that God places man in a position of authority over Creation. From Jesus’ example, we know that Biblical leadership involves an attitude of service… so how do we apply that attitude of servant leadership to our environment?

Earth Day is as good a time as any to think on these questions. We’ll be pointing out a few resources about Christians and ecological stewardship this week, but for starters, here are some excerpts (both in PDF) from two recent books that address the issue in depth:

• The opening chapter of Living the Good Life on God’s Green Earth, “Christian Theology and Creation Care,” talks about how caring for Creation fits into the Christian call to discipleship. (The chapter begins on page 9 of the PDF. Learn more about the book here.)
• The introduction to Our Father’s World: Mobilizing the Church to Care for Creation talks about the important role that every believer—no matter how “important” or “small”—has to play in the grand task of Creation care. (Read more about the book here.)

These two excerpts should get you started thinking about (or re-thinking) how environmental stewardship fits into the Christian life. This week, put aside your stereotypes about environmental activists or political extremists, and ask yourself: how does God want us to relate to the world around us?

Currently, I’m sitting in a lawn chair on my porch with my sleeves rolled up taking in the sounds of the neighborhood. Every once in a while a bird will wander close enough to see what’s going on with the human near its tree. The grass is green and there are flecks of yellow on some of the bushes across the street. A white butterfly is testing its wings against the light breeze.

Life is good because God’s creation is awesome.

For Christians this should be the impetus for celebrating Earth Day. There are plenty of reasons why people make this day special, and a lot of them are political; however, today I don’t really care because the sun is sneaking out behind the clouds and making my day bright.

‘Hallelujah’ just doesn’t seem like a good enough word when I think of the scope and bredth of what God gave us.

You’ll hear a lot about stewardship this week, and that’s a good thing because for the most part we could all stand to live a little more intentionally when it comes to loving and serving one another through the proper care of our resources. But today after all the hype and festivities, I urge you to go outside (even if it’s raining) and worship God for what you see in front of you.

Praise the LORD, my soul.
LORD my God, you are very great;
you are clothed with splendor and majesty.

The LORD wraps himself in light as with a garment;
he stretches out the heavens like a tent

and lays the beams of his upper chambers on their waters.
He makes the clouds his chariot
and rides on the wings of the wind…

Read all of Psalm 104