In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made (John 1:1-3).

[Jesus Christ] is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For by him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things were created by him and for him. He is before all things, and in him all things hold together (Colossians 1:15-17).

In the past God spoke to our forefathers through the prophets at many times and in various ways, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed heir of all things, and through whom he made the universe. The Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of his being, sustaining all things by his powerful word. After he had provided purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty in heaven (Hebrews 1:1-3).

Tuolumne Meadows, Yosemite NP

One of my favorite old hymns of the church is “Fairest Lord Jesus,” in part because it was the first piece of choral music I sang in high school choir—in a secular high school! Miss Van Alsberg would probably be fired if she did that today in most secular schools. But the song came to mind afresh yesterday when I heard it on Christian radio on my way up the hill from Palm Desert to Joshua Tree NP. The lyrics of its first verse grabbed my attention because of my Wednesday post on who Jesus is to our young people today. They will be familiar to many:

Fairest Lord Jesus, ruler of all nature,
O thou of God and man the Son,
Thee will I cherish, Thee will I honor,
Thou, my soul’s glory, joy, and crown.

Yosemite woodland

The remainder of the lyrics speak of Jesus being fairer than the meadows and the woodlands in their spring attire and brighter and purer than the sunlight, moonlight, and starlight. This, of course, restates a key Christian doctrine: that the Creator is greater than His creation and is wholly separate from His creation. Most Christians understand and believe this.

Because I was a nature lover from my earliest days, I liked all the references to the natural world in the hymn.  However, even as a high school student I did not fully grasp the meaning of Jesus being the “ruler of all nature.” If I had stopped to think—or a pastor had made it clear when I was young—that there is a connection between the Jesus who loved and welcomed children two thousand years ago and the Jesus who is supernaturally acting today to sustain the creation and Who will one day redeem it, I think I would have had a lot more love and respect for the natural world much earlier. 

Merced River, Yosemite

That’s one key reason I feel that what we seek to accomplish with this Website is of vital importance to the church today. Maybe, in fact, some of you reading this are pastors or you are in a position to suggest to your pastor that sometime around Earth Day (April 22) a sermon or two on the implication of the passages above might be appropriate. Only in one of the churches I have attended have I ever heard sermons on Jesus as the “ruler of all nature” and what that might mean in our relationship to the natural world.

I’d be willing to wager that such a sermon or two would resonate with children and young adults. It’s a message they need to hear. And an important question comes out of this consideration: If Jesus is sustainer and ruler of all nature, how might we be working against Him?

The Wonder of Creation mission:

To showcase the wonder of Creation, to encourage trust in the wisdom and power of our Creator, and to inspire a desire to care for the natural world that He has entrusted to us.

[Yosemite photos by Daleberts from Flickr]

Then little children were brought to Jesus for him to place his hands on them and pray for them. But the disciples rebuked those who brought them. Jesus said, “Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these” (Matthew 19:13-14).

Yesterday I had the rare treat of being able to spend an entire day by myself wandering through one of the most unique places in North America: The Living Desert nature center in Palm Desert, California. But being a grandfather of seven—six of them under age 8, I soon felt bad that I was not able to have them share this with me. Grandfathering is like that. Most kids were enjoying their time there, but near the end of the day, I overheard a discussion between a mom and dad and their daughter who was complaining about being tired and was clearly bored.

“You’re eleven and can spend hours running around with your friends,” said mom, “and you can’t handle a few hours here?!” “Maybe we better think twice about the vacation we’ve planned for this summer!” said dad. The child muttered something in self-defense. (I felt it was a bit harsh—but then remembered saying some things similar to that when our three boys were kids!)

I was there telling myself that I was enjoying this treat like a kid; but that kid, and a few others I noted, were not enjoying it. As they walked off, I mused about how one would go about motivating kids today to be nature lovers. It’s a tough task—for a number of complicated reasons. Then the biblical account of Jesus rebuking His disciples for trying to shoo off children from “bothering” their Master came to my mind as somehow related to the problem.

To our kids, who, really, is Jesus?

The obvious theological answer to that is that since Jesus is now at the Father’s side and His Spirit is here indwelling believers, Jesus to our children is the same as who Jesus is to the rest of the world today: His body—the church—loving, and caring for each other, their neighbors, the world of lost humanity, and the good earth. To that eleven-year-old girl, Jesus would—if her parents were followers of Him—be personified in them. This is true of all who claim the name of Jesus.

But let me suggest something else here: While Jesus is indeed at His Father’s side, He is also, according to Colossians 1, the One who created all things, presently holds together all things, and who in His death, burial, and resurrection provided redemption for the cosmos, and will one day refresh, restore, reunify, and reconcile all things to God. If our children knew this about Jesus and recognized His hand in the creation in the beginning and continuing now, might they not have a different impression about the regal bighorn sheep, the sun-haloed cactus, the tenacious yucca, and every blooming desert wildflower? By isolating and insulating our kids from the wonders of His creation, are we not in the same boat with Jesus disciples: keeping the children from the Savior who is also our Creator?

That’s some pretty heavy musing, I know!  But think about it—-and feel free to discuss it using the comments feature below.

Be careful to seek out all the commandments of the Lord your God, that you may possess this good land, and leave it as an inheritance for your children after you forever (1 Chr. 28:8). If anyone does not provide for his relatives, and especially for his immediate family, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever (1 Tim. 5:8 NIV).

In the 1980s, commentators often called the younger generation the “Me Generation” or the “Now Generation.” They saw a disturbing attitude among young people that in essence said, “I want it all, and I want it now.” Considering the greed and materialism the younger generation saw in adults, the cumulative effect of thousands of hours of exposure to “consumer” advertising, the loss of interest in history, the disintegration of the institutions of family and marriage, and the decline of religious values, it is understandable that they would be characterized by self-centeredness.

Contrast that with the attribute of altruism—unselfish concern for the welfare of others. When the Christian values of faith in an eternal God, compassion for others, self-sacrifice, and hope for the future disappear from the general culture, there is little chance that altruism will survive. In fact, most people today would likely have difficulty even defining the term altruism. As the combined Scripture passages above indicate, people of the Word have a responsibility to provide for their children and to leave for them an inheritance of faith and the gift of good land—a creation respected and well-kept.

Christian farmer-philosopher Wendell Berry has written a number of books that underscore the broad meaning of community—community that includes our ancestors, our current family members and neighbors, our animals and land, and our descendants. These words from the book What Are People For? have caused me to consider more carefully the legacy I am leaving:

We do not need to devise a “world of the future”; if we take care of the world of the present, the future will have received full justice from us. A good future is implicit in the soils, forests, grasslands, marshes, deserts, mountains, rivers, lakes, and oceans that we have now; the only valid “futurology” available to us is to take care of those things. We have no need to contrive and dabble at “the future of the human race”; we have the same pressing need that we have always had—to love, care for, and teach our children (p.188).

Berry elaborates on this last line in the book Another Turn Of The Crank:

I know of nothing that so strongly calls into question our ability to care for the world as our present abuses of our own reproductivity. How can we take care of other creatures, all born like ourselves from the world’s miraculous fecundity, if we have forsaken the qualities of culture and character that inform the nurture of children. . . . Whatever the reason, it is a fact that we are now conducting a sort of general warfare against children, who are being aborted or abandoned, abused, drugged, bombed, neglected, poorly raised, poorly fed, poorly taught, and poorly disciplined. Many of them will not only find no worthy work but no work of any kind. All of them will inherit a diminished, diseased, and poisoned world. We will visit upon them not only our sins but our debts. We have set before them thousands of examples—governmental, industrial, and recreational—suggesting that the violent way is the best way. And then we have the hypocrisy to be surprised and troubled when they carry guns and use them (pp.78-79).

This sobers me. As one who believes in Christ, I’d like to think he’s describing only non-Christian people. But I’m afraid I see many of these behaviors and attitudes among those of us who call ourselves followers of Jesus. We’re a long way from being the community that treasures our past, guards our present, and secures our future. While we look for the any-moment return of Christ, we cannot use this expectation to excuse ourselves from the responsibility to leave God’s gift of creation to our children and their children well-kept and as undiminished as possible in its capacity to provide for them what it has provided for us.

[Photos: Lancaster County, Pennsylvania]

Our Relation To Others Through Creation (Part 2)

Be careful to seek out all the commandments of the Lord your God, that you may possess this good land, and leave it as an inheritance for your children after you forever (1 Chr. 28:8). If anyone does not provide for his relatives, and especially for his immediate family, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever (1 Tim. 5:8 NIV).

In the 1980s, commentators often called the younger generation the “Me Generation” or the “Now Generation.” They saw a disturbing attitude among young people that in essence said, “I want it all, and I want it now.”

Considering the greed and materialism the younger generation saw in adults, the cumulative effect of thousands of hours of exposure to “consumer” advertising, the loss of interest in history, the disintegration of the institutions of family and marriage, and the decline of religious values, it is understandable that they would be characterized by self-centeredness.

Contrast that with the attribute of altruism—unselfish concern for the welfare of others. When the Christian values of faith in an eternal God, compassion for others, self-sacrifice, and hope for the future disappear from the general culture, there is little chance that altruism will survive. In fact, most people today would likely have difficulty even defining the term altruism.

As the combined Scripture passages above indicate, people of the Word have a responsibility to provide for their children and to leave for them an inheritance of faith and the gift of good land—a creation respected and well-kept.

Christian farmer-philosopher Wendell Berry has written a number of books that underscore the broad meaning of community—community that includes our ancestors, our current family members and neighbors, our animals and land, and our descendants. These words from the book What Are People For? have caused me to consider more carefully the legacy I am leaving:

We do not need to devise a “world of the future”; if we take care of the world of the present, the future will have received full justice from us. A good future is implicit in the soils, forests, grasslands, marshes, deserts, mountains, rivers, lakes, and oceans that we have now; the only valid “futurology” available to us is to take care of those things. We have no need to contrive and dabble at “the future of the human race”; we have the same pressing need that we have always had—to love, care for, and teach our children (p.188).

Berry elaborates on this last line in the book Another Turn Of The Crank:

I know of nothing that so strongly calls into question our ability to care for the world as our present abuses of our own reproductivity. How can we take care of other creatures, all born like ourselves from the world’s miraculous fecundity, if we have forsaken the qualities of culture and character that inform the nurture of children. . . . Whatever the reason, it is a fact that we are now conducting a sort of general warfare against children, who are being aborted or abandoned, abused, drugged, bombed, neglected, poorly raised, poorly fed, poorly taught, and poorly disciplined. Many of them will not only find no worthy work but no work of any kind. All of them will inherit a diminished, diseased, and poisoned world. We will visit upon them not only our sins but our debts. We have set before them thousands of examples—governmental, industrial, and recreational—suggesting that the violent way is the best way. And then we have the hypocrisy to be surprised and troubled when they carry guns and use them (pp.78-79).

This sobers me. As one who believes in Christ, I’d like to think he’s describing only non-Christian people. But I’m afraid I see many of these behaviors and attitudes among ourselves. We’re a long way from being the community that treasures our past, guards our present, and secures our future.

While we look for the any-moment return of Christ, we cannot use this expectation to excuse ourselves from the responsibility to leave God’s gift of creation to our children and their children well-kept and undiminished in its capacity to provide for them what it has provided for us.

[Landfill photos by Vera Sytch]

How can we celebrate the wonder of God in creation?
By doing everything we can to guard and protect its ability to provide for our children and their children the treasures we have enjoyed and received from it because of our parents’ and their parents’ care and concern.

Shout for joy to the Lord, all the earth, burst into jubilant song with music; 5make music to the Lord with the harp, with the harp and the sound of singing, with trumpets and the blast of the ram’s horn– shout for joy before the Lord, the King. Let the sea resound, and everything in it, the world, and all who live in it. Let the rivers clap their hands, let the mountains sing together for joy; let them sing before the Lord, for he comes to judge the earth. He will judge the world in righteousness and the peoples with equity (Psalm 98:4-9)

in Pollution And The Death Of Man: The Christian View Of Ecology, Francis Schaeffer recounted that Charles Darwin near the end of his life found that two things had become dull to him: his joy in the arts and his joy in nature. Schaeffer comments on the irony of this great naturalist losing his enthusiasm for the very thing he had made his life’s calling. Then he continues:

We are seeing today . . . the same loss of joy in our total culture as Darwin personally experienced: first of all in the area of the arts, then in the area of nature. The distressing thing about this is that . . . Christians often really have had no better sense about these things than unbelievers. The death of joy in nature is leading to the death of nature itself (p.11).

Schaeffer also tells the story of visiting a Christian school in the 1960s that was located across a ravine from a “hippie community.” Curious, Schaeffer crossed the ravine to learn more about the settlement. He discovered that the commune was clearly a pagan one—even conducting pagan earth rituals common to the New Age Movement today. But he was also struck with how attractive the community was and how carefully they kept the land. The difference between the grounds of the two communities was extreme.

The leader of the pagan commune even commented to Schaeffer about the “ugliness” of the Christian school. Schaeffer tells of his reaction to that comment:

It was then that I realized what the situation this was. When I stood on the Christian ground and looked at the Bohemian people’s place, it was beautiful. They had even gone to the trouble of running their electric cables under the level of the trees so that they couldn’t be seen. Then I stood on the pagan ground and looked at the Christian community and saw ugliness. That is horrible. Here you have a Christianity that is failing to take into account man’s responsibility and proper relationship to nature (p.42).

Schaeffer’s book was not just another commentary on the decline of Christianity; it was a call to apply biblical principles to the world’s growing environmental problems. It was an invitation to rediscover the wonder of God in creation. It was a reminder that we are not as likely to care for one another if we have forgotten the high calling of God to appreciate and care for all that He has made.

It’s not too late to find joy and renewed worship in an awareness that was expressed by George MacDonald more than a hundred years ago:

If it were not for the outside world, we should have no inside world to understand things by. Least of all could we understand God without these millions of sights and sounds and scents and motions weaving their endless harmonies. They come out from His heart to let us know a little of what is in it (What’s Mine’s Mine, p.29).

The capacity of God’s awesome creation to reveal knowledge of himself and His goodness is so obvious that children are almost the first to notice—something Peter Illyn of Restoring Eden discovered a few years ago when he was out in the wilderness with his young son.  As they were walking, the joy of the experience prompted the boy to say, “You know, Dad, it’s easy to believe in God when you’re outdoors, isn’t it?”  A sermon from the lips of a child.

How long has it been since you’ve let your voice join with the voices of the mountains and rivers singing for joy at the promise that our Redeemer and Creator will indeed come and judge the world with both righteousness and equity.

See you outdoors!

Dean