In The Beginning: Creation Appreciation #1

This past Sunday I began teaching a new class at church on ecology theology. I plan to post an update each week in this space about some of the things that came up in our class discussion. The goal of this discussion is to cause us to start thinking about how our lives relate to God's creation. As part of His creation, what are our responsibilities to the earth? As disciples of Jesus does our abuse of the earth's resources have any intersection with our love for our neighbor?

There will be a total of 12 of these posts about our class. To find all the posts, click on the label "in the beginning" at the bottom of a post. I'll likely post other entries about the environment but those won't have the "in the beginning" label. Hope this journey causes you to carefully consider how you live in God's creation.

Here is the class syllabus.

Last Sunday we read Genesis 1:1 - 2:3, and then considered some of the following:
1. Why is creation good?
2. What does it mean to subdue the earth v. 28?
a. Surely God doesn’t create goodness and then hand it over to mankind for its abuse at any whim.
3. Was God tired after 6 days of creation? Rabbinic traditions state that God created rest, serenity, and peace on the 7th day. Where do you incorporate these blessings into your life?

Then, we read the second account of creation in Genesis 2:4-2:25, listening for God's purposes in His actions.
1. What does it mean to work (avodah) the ground and take care of (shamar (guard)) it (v. 15)?
2. Side Bar: v. 18 'helper suitable' for...
3. Why is God doing any of this?

We spent a good deal of time on that last question. Why did God create the world? We offered a few different explanations:
1. God's creation is an outpouring of his love.
2. God is seeking relationship and love from free willed creatures
3. The beauty and artistry of God's creation is a literal outpouring of God's glory that could no longer be contained in his other realm.
4. And then Lisa Cantrell offered a beautiful answer that I had never before considered: Perhaps God didn't want Jesus to be an only child. That really moved me. God's love for his son was so great that he created us out of his love for another part of himself. And then Jesus came to the world to reveal the fact that (as Jesus says, in his prayer in John 17.23) God loves us as much as he loves his son.

As a homework assignment, I asked the class to start paying attention to the news about the environment. Avoid the politics of it. Don’t listen to political debates, policies, or candidate positions about the environment. Listen to stories about our demand for oil, the weather, water shortages, food shortages, etc. Pay attention to our relationship to God’s creation.

Next week, we'll continue with Genesis 3 and think about how our relationship with the earth changed after the fall of man.

Feel free to leave a comment if you like. Why do you think God created the world? What do you think about our stewardship responsibilities? Why do you think God commented that his creation was good?