God’s Creation, Our Sacred Trust

Jeremiah 8:18-9:1 and Luke 16:1-13

A sermon by Dick Neelly

Delivered at Second Presbyterian Church, Richmond, Virginia

September 23, 2007

Introduction

The Session of the church has chosen to emphasize our stewardship for God’s creation throughout the coming year. It has asked every council and committee of the congregation to pursue program efforts to put into practice good stewardship for our environment, and it has designated today as the inaugural worship event to mark our common goal of fulfilling this sacred trust.

We hope that our choice to use recyclable paper for the morning bulletin on this particular date will serve symbolically to signal our intention to focus on practical ways to make effective stewardship of the environment evident.

The Old Testament and Gospel readings for today suggest thoughtful reflections for us, as we go about our sacred trust of Christian stewardship. I invite you to listen for two things. First, listen for how we human beings, stewards as we are called to be, are connected to our natural environment inseparably. Secondly, listen for how seriously we are called by Christ to assume the responsibilities for the stewardship of all that God has shared with us

First, we believe that God has created us in an inseparable connection with the environment all around us.

Jeremiah has been called the weeping prophet because he felt deep remorse over the pain, which the people were bringing upon themselves by way of God’s judgment: “Oh that my head were a spring of water, and my eyes a fountain of tears, so that I might weep day and night for the slain of my poor people.”

It is noteworthy that the judgment of God upon the people for their unfaithfulness is mirrored in the suffering of the land and its plant life. Jeremiah bemoans, “Is there no balm in Gilead? Is there no physician there? Why then has the health of my poor people not been restored?” Indeed, the harvest is past, the summer is ended, and the people are not saved from famine. A drought has taken over the land and it has been so severe that even the resin in the famous Styrax tree of Gilead has been dried up, thus denying a medicinal source for healing to sick people. There is no longer any balm to be found in Gilead.

The earth itself suffers, when the people are unfaithful to God. The reason, Biblically speaking, is because the land and the people are a part of one inseparable whole. When we look at the photograph of our planet earth, taken by astronauts in space, it is not difficult to see literally how we and our environment are of one piece of cloth. Circling in the vast darkness of space, we represent life in innumerable variations. There is plant life and animal life. There is life in the seas, in the air, on the land, and under the land. The entire planet is a living reality, made up of life forms that exceed in complexity and numbers our ability to catalogue them all even with all the advanced technologies of the twenty-first century.

When we read the two accounts of creation in Genesis, chapters one and two, we are impressed with how creation is an organic system. Everything is connected as in a vast web of life. No one part of the organic system changes without all the other parts being affected. We know this negatively, when we read that the sin of our first parents resulted in the ground itself becoming a curse to them.

When God called Abraham and Sarah to be the parents of a large family, God gave to them a land to manage so that all the families of the earth might be blessed. Everyone’s well being was intricately connected. There is a very real sense in which the land that God gave Abraham and Sarah to manage was not something they owned. There is a profound sense in which Abraham and Sarah belonged to the land. The connectedness of creation implies that all of us have vital functions to play in the drama of life, and that life cannot be the whole God intends, when we fail to function as God has created us and called us to function.

Perhaps no where in the Bible is the connection between creation and the stewardship of God’s people made more evident than in Paul’s memorable observation, “I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory about to be revealed to us, for the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the children of God; for the creation was subjected to futility, not of its own will but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be set free from it bondage to decay and will obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God.” It is a truly remarkable consideration to reflect on how Paul ties our Christian stewardship to the salvation not only of humankind, but of all of creation in its expansive wonder.

The observation, then, that our lives as God’s people are inseparably connected to the well being of our natural environment makes clear our calling from God to be responsible stewards of all that surrounds us in our environment. The environment suffers, when we fail to take our sacred trust seriously, and as Jeremiah cried out with tears, even the healing that creation can offer to us as its part in contributing to our lives is dried up, when we fail to honor it with lives of morality and grace. Surely the moral failure that leads to such a state of degradation is greed, and the lack of grace is tied to our pride that we collectively, and not God, is the source of our ultimate good.

If, however, we are called by Jeremiah to recognize how we are inseparably connected to our natural environment, Luke reveals how Jesus calls us to take the lead in the practice of stewardship for the benefit of one another and the whole of nature, as well.

Wallace Gay was a wonderful Presbyterian elder. He farmed as an avocation because he loved to keep his hand in the earth, as he would say. He told me a story once about stewardship, which I remember till this day. He said that there was a pioneer, who set about to clear the land of all the roots and briars and rocks in it, so that he could plant the crops by which to feed his family and his livestock. It seemed an unending task, but he persevered until he was able to clear and prepare enough land for his first crops. He planted in time for the early and the late rains, and his field was verdant with the promise of a bountiful crop. Another pioneer passing by stopped and was admiring the find field, and the traveler commented, “My, my, isn’t it a miracle what God can do?” The farmer turned to him and said, somewhat chagrined, “Yes, but you should have seen this land, when God had it all by himself.”

The parable that Luke records from Jesus is a difficult one to appreciate because it almost sounds like Jesus is complimenting a dishonest steward for the underhanded manner by which he served his selfish interest instead of the interest of his master.

Two highly respected students of the Bible, however, Fred Craddock and Eugene Peterson, both offer a single interpretation, which is helpful. They maintain that Jesus does not intend to pay a compliment to a man for cheating his master. Instead they argue that Jesus is telling his disciples that dishonest people can often be more adept at getting what they want done in life than the children of the kingdom are adept at serving effectively as stewards of God.

Jesus observes that the dishonest steward was focused on his goal. He persevered. He would not be distracted under pressure. In the end he apparently succeeded in his selfish pursuit of enough wealth to provide for himself, even after his master expelled him from his job. Jesus does not commend him in any way. Rather, he uses this man’s determination to succeed in achieving his unworthy goal, as an example of the kind of commitment his disciples will need in order to effectively practice the stewardship to which God has called them. Paul defined our stewardship in these terms, when he said that he was called to be a servant of Christ and a steward of the mysteries of God.

Conclusion

Recognizing, then, that we are inseparably connected to all of life on this planet, which God has created, even so much so that we belong to the land more so that we can reasonable claim that any of the land belongs to us; and recognizing further that our calling from God is that we assume an assertive and focused effort in the exercise of our stewardship for one another and for all of creation, we are left to ask what this means for us.

To begin with it means what we are undertaking in emphasizing our stewardship for God’s creation, as our sacred trust in Second Presbyterian Church. It means that all of our councils and committees will be publicizing ways that you may choose to participate in programs and ministries through our church in the coming year to demonstrate that we appreciate our connection to all of God’s creation, on the one hand, and that, on the other hand, we are intentional about exercising our sacred trust as good stewards.

Going further, it means that we will look for ways that we can advocate and exemplify what good environmental stewardship looks like in our places of work and in other spheres, where we have some influence over how things are decided and accomplished.

Finally, and certainly not to be left out, it means that we as Christian citizens will look for ways to influence public policies that may make our air and water cleaner and assure that all people will be treated justly in the ways that governments can cooperate with industries to practice a responsible use of our natural resources.

May we take our calling as Christian stewards to heart not only because we can see how to do so will make our own lives healthier, but let us do it, also, because it is what God calls us to do in order that all the families of the earth may be blessed on the land, which the Lord our God has given us.

And to God alone be the glory, now and forevermore. Amen.