(By Ian Smith) – Have you ever had one moment that was completely silent and completely wonderful as you were sitting outside? The more and more I think about it, the more I find the place in which I live now, the earth, to be beautiful. It really hit me this last summer. I had finished playing a game of soccer and was sitting down to catch my breath when suddenly it was taken away from me all over again; a large sun, the trees, it all struck me as so beautiful, for it is, and more than that the earth is our home.
When God created all things, he uses this phrase “good”. In the original language it was expressing the fact that the thing he had made looked sort of like him. It is the same word that refers to the goodness of God throughout the Scriptures. At the same time, the first humans get the command to “subdue the land.” In the original language, it’s more like what’s printed on the side of cop cars, “protect and serve.” That was the first task of the human race. It is so easy to forget what we’ve been asked to do.
God knows that we are physical beings, that we are beings whose minds who work with what we see and hear. Do you know that thousands of Christians in other traditions never pray with their eyes closed? Do you know why? Because they think that all things draw us into prayer, into God; not distract us from it. This earth has the goodness of God in it, why would it distract us from him?
The more we read the Scriptures, the more we see the fact that there is never meant to be a lasting permanent separation between us and the earth. In fact in the end, God decides to make “his home among men” as it says in the Scriptures. God comes from heaven to live here, on this earth, which it says is our home. That’s the real beauty of living in Christ as well; we get this earth as a gift, and we will see it as it is meant to be.
This whole thing expresses something deeper too. We as Christians receive everything as a gift. Everything we do expresses that God has given us everything and what we give to him is only ever what he has given to us. When we give our offering, we actually give it back, because it was God’s own. This just symbolizes the fact that we bring nothing in.
So now that we know these things, let us delight in what we see around us! But let us also be aware of a deeper reality, this place was a gift, given for us to take care of, and the seeds of this earth will grow trees in a new garden, where the tree of life is; where we and God will live forever. So when we take care of this earth, remember that we are really just cleaning up our house.