"Creation flavored" thoughts on the lectionary texts
Date: October 23, 2011
(note corresponding EarthWords from 3 years ago archived on the website)
Text: Psalm 90.1-6,13-17
Thoughts
"Thou hast been our dwelling place" - metaphor? Or is God really that intimately entwined with, embedded in, Creation
(our "dwelling place")?
Before the mountains, before the earth, and after it all expands itself to the cold darkness? After it implodes
like a bubble? Was there God before the Creation? I guess I've always believed it. Will God still be there
after Creation is finished? (Or does it even mean anything to say "Creation is finished"?) Again, I guess I've
always believed that God would "be there" after everything else was gone, but if God has become so intimately connected with
Creation, maybe I'm not so sure.
On to easier stuff - "Thou turnest humans back to dust". Watching a film on Native American experience one fellow
commented "We go back to be with Mother Earth when we die - why would anyone want to do anything that would harm Mother Earth?"
"A thousand years" - again, watching a piece on nuclear power and the fact that we will have spent fuel rods and worn
out reactors and radiation from accidents around for 100's if not 1000's of years. And that after financial contraction
and "peak oil energy descent" we (our children, grandchildren) may not even have the money, energy, knowledge to safely de-commission
nuclear plants in the future.
http://theautomaticearth.blogspot.com/ (The second video link)
Like grass that flourishes in the morning and withers in the evening. Or in the autumn after a frost. Or
in the drought. They re-seeded a heavily used spot in one of the parks in town and it's amazing how fast it comes back.
Do humans have that same "come back quickly" capability? And where are you in the whole "flourish to wither" continuum?
I'm usually towards the "flourishes" end, but now and then drift over towards "wither", especially when I think about where
humanity seems to be headed (and dragging Creation along with it!)
"Make us glad as many days" - we have been "gladly" burning through our inheritance of fossil fuel in a remarkably brief
span of days, and now I'm afraid we have many difficult ("to see evil"?) years ahead of us as cheap energy comes to an end.
"Let thy works be manifest to us" - because it's calming, refreshing, and just healthy to be aware of and experience
Creation around us.
"And establish the work of our hands" - well I'm not so sure about that. What has the work of our hands brought
forth? Some good, some not so good, I'm afraid. Two lyrics come to mind - "I did some bad, I did some
good, I did a whole lot better than they thought I would." (Don McLean) I don't think so. And "Can't go
back and make things right, though I wish I'd understood. Time has made thing clearer now - we did the best we could."
(Bonnie Raitt) Perhaps.
Text: Deuteronomy 34.1-12
Thoughts
Moses saw the Promised Land - a timely text as we in the USA finally get to dedicate the memorial to MLK Jr. after the
original plan was waylaid by Irene! If you could climb a mountain and look into the future, what do you think you would
see? (If you don't want to see a crowded world of 7 billion plus people, you better get up that mountain in the next
two weeks!
http://www.grist.org/population/2011-10-17-talking-to-my-son-about-sex-and-sustainability) Would you see soil that was fertile and healthy or worn out and eroded (or blown!
http://www.grist.org/list/2011-10-18-watch-a-dust-cloud-engulf-texas) away? Are the forests diverse and strong or vulnerable monocrops? Are there mountains to climb or have they
been bulldozed for mountaintop removal coal mining? And what about the things you can't see? The species that
are vanishing or even gone? The greenhouse gases? Whatever the hydraulic fracturing is doing deep underground?
The oceans expanding, the polar ice gone, the left over radiation? What would you see?
"I will give this land to you" - again, what could that mean? How can we own the land? Do we own it as individuals?
As a nation? On behalf of those who are not yet here? As a species. (The Native American understanding was/is
that the land is "tribal" not "individual". They didn't really believe in owning the land, and certainly not as individuals,
until the Dawes Commission introduced the idea of allotments, primarily in order to transfer ownership of a large portion
of the Indian land to the government!) Could we share ownership along with the animals, fish, plants, birds, etc.?
What would that look like?
Text: Matthew 22.34-46
Thoughts
"First of all, love God." How big a stretch is it (if it is a stretch) to say "First of all -
think of God's Creation"?
And then "Love your neighbor". Does that suggest that the life/health of Creation is (or ought to
be) our primary concern and that the life/health of humanity (or any particular human) ought to be secondary? It kind
of brings to mind the medical understanding that you can't have healthy people in a sick environment.
"On these depend all the law and the prophets" - what depends on the health of Creation? That's a
tougher question than it might seem. Go back to where we started with Ps 90!
Prayer
God of (and in?) Creation,
God before beginnings and outlasting endings -
If we saw Creation as you do
would we take better care,
would we live differently?
Turn our hearts towards you and your Creation
and establish them there.
One Thing to Do This Week
"First of all - Love God/Think about God's Creation" - Spend an hour picking up litter, pulling invasive plants, watering/weeding
a greenspace, plant a bird/butterfly friendly garden, have a meatless meal,...
