More on the The Sixth Day – Humans
Genesis 1
26 Then God said, "Let us make humankind in our image, according to our likeness; and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the wild animals of the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps upon the earth."
27 So God created humankind in his image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them.
28 God blessed them, and God said to them, "Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it; and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the air and over every living thing that moves upon the earth."
29 God said, "See, I have given you every plant yielding seed that is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree with seed in its fruit; you shall have them for food.
30 And to every beast of the earth, and to every bird of the air, and to everything that creeps on the earth, everything that has the breath of life, I have given every green plant for food." And it was so.
31 God saw everything that he had made, and indeed, it was very good. And there was evening and there was morning, the sixth day.
God made humans and declared them “very good” but sometimes I wonder if God was overly optimistic!
We have looked at each of the “days” of creation in this adult forum series, and today we are on the sixth and final day. After the sixth day God rested.
So what is the role that God gave humans with regard to the rest of creation?
If you just read Genesis One, you might be troubled by the words “have dominion” and “subdue.” But there is plenty of evidence in the Bible that humans were not meant to despoil God’s creation; rather that we are supposed to guard it and care for it. For instance, in Genesis 2:15 -
15 The LORD God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to till it and keep it.
We are commanded to take care of creation (which is the real sense of having “dominion” over it.)
There is plenty of biblical evidence that because of our sins as humans, the land is affected as well.
Jeremiah 12:4
4 How long will the land mourn, and the grass of every field wither? For the wickedness of those who live in it the animals and the birds are swept away, and because people said, "He is blind to our ways."
And Hosea 4: 1-3
Hear the word of the LORD, O people of Israel; for the LORD has an indictment against the inhabitants of the land. There is no faithfulness or loyalty, and no knowledge of God in the land.
2 Swearing, lying, and murder, and stealing and adultery break out; bloodshed follows bloodshed.
3 Therefore the land mourns, and all who live in it languish; together with the wild animals and the birds of the air, even the fish of the sea are perishing.
But God has promised to redeem all of creation
2Chronicles 7: 13, 14
13 When I shut up the heavens so that there is no rain, or command the locust to devour the land, or send pestilence among my people,
14 if my people who are called by my name humble themselves, pray, seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin and heal their land.
Romans 8: 19-23
19 For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the children of God;
20 for the creation was subjected to futility, not of its own will but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope
21 that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay and will obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God.
22 We know that the whole creation has been groaning in labor pains until now;
23 and not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the first fruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly while we wait for adoption, the redemption of our bodies.
Humans therefore, particularly Christians, have an obligation to be good stewards of the land.
I have attended most of these forums, and lots of information has been given out, and lots of ideas have been put forth for ways to be responsible inhabitants of God’s creation.
I want to share with you a bit about a personal experience I have had in working with people for the good of the environment, the economy, and aesthetics.
We are summer residents of a small town in upstate NY. The area is economically depressed. Some of the local families have lived in the area since the late 17th century, and many of the farmers have had land for well over a hundred years. Farming is no longer a viable industry in the area, for lots of reasons that I don’t even know about. The consequence has been that the farming families own lots of land, but by the time they pay the taxes on that land they have no money to work the land. They are land rich, tax poor. Many have reluctantly divided up and sold off their land. This is painful to do, if your land has been held for four generations or more.
Tourism is one of the most promising money–makers for the area, and many NYC people have second homes in the area. It is a restful, beautiful place to live, especially if you work elsewhere, or are independently wealthy.
Several years ago, a private industry sent sales people around the area, trying to encourage landowners to let them build wind turbines on their land. As we heard a couple of weeks ago, wind energy is environmentally clean, although the figures I have seen indicate that it takes a lot of wind turbines to make enough power for the enterprise to be economical on a large scale. (But that’s another issue!) The rent the wind turbine company was willing to pay was substantial – several thousand dollars per year, per turbine – and was really attractive to the local farmers whose land was just costing them money.
But here is where the human element came in. You have all heard of the NIMBY syndrome, I suppose? (“Not in My Back Yard.”) Those people who had bought second homes in the area did not want their bucolic views interrupted by “ugly” wind turbines. Town meeting after town meeting was held. The locals fought valiantly, but they didn’t have the expertise, or the funding, and eventually the “we want green energy, but not wind turbines” group elected a block of members to the town board and enacted bylaws to prevent anyone putting up wind turbines. I’m not even an American and my hackles rise at the thought of restricting freedom this way!
But the issue was not straight forward, and some of the issues were never clear. There was the economic issue that I have already mentioned between the low income locals and the high income second home owners. But there was also a related scientific issue of whether the area had enough continuous wind to make the project viable, the issue of whether access to the turbines would cause more environmental damage than desired, the issue of whether too many birds and bats would be killed, and possibly a nuisance issue since some claimed the turbines made a loud hum when they were turning.
All this is just to illustrate that environmental issues are never straight forward. Any energy production is costly to the environment in some way. I have heard hydroelectric power being preached from the pulpit as a safe, low impact source of energy. But tell that to the hundreds, maybe thousands of people whose homes are now under water because of the building of dams, and the countless millions of animals and plants that are effected.
It is practically impossible to live a blame-free environmental life, and all too easy to offend most environmentalists, most of the time. It is very easy to jump on the bandwagon about environmental issues. We all need to do our homework before we start pointing the finger at others.
But it certainly is our duty as Christians to tend the garden that God has given us. I came across a thought provoking essay by Rev. Margot Hudson who is the chaplain of Christ College, Oxford. She was speaking at a workshop called “Too Many Stewards, Not Enough Creation,” and she said that the redemption of all creation “does not mean that humanity will be transported to an environment-less heaven. In a redeemed earth we will still be creatures in a whole creation, enjoying the equivalent of our own abundant biosphere.”
I don’t know if Rev Hudson is correct, but what if she is?