Sermon

One of the most practical skills I learned when I was studying marriage therapy years ago was to listen for how people use personal pronouns.   When people label things “mine,” “yours” or “ours,” they are often telling you much more than they realize.   “Welcome to my home, welcome to our home.”  “Let’s go into the kitchen and sit down, let’s go into my kitchen and sit down.”  Many years ago, I met with a couple, all of whose names I’ll change here, going through some tough times.   I got a sense of what was going on when one of the parties talked about their children as “my Billy” and “your Leonard.”   I’ll let you sort out which son was heading off to college on a scholarship and which one had just been arrested for vandalizing mailboxes in the neighborhood.

Use of pronouns reflects our, often unconscious, understanding of ownership.   So, on this Sunday, with Earth Day approaching this week, as we give attention to the questions of our stewardship of the earth, what are the pronouns we use when we speak of the Earth?   Private property, public lands, restricted access, right of way, my land.

Mindful that all that we have and all that we are, are indeed gifts from God, matters of stewardship are critical in our daily living.   Our lives, this creation, are not just given to us as gifts of God, they are entrusted to us.  Entrusted with the expectation they will be treasured, used with the same care and love that our Creator shows for us. 

In the creation stories in Genesis, humans are given dominion over the earth.   Too often we interpret dominion, not to mean respectful and responsible care, but the right to treat the Earth like it was a Kleenex.   In fact, we are called to use the earth as if it were someone else’s property, with the expectation that we will return it as we found it.

When I was going to graduate school at night many years ago, I worked during the day on a country club as a groundskeeper.   One spring, our superintendent borrowed a special piece of equipment in order to perform some special maintenance and repairs.   It was an expensive piece of equipment, used sparingly, and so every couple seasons, it made sense to borrow from another club rather than to own outright.   When it came time to return it, I washed it off, cleaning it up pretty well, in at least the same condition as it was when we borrowed it.  When the superintendent saw this, he instructed me to clean it again, and to clean it thoroughly.   He wanted it returned, not as it was when we had picked it up, but as it was when it was delivered brand new.   He commented, “It’s always easier to ask to borrow something that you’ve returned in better shape than you got it.”  In the process, I got a lesson in being a responsible steward.

Today’s lesson from Job is a rich reminder of whose Earth this is.   We all recall Job as a righteous man, whose faith was quite admirable as he lives his life, the playing piece in the battle between good and evil.   But at the end of the book of Job, God responds to the back and forth between Job and those who came to counsel and comfort him.   Out of the whirlwind, God reminds Job and us, just who is in charge; who is God and who are part of God’s creation.

“Where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth?...Who determined it’s measurements?”   Throughout chapters 38 and 39, God continues, “who shut in the sea with doors?...Can you bind the chains of the Pleiades, or loose the cords of Orion?....Do you know the ordinances of the heavens?  Can you establish their rule on earth?.....Do you give the horse its might?  Do you clothe its neck with mane?”

In response to this, the Rev. Carlyn Valentine Pryce notes,” God is not just showing off here, God is showing Job who God is. And God is showing Job the cosmic context in which, alone, his life has meaning and his suffering has its place. God is also showing Job the world; by having the mirror removed, Job’s face is turned toward the glorious cosmos of which he is a part. You see, what Job learned, finally, was to accept the terms of Creation, not with defiance, but with humility and gratitude. Wendell Berry, that great American philosopher and farmer, says that what we need to do is to learn to experience our dependence on other living things with gratitude. “For we are living from mystery, from creatures we did not make and powers we cannot comprehend.”

In these opening days of the 21^st century, we continue to wrestle with the questions about worshipping the Earth and worshipping our Creator and with questions about the balances in having dominion over the earth and being responsible stewards of the earth.

We are mindful that increasing numbers of the world’s citizens have the capacity to destroy the world through the horror and terror of nuclear weapons.  Increasing numbers of scientists are warning of the threat to the world through our overuse of medicines like antibiotics that are leading to a proliferation of drug resistant bacteria and virus’.   And the great threat that comes through the dangerous practices in which we exhaust our natural resources or pollute this world.

We are now at a place, a crossroads of sorts, where with increased knowledge and technology, we have the means to better the world or destroy it.   Most critically, as responsible stewards of God’s gifts, we have the means to pass this on to our descendants better than we found it. 

In the season of Easter, we remember anew, with grateful and hope-filled hearts the wonder of God’s love over all things in creation, including sin and death.   We celebrate the resurrection of Jesus Christ and today we celebrate the resurrection of God’s creation, the earth.

And just like the resurrected Christ had a scarred body, which he invited the doubtful to experience by placing their fingers and hands inside the very wounds, so too are we mindful that the earth has scars; scars which have lessons for us also; scars which can convince us to care for the earth differently.

Let us be mindful of the scars of clear-cut forests, of the rainforests of the world, which in so many ways act like the lungs in our bodies, being slashed and destroyed.  Let us be mindful of the threats in pollution to the ozone layer, which protects the earth from destructive rays of the sun, like the skin that envelops our bodies.   Let us be mindful of the species which are becoming extinct daily.   There was a story on CNN this week detailing the efforts being made, 24 hour armed guards, to protect the last male northern white rhino, who they hope to be able to mate with one of the only two remaining female northern white rhinos in the next few weeks.

And on this day, when we commend, bless and send off to West Virginia with our prayers and good wishes, our mission team, let us be mindful of the scars made by mountain top removal mining, once known as strip mining, which levels mountains and pollutes fresh water streams with debris in an effort to mine coal in a cost efficient, but ecologically devastating way.   They intend to feel that wound, explore this scarring of the earth during their time there and will certainly bear witness to this when we hear from them on May 3^rd and fellowship with them on May 8^th.

In Psalm 8, we hear the reminder—“what are human beings, that you are mindful of them, mortals that you care for them?   Yet you have made them a little lower than God, and crowned them with glory and honor.   You have given them dominion over the works of your hands.”

In giving humanity dominion over the Earth, God is calling us to be co-creators of the earth entrusted to our care.   In the near future, we will flip the switch and become self-sufficient in terms of our electrical use here at Spring Glen Church.   We will hear God’s call and challenge to be co-creators, using the resources and gifts at hand, to generate our own electrical power. 

And rising to the high calling of serving as co-creators, today we celebrate not just a clean and efficient form of producing electrical energy, today we embrace this role.   For by the gifts, talents and resources of God, we can now not just make electricity by consuming the resources of the earth, we can make electricity by transforming the gifts of God in sunlight. 

Transformation rather than consumption is truly a sign of faithful living.   Think about it.   When we receive love and share it with others, we transform, and not just consume, love.   When we receive grace from God or others, we are called to transform it, not consume it.   “Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive who trespass against us.”

Solar panels are sacred in that they transform sunlight into electrical energy.   In solar energy, we embrace the call to be co-creators with God, using the means to transform sunlight into energy in a non-polluting, non-consuming way.  And so, this day, this week, we glory in God’s call and promise in new and wonderful ways, embracing the blessings of the resurrection, transforming the scars upon the earth through acts of responsible stewardship.

When it comes to the planet, the gift of the Earth we share with billions of others of God’s children, a wonderful story I first heard from Elie Wiesel always comes to mind.

Wiesel tells the story of two men crossing a large lake in a small rowboat.   The challenges are many, but by their determined work and effort, they are making progress.   Halfway across, one of the men stops rowing, and reaches into his bag and pulls out a small hand-held drill.   Looking beneath him he places the bit against the bottom of the boat, he begins to bore a hole.  His outraged companion asks, “What in the world are you doing, drilling a hole in the bottom of the boat?”  To which the other responds, “Don’t worry, the hole will only be under my seat!”

Today, together, we take a big step in the right direction, moving away from an approach to earth stewardship that is only concerned with the impact of the hole that is under my seat.  We serve as a witness to others in our efforts at responsible stewardship of the earth, and in the opportunity to serve as co-creators with God, in creating ways in life is enhanced by transformation rather than by consumption.   May this day be the start of our renewed efforts to transform, rather than consume the gifts of God in the living of our days.   Thanks be to God.  Amen.