Caring for creation — A Christian perspective
By Dara Fillmore
Did you know that on April 28, 1975, Newsweek published an article on global
cooling?
Why the big change nowadays with all the talk about global warming?
Maybe an attempt is being made to divert people from the truth; it could be an
effort to defame our Creator and control the resources the Lord has put on the
earth for our use. Now all the talk seems to have switched to global warming and
extreme climate change, not cooling. Not that it’s any comfort to you, but the
world is going to get hotter. According to the third chapter of 2 Peter,
eventually it’s going to become a ball of fire.
I’ve made arrangements to be in a much better place at that time.
Have you? I hope so.
We are told to take care of the earth, but we must balance our stewardship
between an extreme view of protecting the earth from humans and an extreme view
of protecting the earth for humans.
In Genesis 1:28, God tells Adam to “... Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the
earth, and subdue it; and rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of
the sky and over every living thing. ...” We are neither to trash things nor
treasure them as more important than relationships with others, nor hold things
on earth in higher regard than human life.
Which is more necessary – to save wild horses from slaughter or to save human
babies from slaughter? Should the priority be planting more trees or planting
the love of Christ in people we know? Is it more imperative to save the Alaskan
wilderness or to save others from eternal separation from God?
We each must carefully weigh our decisions about caring for creation after we
ask God for guidance. Everything from recycling to solar power ought to be taken
to the Lord for wisdom.
In Isaiah 55:8, Isaiah writes, “‘For My thoughts are higher than your thoughts,
neither are your ways My ways,’ declares the Lord.” He knows what the weather
will be like tomorrow. And He knows when the world will burn up.
We must carefully weigh our choices about what to do with global cooling and
warming. We must each decide what our stewardship of the earth should be,
according to what God has said and how He leads each of us. Psalm 93:1 says,
“... Indeed, the world is firmly established, it will not
be moved.”
That is, unless God tells it to move.
