How Can I Care for Creation?. Stephanie McDyre Johnson
natural world around them, depended on the land and water to survive, and strived to live in harmony with all that God had created. From the powerful creation in Genesis, to the hope of new life for all creation, to the promise of healing in the book of Revelation, creation can thrive and flourish as God intended when harmony is achieved. In our time, for the sake of all God’s creation, we are called to retrieve and remember those shared memories from long-ago generations of connection to the world around us.
For Further Reflection:
• Read both accounts of creation: Genesis 1:1–2:3 and Genesis 2:4–24, plus Psalm 104. What are the similarities and differences in the three accounts of creation?
• How do you imagine “creation groaning in labor pains” (Romans 8:22) at the beginning of time as well as today?
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How did we get so far away from the centuries-old scriptural tradition steeped in nature-based biblical stories? Did we forget that humanity, for most of our existence, relied on and feared nature? Did we somehow forget that message that the Good News of Jesus was about all creation? Did we forget that humans have always counted on one another, and the earth, for survival? In this short chapter, we will briefly explore these questions on our journey to restore and reclaim a right relationship with all God’s creation.
Human Separation from God’s Creation
Theologians and historians suggest that with the Age of Enlightenment there began a separation between God and creation. In an age when reason was seen as a high value, the stories of creation having human characteristics or humans as an equal partner with all creation were dismissed. As seekers in the Enlightenment, it was believed that the essence of humankind was superior and all knowing. Humans ruled and controlled nature for their own advancement. Thomas Jefferson went so far as to rewrite his Bible to take out all the Jesus miracle stories as they couldn’t be proved or based on anything that could be reasoned.
Growing scientific knowledge created a false dichotomy between science and religion, suggesting that science could undermine scriptural and church authority. Ultimately this sensibility pitted religion and science as two different forms of understanding the world, creating uneasy relationships between the church and scientific inquiry. As science began to unearth a deeper understanding of how things were created, the Bible could no longer offer a literal narration of creation.
With the release of Charles Darwin’s On the Origins of Species in the mid-nineteenth century, an even deeper divide between faith and reason developed. Darwin’s book was a treatise on the evolution and development of species with scientific research. The book and other contemporary work undermined the concept of creationism. If science could be used to fully describe how creatures and plants were created and related to each other, what need was there to believe in a God that created and sought harmony? It is this perceived threat to the literal interpretation of the Bible that still divides American Christians, some who do not believe in the scientifically proven theory of evolution.
The Industrial Revolution seemed to exacerbate the growing separation between God and creation. With the movement in the United States toward urban areas, mass migration resulted in people moving away from agrarian lifestyles. No longer did people remember the cycles of the seasons and their dependence on good seeds, abundant rain, and fertile land for harvest. With rapid technological advances, the idea of subduing and imposing dominion over nature seemed all the more possible. Factories spewing forth air, land, and water pollution began to create a consumer-driven society.
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