By Sandra McCracken*

Photo: Betty McCracken

My father is a brilliant biology teacher, now retired. My mother is a thoughtful student of the Bible. They will have been married for 50 years this August. They have made records of their years of bird-watching in a worn Peterson Field Guide, plotting their dates and sightings together in the margins. They took me on nature walks as a child and we talked about the names of Missouri birds and trees and flowers.  

Maybe that’s one of the reasons that I love Maltbie Babcock's "This is My Father's World." I love the line “He shines in all that’s fair” because this poetry has given me license to make art about all aspects of life. I have been shaped by the same kind of experience that Babcock describes in being able to taste and hear and see the glory of God in the skies, the flowers, and the birds singing their melodies like hymns.  

In recent months, I’ve been reading John Muir's memoir and writing poetry and melodies about what it means to posture myself in such a way that is more mindful of my place in the world. Water. Electricity. Oil. Pesticides. Organic foods. As Muir wrote, “When we try to pick out anything by itself, we find it hitched to everything else in the universe.” We are all pulled and affected by our place and by each other. Our little choices do have consequences. And there is so much to consider — just reading labels at the grocery store can be a precarious business.

The more I learn, the more I find that unfortunately America has not had a stellar reputation for stewardship throughout history — logging, strip mining, and crop dusting, just to name a few problems. Nor has this been a pressing concern for most of the American church, whom you might think would be at the front lines ready to care for God’s creation. All too often, the topic of conservation quickly becomes political and we run to the safety of our pat answers. There have been some confusing lines drawn by both parties that do not add up to a consistent theology. The only way to get past these political blockades is to go up and over, elevating the conversation, speaking in nuances instead of sound bites, truly listening to each other, and looking for points of unity in spite of our differences. In fact, our diversity may be our best asset when it comes to seeking solutions for our environmental challenges.

One of the biggest hurdles for me personally in caring for the earth is that the problems feel so overwhelming. I cannot easily read National Geographic without feeling heavy-hearted about the realities of our condition, both within our own insatiably selfish hearts and in my sadness over the many species and habitats that we are losing along the way. And deeper still, if we are attentive to the words of Jesus and His care for the poor, the choices we make in the way of stewardship deeply cut into the survival of the people most desperate for these natural, sustaining resources. The poor are the first and hardest hit by these ecological losses and irregularities.  

Photo: Sandra McCracken

So with each passing day, I am becoming more attuned to the particular DNA I have from each of my parents — biology and theology — pushing me forward on the journey of conservation. I might be unqualified, but everybody has to start somewhere. Rather than burying my head in the sand like I am inclined to do, I have to lean into my discomfort. I’d rather deepen my longing, not assuage it. And I look to the great hope that all things will one day be restored and renewed. I want to honor and care for God’s creation not because of a marketing team pulling on my checkbook, but because of a doxological pull that tugs on my conscience.

As a songwriter by vocation, all of this comes out of me more as poetry than as politics. The wonder of the great outdoors creeps into the songs I write. My favorite time with my children is when we walk in the woods or explore the creek. We visited the Redwoods together in January and stood at the base of those 2,000-year-old trees in wonder. I can’t help myself from whistling back at the Towhee birds in Shelby Park. I am giddy when I hear or glimpse the Barred Owl that shares the beautiful old trees in our urban neighborhood. I wake the kids up some nights to see a particularly bright moon in the sky. And I will never get over the thrill of an airplane window seat view — seeing the horizon, the landscapes, the contours of the countryside, and the rivers carving spaces in between.  

Recently, I had the great pleasure of hearing Peter and Miranda Harris, the founding members of A Rocha, a global conservation organization. They shared the story of their journey from a humble small group in Liverpool, to the Alvor estuary in Portugal, and now it has become an international network of conservationists in 16 countries. I had never before heard anybody speak with their particular blend of hope, ethics, and spirituality. It was a rare and powerful combination. As I sat in the room that evening, it confirmed in my own spirit that I'm on some sort of old-yet-new journey through these themes. 

L to R: Jill Phillips, Sandra McCracken, Miranda and Peter Harris, and Jenna Henderson

Miranda wisely confessed, “We cannot save the world — that’s God’s business. If we stop being in-process, we’ve lost the battle.” Knowing that we cannot control the outcome is really the beginning of the path, not the end. It is a small but real thing that each of us can enter into this practice of conservation believing that we can be part of tangible renewal. For some, it might take the shape of educating or gardening. For others it might look like banking or engineering, a public office or scientific research. It takes all kinds to accomplish the greater good. And it matters for us to practice renewal. It matters because God loves what He made, and when you love someone, you are drawn to love what they love.

At this invitation, we see that the earth is full of remarkable displays of God’s glory (Psalm 104). As we join together in earth-enjoyment, we come not just as individuals, but as a diverse family of people. This co-laboring to bring healing and wholeness is a simple call and yet a difficult one to abide.

This kind of unity is a challenge every day right under my own roof. In our family of four, from morning until night, we shift our weight back and forth to try our best to respond to the will and desires of each person. And therein is the conflict. My youngest child is three years old and she shows her will in full color. I, too, have a strong will, but a more grown-up version. The same goes for the other two. We each want things our own way. Sometimes we want to be left alone to have it our own way, but we need each other. We get frustrated. We want things to work but they don’t always work. And if Mick Jagger is right, that “you can’t always get what you want,” then could there be a higher objective for our desire?

The result of how we go about getting what we want extends out from individual families to neighborhoods, then cities, countries, and even out into the atmosphere surrounding our planet. Together we multiply our potential for sustainability, and together we multiply our potential for destruction. We react to each other with changing shades of conflict and complacency because we desire to have things our own way. Meanwhile, the honeybees in the clover fields, the fish in the ocean, and the polar bears on the ice caps go about their day-to-day lives. Their health and wholeness is directly and profoundly affected by how we work out our desires.  

Jonathan Edwards, the great intellectual and theologian, made the case that we have free will, but that at any given moment we are slaves to our greatest desire. And our desires will function to guide our behavior whether we acknowledge them or not. James K.A. Smith, philosophy professor and author, puts it this way in his bookDesiring the Kingdom: “Our love is aimed from the fulcrum of our desire — the habits that constitute our character, or core identity. And the way our love or desire gets aimed in specific directions is through practices that shape, mold, and direct our love.”

I confess that I am more than a little weary of my same old practices. I want to wake up and name my desires, to bring them out into the light. I want to see things as they are so that I can change and be changed. This is the beginning of care and conversation, whether it’s about protecting dolphins, or about the community garden, or about policy making on Capitol Hill.  

No matter your life station, there is still some small good to be done. Maybe we can’t change the world, but we can do something. This summer, as we celebrate my parents’ 50 years of marriage, I realize that they have built 50 years of good things, pouring themselves into their family. They taught me to love the things that they love, shaping my desire for beauty and biology, and now I am able to spend some of that inheritance on my own little ones. No one may notice whether or not you recycle that cup when nobody is looking, or if you ride your bike to work, or if you teach your young nephew the difference between maple and oak trees. But a few small habits aligned for the greater good can add up to a whole garden of hope. And hope, like an eager seed, points us to a day coming when God’s green earth will be made new. 

*Sandra McCracken is an independent singer-songwriter whose smart, soulful blend of folk and gospel is as progressive as it is timeless. In the past 13 years, McCracken has released seven studio albums and two duo EPs with her husband Derek Webb; most recently, she has teamed up with a side band, Rain for Roots, to record and produce an album of children's songs. She is a founding contributor of the Indelible Grace hymn project, and her re-tuned hymns are sung in congregations across the country. McCracken currently lives, writes, and records at her home in East Nashville, Tennessee, with her husband, Derek Webb, and their two children.

A New releise from Eerdmans Press

An interview in “The New Evangelicals” by Marcia Pally Professor of multicultual studies at the New York University with Tri Robinson, Senior Pastor, Boise Vineyard Church concerning issues of social justice -

TR: When Jesus first started his public ministry he went to his home town of Nazareth. He entered the temple and was handed the scroll of the prophet Isaiah to be read before the people. He opened it to what we know today as Isaiah 61. He read, “The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because the Lord has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives…” and so on. It was a well known messianic passage, and after he had finished he announced that he was the Messiah, and that in a manner of speaking Isaiah’s words would be his job description.

The point is, if healing the brokenhearted, setting the captives free and ministering to the poor was his job description then we believe it is ours as well. This kind of ministry is more needed in the context of today’s world than ever. For example, we live in a world where many are held captive to addictions and extreme poverty and even such atrocities as human trafficking. Here at the Boise Vineyard we hold the conviction that Christians must express the heart of God by helping to be part of the solution to human suffering and world crises.

The world is becoming more hostile every day, not just in man’s inhumanity to man, but environmentally as well. In Matthew 25 Jesus exhorted his followers to minister to the extreme poor when he said, “I was thirsty and you gave me something to eat…” telling them (and us) that to provide clean water for the thirsty is ministry. I never fully understood this passage until my wife and I experienced the extreme poverty in Zambia, Africa a few years ago. It was there that we became aware of just how much of the world’s fresh water is undrinkable, and how it is literally killing people.

MP: Does this reflect a shift in church activism?

TR: I have a personal perspective on why much of the church in America has been negative towards issues of social justice and ministries such as environmental stewardship. I believe the pushback started as far back as the seventies during the Jesus Movement. During that time there was a huge emphasis on eschatology (the study of the end times.) We believed that things like plagues, increased violence and natural disaster were birth pangs of the last days before the second coming of Jesus. We thought that they were just a part of God’s plan. As a result, we put our emphasis on evangelism (getting people to heaven) rather than diving into the crises that caused human suffering.

During that time, some Christians felt that they could better control social change through politics than through ministries of compassion and as a result the religious right was formed. Things rapidly became polarized between what was perceived to be liberal and conservative agendas. Everyone took sides and was willing to die for them. Issues such as social justice and the environment somehow fell on the liberal side of the line and many churches turned their backs on them.

As a pastor I do not believe that telling people how to vote is my job but rather presenting the kingdom of God in such a way that people will want to return to the valid ministry of Jesus. People love our church because we do care for the poor and partner with other agencies that share our conviction on these matters.

MP: What kind?

TR: We work with groups like the Boise Rescue Mission and City Lights (a women’s shelter.) These are Christian groups, but we also work in the local jails and prisons. We have worked with agencies like the Forest Service, Fish and Game as well as a secular environmental conservation group. I was asked to speak at this conservation group’s convention a few years ago even though we have clearly been on opposite sides of the abortion issue. They recognized that I authentically cared about the importance of the environment and overlooked the thing that polarized us.

I don’t want to be perceived as their enemy even though we don’t see eye to eye on every issue. I have even met with our local ACLU leader here in Idaho. I do tend to get angry at the ACLU because I believe they have been illogical about many things I am passionate about. But, I also discovered that by spending some time together we could agree and connect on many other important issues. They care about people, but because of their misconception of who Jesus is, they have seen the Christian church as irrelevant to their cause.

This country was founded on the Christian faith but we are clearly a secular nation now, and to be effective we need to understand it. I do believe every Christian should vote. I think it is an American responsibility, but I never tell our people who to vote for. I believe if they have God’s heart they will figure it out for themselves.

I, for one, would hate to lose my freedom to openly express my faith in a nation that once honestly meant it when they said, “In God we trust.” The truth is that the way things are going, I fear even losing our non-profit tax status. This would really damage our ability to care the poor to the degree that we do. I will admit that there are probably some churches that may not deserve it. Churches were originally granted non-profit status because they were the nation’s welfare agency, and if we are doing what Jesus called us to we still would be. Honestly, I do believe we can do it much more effectively and at a fraction of the cost of government agencies because much of the work is done by volunteers with a heart to serve those in need.

In the case of receiving grant money for specific outreach ministries, it has mostly come through other Christian organizations. But, the largest portion of our financial provision is collected in our Sunday offerings. As stewards that are accountable for the funds we have been given, we have learned to operate with little to no waste. We try to use every penny wisely because we have so few of them.

MP: OK-you don’t take government funds so that you can preserve a religious approach in your ministries. Is that the same for co-religionist hiring?

TR: If we had to hire people who didn’t share our values, it wouldn’t work. We do what we do because of a biblical mandate and a heart to serve God. Outside of that, we would have little motivation.

MP: If someone has your values but isn’t in your church?

TR: We have teachers in our elementary school who aren’t members here and neither is one of our accountants, but they do share our faith in Christ. And, though not on our church payroll, we have worked with Jews and Catholics alike on the environmental issues and have more than once asked a Jewish Rabbi to lead us through a Seder service.

MP: You have said if we take abortion off the table…

TR: …then we can focus on other things. Please understand that abortion is a huge factor for us, especially when it comes to choosing who to vote for. But, I also see that the environment is killing people, especially young children. Over 80 percent of infant mortality in the developing world is water-related. For me that is a ‘sanctity of life’ issue also. In fact our i-61 Ministry–formerly called “Re:Form,” www.i-61.org– has been trying to work on every front. (“i-61” stands for Isaiah 61.) There are seven circles in i-61: world hunger, health, environmental decline, human trafficking and social injustice, illiteracy, corrupt leadership and spiritual deadness. We are in the process of building schools and ministries to prepare people to work in all seven areas. It is our desire to be a model for churches across the country who share our heart for these things. Many pastors are afraid of these ministries because of the stigma of liberalism–which is really crazy in my thinking since they are all so clearly biblical issues.

MP: Do you partner with groups to reduce abortion?

TR: We do, but only those that share our heart to minister in the compassion of Jesus. We actually provide facility space here on our campus to one such agency. But, here is the thing. We believe it is an injustice to tell a young girl who is pregnant, broke and scared not to have an abortion if we’re not willing to stand with her through her crisis. At the clinic we house, Stanton Health Care Clinic, they provide not only counseling but also pre- and post-natal care for those women (many young girls) who find themselves facing an unexpected pregnancy. Through the services provided at the clinic, they lovingly take these young girls by the hand, walking them through the entire process, while providing invaluable support to them as they choose the path of bringing a little one into the world. In the past, many have done otherwise when confronted with this type of situation, and all in the name of Christianity. Unfortunately it may not have expressed the love of Jesus but rather a spirit of condemnation.

Frankly I am saddened that there have been some from our camp that have operated out of an antagonistic judgmental spirit. We must stick to our convictions but we need to teach our people to embrace and operate in the fruits of the Spirit – love, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, and self control. It’s not just what we say, but also the heart in which it is said. I am grieved at the mean-spiritedness that often comes through some of those who have airtime. Sometimes I think Christians perceive these people as apostles rather than the radio and TV commentators that they really are. We as Christians should be in the trenches serving the broken world instead of reacting and arguing with those we disagree with about the reasons and causes of the crises.

Concerning politics it would be great to see a movement evolve with the righteous values of the conservative right blended with the idealism and heart for the poor of the liberal left.

MP: What does that mean in practice?

TR: That’s the hard part isn’t it? Here is the deal. Change requires what I call a ripple effect. For example, I tell people, “We will never change the global environment if we don’t first change the environment of people’s hearts.” One of the main characteristics of becoming Christ-like is to become others-centered. If I authentically have Christ in my heart, I gain a new worldview. I see others as more important than myself. I clean up the toxic waste in my heart and it affects my thinking which in turn changes my motives. I no longer have the idea that “I want mine and I want it now” but instead desire to preserve things for the sake of future generations. I tell people if you want your kids to value environmental stewardship tell them to clean up their rooms. First our attitudes change then our practices change. We paint our houses and mow our lawns as much for the sake of our neighbors as for our own satisfaction. As we care about our own world around us, eventually we begin to care about the planet for the same reason. It all has to start in the heart. That’s why I’ve dedicated my life to the only thing I know of that changes hearts – and that’s Jesus.

I do struggle with things like the current [Obama] administration’s stimulus package simply because I don’t think it’s going to be good for future generations. In the long run, I think it will simply bring more future financial bondage. Personally I think it would be better to sacrifice now in an effort to deal with our national debt rather than to impose that on our grandchildren and their children. It’s just not forward thinking.

MP: What would you say to a gay couple in a stable, loving relationship?

TR: A gay relationship is not what the Bible spells out as being stable or right. For that reason it’s not okay for me, but then neither is any adulterous relationship. It’s like divorce; the Bible says God hates divorce, but what we must understand is – he in no way hates those who are caught in it. He so loves them that he sacrificed his life for them. He just hates the stuff that takes away from wholeness and spiritual and emotional health.  That’s Isaiah 61, “He came to heal the broken hearted.”

MP: What about conscience-based social service refusal?

TR: I believe it is absolutely wrong to not allow doctors the right of refusal to perform abortions if it goes against their convictions. For one thing we will lose many good doctors if this is forced upon them. Many will opt to give up their practice if they are made to go against their religious and ethical convictions when it comes to the sanctity of life and preserving it.

MP: Teaching creationism or intelligent design in public schools?

TR: I used to be a secondary school science teacher before I entered the ministry. I taught it both ways and let my students make up their own minds. I think that’s part of the intellectual process. I for one actually came to my belief in God through science. I can’t see how anyone can closely look at the creation and miss that fact that there must be a creator. Darwinism is a theory. The Bible is based on faith. When a theory attempts to undo or disprove faith, that’s a problem for me.  The fact is, though, from my own experience I believe God is much bigger than the bias of a teacher. If parents and the church are doing their job effectively children will eventually discover the truth concerning God and the universe no matter what the world throws at them.

MP: Moments of silence in schools?

TR: Honestly I think in this day and age prayer in schools is a non-issue. A family has to take their responsibility seriously when it comes to teaching faith and values. When I sent my kids to public schools I sent them to get an education. Frankly I didn’t want non-Christian or even nominal-Christian teachers leading them in prayer or teaching them the Bible.

MP: Religious symbols in public places?

TR: It’s ridiculous to take those away. A framed copy of the Ten Commandments in a courtroom is a statement that our country cares about justice and was established in Godliness. If nothing else, it is an historical document. It is another case of the small loud minority imposing their prejudice on the majority.

MP: What about other religions having their symbols?

TR: Forcing a population to take down religious symbols is discrimination and the thought of it offends me. Historically every time a government has forced that issue on its population it has lead to socialism, communism and in the end, bondage and pain.

*

By Robert Campbell*, Pastor of Santa Margarita Community Church

I find myself listening to this interview with Peter Harris again and again. I sat in the room while it took place, but still I go back to it often. Those moments as a fly on the wall set something free in me and I make mental pilgrimages to them often. On one of those recent mental trips, while mowing my lawn, Peter Harris asked me a question (not literally, but you know what I mean):  “What does an A Rocha-shaped church look like?”. I waited and waited for the gloriously details of a church in the ditches of creation care, but he didn’t answer his own question. He left it up to others to live out and discover. Therefore, as a deliberate and dedicated lover of the local church, on that pilgrimage with a community of local people, I feel compelled to try and answer: What does an A Rocha shaped church look like?

An A Rocha-shaped church starts with a people in a particular place who are willing to do the hard stuff. They do it out of their holistic theology of Christ’s lordship over all of life, and with the leadership of a pastor who is also a real person living in that real place. I realize I am saying nothing new. New is not the point. Believing and acting are the point. Any definition of a local church must begin, with real people. People with actual names like Matt, Su, Ben and Serenity, who are not only fellow parishioners but also neighbors. When an A Rocha-shaped church prays, “Our Father,” these are the faces that come to mind. Those faces have stories to tell. The stories involve joys like marriages, babies being born and relationships being restored. They also include many human sorrows caused from death, brokenness and simple sin between people in their circles. That’s the way it is with real people in an A Rocha-shaped church. The actual people matter more than theoretical people who might attend one day if we run the right advertisement or offer the right program.

The real people are also dirt people. Maybe “dust” people is a better description. Whenever I use the word “dirt” in a sermon I am reminded by my geologist friend, Bonnie, that dirt is what you find on the floor. I am referring to “soil,” she says. I get it, and A Rocha friend Mark McReynolds tells me it’s not a “bird,” it’s a male Western Tanager. I am learning, slowly. The book of Genesis uses the word “dust” to describe the creation of mankind; we are dust and breath, body and Spirit. An A Rocha-shaped church will be made up of dust people. Dust people are not fake people living in a fake world, but a desperately practical people working it all out in the dirt of daily life. They are concerned with every step and every act for the good of the people they live with in the place where they live together. A dust person builds a fence around the yard and puts the unfinished side facing inward so their neighbors see the clean part. A dust person hears about A Rocha’s kestrel program in NW Washington and asks how it might benefit their grape-growing neighbors in California. My people are dust people and they are the real thing. They are Christian all the way down to the dirt.

What we believe comes out of our fingertips. This is always true. An A Rocha-shaped church is formed out of an A Rocha-shaped theology, a theology that includes the dirt. We believe that God is the owner of all things. Creation is His and His will is going to be accomplished in it. We believe that God has given us the responsibility to steward His creation towards His ends, which includes both people and place since it is impossible to separate them. We believe all of our daily actions on this planet we call home are acts of worship towards Jesus. We believe all this because Jesus Christ is the Lord of all of life, not just the so-called “spiritual” parts. Our working, playing and loving are all spiritual acts when done by faith in the finished work of Jesus on the cross. While our culture relegates religion to the private sphere, the God of the Scriptures does no such thing. As believers, we know what we go about our daily lives under the smile of God because God is happy with Jesus and we belong to Jesus. Because that is firm and settled, we are free to just try the hard stuff to see if it makes a difference, and it will make a difference.

When questioned about what A Rocha should look like in particular place, Peter Harris is known to answer, “I don’t know, I don’t live there”. He is right, only the people living in place really know how people concerns and place concerns come together. In my place they come together between ranchers and environmentalists, both who love the land, but speak a very different language.

What is it in your place? An A Rocha-shaped church will explore the needs of their own place and be willing to just do the hard stuff because it needs to get done. Don’t know where to begin? Come and see what Marty and Emiko have going at the Santa Barbara A Rocha project site. Go see the great work Dave is doing with the watershed in NW Washington.You will be inspired, challenged, taught and encouraged. Then you can go home and try something.

Me? I’m that Pastor. I live here. I am effecting and affected by my people and my place. Their stories become part of my story and their circles become my circles. It is my responsibility to lead my congregation in learning to value each other and the place where we live. It is the charge of God to me to bless my people with a truly human spirituality that affirms the redemptive power of their daily lives outside of the church gathering. Today, I offer that blessing to you. If you are an ecologically oriented believer trying to find your way to bring people and place together, but not feeling the affirmation of your local church: you are doing a good work, the Lord bless you and keep you. If you are ecological worker, daily striving to do good without the ordination that the church gives to ministers or medical doctors: you are loving your neighbor well, the Lord make his face to shine upon you and be gracious to you.

*Robert Campbell is Pastor of Santa Margarita Community Church, an Evangelical Free Church on the Central Coast of California.

Renewal's partner organization, the Creation Care Study Program, has a campus in the beautiful New Zealand town of Kaikoura. Right now, Kaikoura is faced with the impending threat of offshore oil drilling. 

by Tom Rowley

Around the world, people are starving, forests are dwindling, rivers are drying up and species are going extinct. The reasons, of course, vary: from corruption to desperation to ineptness and more. But the root cause—whatever the intervening ones—is that humankind has ignored and distorted our role in stewarding the Earth--our first and primary role according to Genesis. The ecological crisis, then, is actually a church crisis.

For decades, that crisis went unnoticed—if only by the church. Fortunately, the danger that the church wouldn’t “get” environmental stewardship now seems past. Not so fortunately, a new danger lurks: that we’ll get it wrong.

Which isn’t to suggest malicious intent. (Though given we’re a fallen people, there is certainly some of that. No names here but follow the money…) Rather, it is simply to say that we must carefully examine both our motives and our methods. Both “why” and “how” are essential. Both distinguish a biblical approach from a secular one, which by anyone’s estimation, including most secular environmentalists, has failed. So while it’s right to care for the poor who are disproportionately harmed by environmental degradation, just as it’s proper to want rivers for my children’s children to swim in, these are not the primary biblical reasons. Nor are recycling or governmental regulations or eating locally comprehensive responses. All are good and necessary; all—individually and even collectively—are insufficient. And if they are all we’ve got, then we’ve got it wrong.

Getting it right, of course, is a long, difficult process. Case in point: A Rocha, the Christian conservation organization I work for, has been at it nearly 30 years now in 19 countries and we do not have it all figured out. We have, however, with help from some of the world’s best and brightest theologians and conservationists, learned some really important lessons.

It is worship. Caring for the Earth is a right and worshipful response to God in recognition that all things have been created through Jesus and for him, that in him all things hold together, and that through his death on the cross all things are redeemed. It is worship of God the Creator, not his creation.

It is relationship. Caring for God’s creation is a way of lovingly relating to God, to ourselves, to our neighbors and to all of nature. It is a way of living.

While it serves other purposes, it is right to do regardless. Stewarding the Earth is directly connected to other biblical commands—caring for the poor, loving our neighbors and sharing the Gospel. But it is not strictly utilitarian. God values his creation simply because he made it. We should do no less.

It requires both passion and grace. As with any other aspect of Kingdom living, caring for creation is by turns gratifying and frustrating. There are blessings and there are challenges. And we must not let our passion for creation or for our projects outrun our grace for people—those we work with, those we seek to influence and even those who seem to stand in our way.

It is a “get to”, not just a “have to”.  If we are open to them, the blessings that come from relating rightly to God, self, neighbors and all of creation far outweigh the sacrifices and inconveniences involved. With gratitude and obedience comes joy.

This is not a program. Showing God’s love to all creation—human and non-human alike—is not a series of tasks or boxes to check. It cannot be summed up, nor packaged. It can only be lived—as worship, in relationship, with both passion and grace, because we get to.

The road to “getting it right” is long, uphill and at times full of potholes (none of which negate the joy). These principles serve as guardrails. In future posts, I'll write more about them and how they translate into actual projects.

By John Humphreys

I subscribe to the BRILLIANT “Parasite of the Day” web page.

As the organizers put it – “The United Nations declared 2010 the International Year of Biodiversity. In celebration of the enormous diversity of parasites and to highlight their importance, we created this blog, which showcased a species of parasite every day. Now that 2010 is over, we will continue to add more parasites from time to time.”

All the way through 2010, all of us subscribers were entertained, educated and disgusted in equal measure by the extraordinary variety of organisms which make their living off other creatures.
Some are more-or-less tolerable for the host: the mistletoe, which all of us love to kiss under, is not often lethal to the tree it grows on and the ubiquitous head louse is merely an irritation to us, although has school districts and parents up in arms when they see it.

Some are genuinely spectacular – like the largest flower in the world, sported by the rainforest parasite Rafflesia arnoldii. Others are actually parasitoids rather than parasites because, simply, they always kill their host – the newly discovered and very worrying “white nose syndrome”, a fungus that chokes hibernating bats, is a case in point.

Then there are the plutocrats of the parasite world – the hyperparasites, who parasitize parasites themselves. An example is the tiny wasp Caenacis inflexa, which attacks other wasps like Eurytoma rosae and Glyphomerus stigma…which themselves are parasitic on  the “gall wasp” Diplolepis rosae…the ecology of plant galls is endlessly fascinating.

Of course, there are some genuinely terrifying creatures like the nightmare-inducing tongue-eating louse and the ghastly crab-controlling barnacle.

Now, many of these beasts…and plants…and fungi…have exquisitely exacting tastes. They may only target one single organism to live off. While this type of deal must have some advantages for the parasite, there is one enormous downside: your host dies out, you die out.

Which leads me to the tick, Ixodes neuquensis. It is only found on a gorgeous little opossum-like creature, the (confusingly named) ‘mountain monkey’ Dromiciops gliroides. This charming little thing lives in South America and its forest home is being torn down.
When it goes, when it is gone forever, and two things will happen.

Firstly, we will never see it alive again. Films don’t do the same for me, sorry. It will be gone, and nothing this side of the Second Coming can bring it back.

Secondly, a variety of living creatures dependent on it will join it in oblivion. Not just the tick and other parasites; this marsupial mammal is the only known way that a unique plant –Tristerix corymbosus, a type of mistletoe - can spread its seeds (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dromiciops_gliroides and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tristerix).

Ironically this mistletoe only parasitizes two cacti. So the whole ecosystem is teetering on the edge of oblivion. As I say ad nauseam, the only way for you and I to do anything about this is to help preserve the forest. And spread the word. Thanks for reading.

Cute, almost gone.