What a wonderful world
The goodness and sufficiency of creation
Welcome to this first in a series of six small-group sessions exploring why and how the church should respond to the climate emergency. The first three sessions will look at “Why?” and the second three at “How?”.
The title for this series of studies comes from a short video clip produced by Hannah Malcolm for the Nazarene Theological College. You can watch this below:
Hannah has recently editted a book “Words for a Dying World, Stories of Grief and Courage from the Global Church” which is a very valuable, if challenging, read. The original video is available of the NTC YouTube channel.
Hannah justifies the church responding to the climate emergency in terms of beauty, truth and justice. This week we’re going to focus on beauty. I’ve given the session the title, “What a wonderful world” and sub-title, “The Goodness and Sufficiency of Creation”.
The Goodness of Creation
We’ll start off by looking at the inherent goodness of the world. There are many passages in the Bible that refer to this. Seven times during the first creation story in Genesis (1:1-2:3), for example, God stands and looks at what he has created and proclaims sees that it is good. There are many psalms that also exalt the beauty of creation and positive nature imagery recurs throughout the Old Testament. This continues into the New Testament but to a more limited extent.
We’re going to listen now to Psalm 104 in the Message translation. This is a video with images. We suggest you look at these for the first few seconds at least but you might then prefer to close your eyes and let your mind generate your own pictures. Be conscious if any of the words of the psalm cause you to remember particular times in your life when you’ve rejoiced in the wonder of nature.
Spend a short time (a minute?) in silence and just reflect prayerfully on a particular time when you’ve felt particularly close to God in nature.
Question 1: Where, when and how have you encountered God in nature?
If you are working through this material in a group, then you might want to start off by sharing the situations that you each reflected upon during your minute of silence. When you’ve done that have a slightly broader discussion about where, when and how we encounter God in nature.
The Sufficiency of Creation
As well as the goodness of creation another theme that resonates throughout the Bible is that of the sufficiency of creation. God has given us enough for what we need. There are numerous passages that reflect this. Jesus tells the parable of the Rich Fool who accumulates more than he needs in bigger and bigger barns but then dies early and finds he has nothing (Luke 12:13-21). This theme echoes the story of the manna that was given to the Israelites when they were wandering in the wilderness (Exodus 16). God told the people to take as much as they wanted but no more. If the people took more than they required, then the manna became infested with maggots by the following morning. The passage even records Moses being angry with any people that he saw taking more than they needed. In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus told his followers that they should not worry about where food and clothing were going to come from. “Not even Solomon in all his splendour was dressed like one of these”. In the Lords’ prayer we pray “Give us this day our daily bread”, we don’t pray for cake or an evening out at Pizza Express. We just pray that we will be provided with the essentials.
We’re going to look in more detail at one particular story. When Jesus sends out his disciples on mission, he explicitly forbids them from taking anything but the bare essentials with them. Living simply and with only what God supplies is linked in this story to the mission of the disciples to proclaim that the “Kingdom of heaven has come near”.
Matthew 10:1-4, 7-10 (NIV)
Jesus called his twelve disciples to him and gave them authority to drive out impure spirits and to heal every disease and sickness. These are the names of the twelve apostles: first, Simon (who is called Peter) and his brother Andrew; James son of Zebedee, and his brother John; Philip and Bartholomew; Thomas and Matthew the tax collector; James son of Alphaeus, and Thaddaeus; Simon the Zealot and Judas Iscariot, who betrayed him.
As you go, proclaim this message: ‘The kingdom of heaven has come near.’ Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse those who have leprosy, drive out demons. Freely you have received; freely give. “Do not get any gold or silver or copper to take with you in your belts — no bag for the journey or extra shirt or sandals or a staff, for the worker is worth his keep.
Question 2: What new insights can we get from reading this and the other familiar stories in the context of the climate emergency?
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Question 3: Should we make living simply part of our mission and outreach and how can we do this?
You might explore whether going out with so little equipment and few possessions is integral to the disciples’ mission or just a coincidental detail. Is this a model for how all Christians should live all the time or is it a specific to a small group of people for a short period of time?
In this series we are going to make use of some videos from the Lausanne Movement’s global classroom. Let’s listen to what they consider are the Biblical Foundations of Creation Care. As you listen make a mental note of anything that strikes you and you’d like to talk about. We’ll watch just over 3 mins of the video and then pause for a chat before watching the second half and having another.
Question 4: Which did you find most interesting in the video and why?
Question 5: How do you feel about the idea that Jesus died for creation as a whole rather than just for humans?
Some of you may find this more convincing and useful than others. Have a chat about this in your groups - you don’t have to agree with the speakers!
This is the end of the first session. If you are working through this as a group you might like to spend a few moments praying together in light of what you have learnt and shared.