Wednesday Word . . . God’s Creation
Joelene and I are going away this weekend for some much needed rest and lazy time. We’re making a short trip to Thermopolis, leaving tomorrow and returning sometime Sunday afternoon.
I’ve spent these past few days working on my portion of Annual Meeting stuff (Reminder: the Annual Meeting is Sunday, February 1, with 9:00 worship followed by breakfast and the meeting) and working with Monica to get the bulletins ready for this coming Sunday service.
As I was proofing the 10:00 bulletin I came to the Prayers of the People. During the Epiphany season the 10:00 service uses Form IV (found on page 388 of the BCP). I like to rotate through the various prayers during the Church year, so this certainly isn’t the first time I’ve paid attention to the prayer; but for some reason the third petition caught my attention:
Give us all a reverence for the earth as your own creation, that we might use its resources rightly in the service of others and to your honor and glory.
In this short petition we ask for a sense of reverence for the earth. In this short petition is the recognition that the earth was created by God, therefore the earth belongs to God. In this short petition is a prayer to use resources rightly – and not for ourselves but in the services of others.
This touches on everything from strip mining and logging to drilling for oil in fragile environments all in the pursuit of the almighty dollar. It touches on over-fishing and a refusal to look for alternative energy sources. It touches on the equitable distribution of food items. It touches on the heresy that my individual rights are more important that the well-being of my neighbors. And it brings to mind the famous saying, “We do not inherit the earth from our ancestors; we borrow it from our children.”
May we all do our own small part to help bring this petition to fruition.
Blessings,
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