This subject has finally begun to get some serious attention in evangelical circles, and all i have to say is that it’s about time. Ever since I was a young boy, I have always found the typical Christian perspective on the environment difficult to understand. When people were chaining themselves to trees to save a patch of forest, for some reason the Christian thing to do was haul them off to jail, level the forest, and make room for new factories and shopping centers to be built. Hooray for industrialization! I understand that most tree-hugging types tend to have a “save the whales, kill the unborn babies” kind of worldview… but can’t we at least agree that whales are worth saving if possible?

Don’t get me wrong. I am not a tree hugging hippie, nor am I against advances in technology, nor am I against new factories or shopping malls. Someone has pointed out that the Bible begins in a garden and ends in a city. I am all for progress. But I am not in favor of progress at any price, especiialy when the price is as costly as God’s beautiful creation. Here are a few reasons why I believe it is every Christian’s responsibility to care for the environment.

1. God has entrusted us with His creation.

This reason ought to be enough for us. We are called to be stewards of His creation. He made this beautiful world for us to live in. It is perfectly suited to sustain human life. He engineered it for us, and He placed humans here as caretakers of it.

Gen 2:15 “The LORD God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it.” Working the earth means cultivating it, nurturing it so that it produces more and can sustain more life. God gave us dominion over the earth, not so we could do whatever we want with it, but so we could care for it, tend it, work it, even improve it in some ways, with new technologies, etc.  God placed us here, and said, “Now, show me what you can do with what I have given you”. I am reminded of the parable of the talents – we are stewards of all God has given us, and this applies to His Creation which He loves. Let’s try not to mess it up.

2. To the extent that we allow creation to deteriorate, we are distorting God’s ability to communicate to us.

Ps 19:1-4a “The heavens declare the glory of God;
       the skies proclaim the work of his hands.

 2 Day after day they pour forth speech;
       night after night they display knowledge.

 3 There is no speech or language
       where their voice is not heard. ^[a]

 4 Their voice ^[b] goes out into all the earth,
       their words to the ends of the world.”

God communicates to people through his creation. Let’s not mess it up.

3. God reveals his nature to us through creation.

Rom. 1:19 “For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse.”

The beauty and order of creation are clues to us as to what kind of God we serve. He is creative, artistic, orderly, complex, etc…. When species of plants and animals go extinct, there are facets of God’s nature that we can no longer appreciate through those specific parts of his creation. It is difficult to appreciate the beauty of our Creator by observing a beautiful sunset which is obscured by smog, or by observing a beautiful ocean front with garbage littering the shoreline.

4. It is a way to “love your neighbor as yourself”.

The parable of the good samaritan redefined for the pharisees who counts as a “neighbor”. Jesus opened it up to mean “anyone in need.” Can we not also consider future generations as “neighbors” of a sort? I certainly want my children to have clean drinking water and clean air. I want the same for your children. To the extent that we pollute, waste, and live excessively, we are messing up the environment for our current neighbors, and for future generations. This is not loving behavior… in fact, it is a little selfish.

5. Heaven is a place on earth.

Contrary to popular Christian fiction, and much popular theology, this world ( ie. planet earth) will probably where we spend eternity. And somehow the things that we do in this life carry on into our resurrected lives on the New Earth. (Jesus’ resurrection body still bore the marks of his crucifixion, he ate food, etc.)   This is not something I have studied very much, but I do believe that when Jesus returns to restore the heavens and earth, he will indeed RESTORE this earth. It will not be destroyed and made new. It will be transformed, much in the same way that our bodies will be transformed. If Jesus’ body is any clue as to what the new earth will look like, it is at least possible to imagine that the ’scars’ we create in this life will somehow carry over into the restored earth.

This last point, I can live without. I am sketchy on my eschatology, but I think the other 4 points still carry the day.

God is green, the earth and all that is in it belong to him… let’s not mess it up.