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BY GLENN PEASE
1. THE MAJESTY OF MAN Based on
Psa. 8
2. WE ARE BORN TO RULE Based on Psa. 8:1‑9
3. SANCTIFIED SILENCE Based on
Psa. 46:1‑11
4. SAINTS IN THE COMPLAINT DEPARTMENT
Based on Psa. 77
5. THE PLEASURE OF POSITIVE THINKING Based on Psa. 84
6. THE PLEASURE OF PASSION
Based on Psa. 84
7. THE PLEASURE OF PERFECTION Based on Psa. 84
8. THE PLEASURE OF POWER Based on Psa. 84
9. THE PLEASURE OF PROGRESS
Based on Psa. 84
10. REVIVAL Based on Psa. 85:6
11. A NEW SONG Based on Psalm 96
12. THIS IS THE DAY Based on
Psa. 118:6‑14
13. TURN ON THE LIGHT BASED ON
Psa. 110:105
14. A MOUNTAIN TOP EXPERIENCE
Based on Psalm 125
15. WHAT IS SIN? Based on Psa.
51:1‑2
16. CONFESSION OF SIN Based on
Psa. 51:3
17. HONEST TO GOD Based on Psa.
51:6
1. THE MAJESTY OF MAN Based on Psa. 8
King Louis
XIV of France was once reminded by the chaplain of his court that he was a
sinner and in danger of damnation. He
shrugged his shoulders and said, "All true, no doubt, but the good God
will think twice before He casts out so good of Prince as I am." Here was a man of pride who thought of
himself more highly than he ought. On
the other hand, when the medical student defines man as "A highly
developed vertebrate, a more or less clever and successful ape, who has worsted
his competitors in the struggle for existence," we say this is foolish
pessimism, and an all together too low a view of man. What is man anyway?
J. S. Whale
wrote, "What is the truth about the nature and end of man? This is the ultimate question behind the
vast debate, the desperate struggle of our time. Ideologies‑ to use the ugly modern jargon‑are really
anthropologies. They are answers to
that question which man has not ceased to ask ever since he began asking
questions at all: Namely, what is
man?" This question becomes even
more relevant when we think of the Incarnation, for our attention is focused on
the fact that God became a man. This
adds a whole new dimension to our thinking, for whatever man is in his
essential nature God became that, and because of it we have a human
Savior.
Several
millenniums ago David asked this question from the point of view of a
believer. He looked into the starry sky
and gazed attentively at the moon, and suddenly the majesty and magnitude of it
over whelmed him. In wonder at the
great contrast between all of this and himself he cried out in amazement to
God, "What is man that thou art mindful of him, and the Son of Man that
you visit him?" If David had cause
to wonder what made him an object of God's concern, how much more do we in our
age of astronomy? Fred Hoyle of St.
John's College says that our earth is only a speck of dust, for in our galaxy
alone there are ten billion stars as big or bigger than our Sun, and there are
more than one hundred million more galaxies.
Sir
James Jeans in his book The Mysterious Universe says that the majority of stars
could be packed with hundreds of thousands of our earth, and some giants are so
large that even millions of millions of our planet could not fill them.
We are so materially insignificant that the universe
would suffer no more loss by our destruction than a vast forest would suffer by
the burning of one leaf. Who can fail
to be humbled by such facts? Someone
might say that man has gone a long way by getting to the moon. But this does not change the picture in any
measurable way. It is like the boy who,
when he heard that the Sun was 93 million miles up, asked if that was from the
ground or the top of the house? When
you are dealing with the figures involved with astronomy, anything that man
does in space is relatively insignificant.
We can only stand in awe at the magnitude of it, and ask with David,
"What is man that you are mindful of him?"
In our
search for an answer to this question we find that men fall into two categories
in their conclusions. One group is
pessimistic as to what man is, and the other group is optimistic. This is an over simplification, and it does
not mean there are not all shade of differences. You can never divide men into two camps on anything, for they
have the capacity for a great variety of opinions. Someone said that there are only two kinds of people in the world‑those
who think there are two kinds of people in the world, and those who know
better. We know better, but we are
dividing them into two camps on this question.
First of all we will look at‑
I. A BIOLOGICAL VIEW OF MAN.
By biological
I mean those who, because of ignorance or false intelligence, cannot see that
man is anymore than an animal. They see
him strictly as a product of fate and evolution, and not of creation. In other words, it is a view of man that
leaves out God. The result is
pessimism, for although they recognize that man is the animal of supreme
intelligence, they also recognize he has a pathetically poor record of applying
it. He can develop all kinds of schemes
to protect himself, and then go to war and destroy everything he developed, and
himself as well.
Bernard Shaw said that the folly of man convinced him that earth was a
cosmic insane asylum where the people on other planets brought their cases of
insanity. H. G. Wells, who was an
optimist at one time, said, "At one time my faith was: Man must go on‑conquest beyond
conquest‑but now I see man being carried more and more rapidly along the
stream of fate to degradation, suffering and death." Without God the man who sees only biological
man has no goal, and all seems so futile.
Other pessimists express their futility by defining man as‑
"A bundle of cellulose matter on its way to
become refuse."
"A voice crying in the night with no language
but a cry."
"Some random mutation on a wayside planet."
"A pigmy among the giants of creation, a puddle
reflecting a star."
"The saddest of all beasts of the
field." Homer.
The
result of this strictly biological pessimistic view of man is the philosophy
that says, "Let us eat drink and be merry, for tomorrow we die." Man loses his dignity, for he is a mere
animal living on an animal level with his life being guided by the lust of his
body. This is what leads to all kinds
of open corruption on the basis that it is realistic. This is the way man lives, and so this is the way he should be
portrayed on TV and in movies. Without
the concept of God and the soul people never ask whether or not if what is
realistic is right. For biological man
what is right is determined by what is being done. To see man as a complex animal only leads to secularism,
materialism, and pessimism. Now let's
consider‑
II. A BIBLICAL VIEW OF MAN.
No view
of man's material origin can be lower than that of the Bible, for it tells us that
God formed man from the dust of the ground.
The Bible is also clear that all has sinned, and that the heart of man
is desperately wicked. If we looked at
the biblical view of man in his sin only, we might conclude that it too leads
only to pessimism. But the Bible gives
us a balanced view that leads to a positive perspective. In verse 5 we see that man is God made. It is true he was made of dust, but God
breathed into him the breathe of life and made him just a little less than
divine. The word here for angels is
Elohim, which means God. And so man was
made a little less than God, or a little less than divine. He was made in the image of God, and for the
glory of God, and for fellowship with God.
Therefore, man is of infinite value.
Leonard
T. Towers said, "It is not that we are worth it, but that God has made us
worth it." We are worthy of God's
consideration because He made us of infinite value. Man maybe small, but he is the crown of creation. He alone has the God like capacity to think
and to reason. All the wonders of the
universe do not compare with man, for he can appreciate the wonders and beauty
of creation and praise their Creator.
Not one of the billions of stars even knows that they exist. The heavens declare the glory of God and
show it, but only man can praise his Creator and know it.
The
mistake of the pessimist is that they think only in terms of quantity and not
quality. Man is materially
insignificant, but qualitatively he is of the first rank. Man ought to know better, for they will give
more for the paint on a canvas than for enough to cover a battleship, and more
for a pearl than for a huge bolder. Man
has a standard of values that prefers the smaller over the greater because of
the quality involved. Are we to believe
that God is of less intelligence, and that he prefers, in contrast to us,
quantity rather than quality.
Is God a child who prefers the nickel to a dime
because it is bigger? All of the
arguments for pessimism based on the smallest of earth and man are foolishness,
for in spite of his smallest man is greater than all the vastness which he
sees.
The
heavens declare the glory of God, but they declare it to man. All of the beauty of creation only has
meaning because of man's God‑given gift of intelligence. The Grand Canyon, sunset, snow covered
mountains, and flowers are all for nothing without man's capacity to appreciate
them. Does the crocodile admire the
beauty of the flamingo, or the sparrow that of the cardinal? Man even in his fallen state is great in the
sight of God because God made him, and gifted him with the ability to
appreciate what He has created. He is
corrupted and like a diamond in the mud, but he is capable of being restored to
shine again in great beauty.
In
verse 4 we read that God has not only made him, but is mindful of him, and
cares for him. In spite of man's
rebellion and fall God considers man to be of infinite worth. It was while we were still sinners that
Christ died for the ungodly. Why? Because even in his fallen state man was of
great value to God. Even ungodly man is
still the most God‑like creature.
The church was wrong for centuries in holding that the earth was the
center of the universe, but spiritually they were right, for it alone, as far
as we know, is the only planet with a cross.
It alone is the scene of the incarnation where God became man to redeem
him and restore him to the splendor in which he was created.
The
biblical view gives us a balance view of man in which we can see that he is, in
the words of Pascal, "Both the glory and scum of the universe." To God he was worth the cross. "He is divine grandeur mingled with
dust." It is true that he made
shipwreck and sank in the sea of sin, but he took with him the treasure of an
eternal soul of such worth that God was willing to seek its recovery even at
the cost of the cross. Christmas is
God's answer to the fall of man. Deity
descended to the depths to deliver man from damnation, degradation and death,
and to restore him to the dignity, which is rightfully his as the image of God.
God
so loved the world, that is the people and not the plains‑men and not the
mountains, that He gave His only begotten Son.
When the Christ child was born the brilliant star shown overhead. Which was the most precious to God‑the
star or the baby? In spite of its
material superiority certainly no one would say the star was more
precious. The Psalmist goes from the
heavens to the infants in verse 2, and the impression is, what a drop, but
after God has become a babe Himself in Christ, it is not a drop, but a
rise. In Christ man has been lifted to
the place of highest dignity. When
Christ ascended He did so as God‑man, and man was crowned with glory and
honor in the highest sense.
Christianity has always held to the high worth and dignity of man. When Constantine was converted and the Roman
Empire became nominally Christian, legislation was passed to abolish the
branding of criminals and debtors on the face because man was made in the image
of divine beauty. In contrast to the
practice of the day Christians loved all children. Adolf Deissman found and Egyptian papyrus containing a letter
from an Egyptian worker to his expectant wife in which he wrote, "If it is
a boy, let it live, if it is a girl, cast it out." It was a common practice to expose and
abandon any child, who was not wanted, but in 300 years Christianity abolished
all such degrading practices.
God
made man, He loves man, he redeemed man, and, therefore, anything that degrades
man and makes his life cheap is not the will of God, but is contrary to the
whole revelation of God. The
incarnation was the act of God whereby He said that man is the masterpiece of
His creation, and is just a little lower than divine. James Mackey said so wisely, "The baby came because God
could not get enough of Himself into anything else to show forth His true
nature. There is more of God in the
helpless infant lying in the hay beside the cattle then there is in all of the
stars and moons of limitless space."
Let the pessimist hang their heads and despair at the smallness of man,
but we will rejoice, for no man is small or worthless before God.
Muretus, the 17th century French scholar fell ill while he was in exile
for being a Protestant. He was taken to
a pauper's hospital in Lombardy. The
doctors who were consulting about him spoke in Latin thinking that this pauper
could not understand the tongue of the learned. One of them said, "Let us try an experiment with this
worthless creature." Muretus
startled them by saying in Latin, "Will you call worthless one for whom
Christ did not distain to die?" No
man is worthless for whom Christ died, and He died for all men.
It is true that man is a strange mixture
of deity and dust, and of love and lust.
He has the capacity to murder or to be a martyr; to live a life of crime
and ignorance, or of compassion or inspiration. Sin has made him abominable, but grace can make him
admirable. Christ can restore the
lowest to the place of man's original glory when God said, "Let us make
man in our image." A poet wrote,
Hark! The
Eden trees are stirring,
Slow and solemn to you're hearing!
Plane and cedar, palm and fir,
Tamarisk and juniper,
Each is throbbing in vibration
Since that crowning of creation. E. B. Browning.
The
whole story of the history of salvation is about God's acts in history on
behalf of man. The creation,
incarnation, crucifixion, resurrection, and ascension are all for the
restoration and exaltation of man to the place of God's original intention,
that we might praise Him and fellowship with Him forever. The point is, that a Christian should have a
high respect for the dignity of his own soul, and of those of all people. Someone has said, "Self‑conceit
may be objectionable, but self‑contempt is ruinous." One can be humble and still have a great
sense of self‑respect, for both are essential to an adequate Christian
life. The pessimist looks at the
greatness of all God has made and says, "Man is a microbe clinging to a
grain of sand, and if there is a God, He is too great to care for
me." In contrast the Christian
looks at it all and says, "Such a God calls me to be great."
What
is man? He is that creature who is made
a little less than divine, but who fell from this exalted position through
sin. Nevertheless, like a diamond in
the mud he is worth picking up. Even as
a sinner he is precious in the sight of his Creator, and so God out of His
infinite love and mercy sent His Son to redeem man and restore him to
fellowship with Himself. This makes man
the greatest object of God's concern in all the wondrous magnitude of His
creation.
He is the only creature God ever made that was worth
the cross. The price which is paid for
anything determines its value. This
means that man is the highest valued part of the universe, for God paid the
highest possible price for his recovery.
This means that if your life is not involved in God's plan to rescue the
diamond in the mud and restore it to a place of beauty, you are missing out on
the highest goal in life. Your answer
to the question, what is man will determine so much of what your life will
be. The story of the Good Samaritan reveals
this clearly. The thieves said,
"The world is mine and I will take it." The priest and Levite said, "The world is mine and I will
keep it." The Good Samaritan said,
"The world is ours, and I will share it." He alone had the mind of Christ for he saw the value of man and
desired to contribute to his recovery.
May God help us all to have a Christ like view of what man is.
2. WE ARE BORN TO RULE Based on Psa. 8:1‑9
David did
not need a telescope to consider the heavens and the wonders of God's
creation. What he could see with the
naked eye left him in awe at the majesty of God. Today we go far beyond the vision of David, not only into the
macrocosm of the vast universe, but because of new instruments we know what
David could never imagine. We know of
the microcosm that God has created that is even more basic to life on
earth. Back in the late 80's Sallie
Chisholm, a biological oceanographer at MIT made a mind‑boggling
discovery about how God runs this world.
She and her colleagues discovered billions of trillions of zillions of
plants that man never even dream existed.
Man never dreamed that plants could be so small.
It was
only a few years earlier that Bob Guillard, the researcher who built up the
famous Bigelow collection of phytoplankton, said of these single cell plants of
the ocean that he discovered, "A hundred years of oceanography and the
most abundant being in the world wasn't recognized by anybody." But like some kind of sports record it soon
fell, and is no longer the record holder, for Chisholm discovered plants and
even greater abundance. There are as
many as 3 million of them in every ounce of ocean water.
They
were not discovered by a powerful microscope, but by a new tool called the flow
cytometer. Sea water is compressed into
a thin stream and the cells are marched single file two thousand per second
past an interrogation point where they are bathed in laser light which causes
them to fluoresce. The color of the
florescence indicates what pigment a cell contains. The cells then can be separated into species much like you would
distinguish a flow of Japanese and Swedes without looking at them if you had
information about their size and hair color.
If you had a flow of people all of whom had red hair, and none of them
over 4 feet tall you would know you had discovered a new people. That is how Chisholm discovered the new
plant. They are 30 millionths of an inch
across with a unique type of chlorophyll.
You
might say, "Who cares, and what difference does this make to
us?" First of all, God made them
the most abundant form of life on this planet.
Secondly, they keep us alive.
They harness the energy of the sun, and by the process of photosynthesis
they produce the food of life for all the creatures of the sea. They also take out of the air half of the
carbon dioxide we put into it. If they
didn't do it the planet would warm up by the green house effect, and we would
be the ones frying instead of the fish of the sea.
The point of all this is that man is ever
learning of the delicate balance of nature, and of how God has made all of life
to work together so that every part of nature is dependant upon every other
part. If man throws a monkey wrench
into this beautiful living machine he makes a mess of it, and he risks serious
damage to his own well being.
Christians are as likely to throw the system of nature into imbalance as
anyone. Christians have been major
supporters of the philosophy that says nature exists for our benefit, and so if
we want to abuse it and misuse it that is our privilege. Much like the Christian slave owners in
early America, they feel they have the right to use what is their property
anyway they please. And they feel they
have Scripture to back them up.
Here
in Psa. 8:6 it says clearly, "You made him the ruler over the works of
your hands; you put everything under his feet." Man is made the ruler of nature, and he is made king of creation
by the Creator Himself. If we go back
to Gen. 1:28 we read these first words of God to man: "Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and
subdue it. Rule over the fish of the
sea and the birds of the air and over every living creature that moves over the
ground." The lion is not king of
the beasts. It is man, and he was put
in charge by God and told to rule. None
can argue with this clear revelation. The
problem comes because of the fall of man.
He did not become the kind of ruler over nature that God intended. Just as many of the kings over his people
led them astray from his will, so man as a ruler over nature abused his God‑given
power, and he became an enemy rather than a friend to nature.
If we look
at Adam before the fall we see the proper role of man in relationship to
nature. In Gen. 2:15 we read, "The
Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take
care of it." You will note that it
is a perfect sin free world, and God has said of everything that it was very
good. And yet in this perfect
environment nature needed to be taken care of.
The implication is clear that even a perfect nature will deteriorate
without care, and man was to provide that care. Man was made to benefit by nature's abundance, and to reap a
harvest for his labor, but he was made to be a benevolent dictator over nature
and not a ruthless tyrant exploiting nature for himself with no concern for it
as a part of God's creation. In other
words, though it is true that God made man the ruler of nature, he made him to
be a benevolent ruler who would cooperate with God in keeping nature good,
beautiful, and beneficial in the way God intended.
Man in
his fall became a rebel and decided that his will was what mattered, and he
would use nature as he saw fit for his own good regardless of how God designed
it. In other words, man became an
irresponsible ruler. He abused his
power and position. It is the same
story as in every other area of man's dominion. God gave man dominion over women for the benefit of both husband
and wife. But man abused the power of
his position and made women slaves. He
turned tyrant and robbed women of the benefit of a benevolent leader and
perverted the purpose of God. No ruler
is ruling as God intended unless the ruled are greatly benefited by that
rule. Any ruler who exploits the ruled
for himself and does not make those ruled happy to be under that rule is a
rebel ruler and not the responsible ruler that God intends.
This
can be applied to nations, tribes, and families, or as we are considering in
this message, to nature. God's intent
was that man would rule nature in such a way as to make man and nature mutually
beneficial. Unfortunately, Christians
often feel that power means that you have the right to do as you please. If we rule nature, then we can do whatever
we want to it, for it has no rights whatever, and it is our slave. Francis Schaeffer in his book, Pollution And
The Death Of Man: The Christian View Of Ecology, agrees with the critics that
say Christians have been a major cause of the problem in our world today. Christians were duped into believing the
philosophy of Plato was more Christian than the Bible. Plato said that the material world is not
important. All that really matters is
the spiritual. This sounds so good to
be anti‑materialistic and pro‑spiritual that Christians felt it was
the superior view of life.
What
this led to was Christians who felt no responsibility for caring for the
material world that God created.
Christians became notorious for their indifference to the balance of
nature. What do we care about nature
was their attitude. "This world is
not my home, I'm just a passing through.
My treasures are laid up somewhere beyond the blue." So why should I care if we pollute and
damage the ecosystems that keep the earth in balance so that all life can
thrive? Under this false world‑view
man was permitted to destroy the handiwork of God. Christians did not care for the world, for it was all going to be
burned up anyway, and so why bother to protect and preserve what was going to
pass away? The whole idea of nature
having any rights was as foreign to Christians as was the idea of blacks having
any rights to Christian slave owners in the old South.
Schaeffer said that he sighted with the hippies in the 60's, for they
had a biblical view of respect for nature.
Christians, on the other hand, linked up with modern technology, which
said that man has the right to exploit nature regardless of the damage. Nature is not a friend we need to respect,
but a slave we can use or abuse as we please.
Schaeffer wrote his book to get Christians off that wrong track of
following Plato and back to a biblical view of nature and ecology.
God
created all things and said that it was very good. Creation is the handiwork of God, and just as we respect the
works of men, so we are to respect the work of God. We have something in common with all of nature. We are the handiwork of God. We are one in our origin, and one in our
ultimate destiny, for God will create a new heaven and earth to replace this
fallen world, and all creation will be a part of God's eternal kingdom. This means that a biblical view of nature is
not one of indifference to it, but it is one of respect. Our dominion over nature is not just so we
can exploit it, but like Adam, care for it.
We are to keep it operating according to the laws God has built into it
so that it benefits man and is a piece of art for God to enjoy.
Matter
is not evil as Plato taught. It is a
good work of God. Matter is so good
that God sent His Son to become flesh to redeem flesh and take the fallen body
of man into the kingdom of God where it will be made new, pure and
eternal. God did not reject the
material world in favor of the spiritual world. He sent His Son to become a part of the material world that it
might be saved and be a part of the eternal world. It is heresy to reject the material world, for God made it co‑equal
with the world of spirit. It is anti‑Christ
to reject the material world as evil, for nothing God has made is evil. The whole physical world is an object of His
love and plan of redemption. Nature is
good, and a biblical view of it leads to responsible rule where man cooperates
with God to care for it and respect it.
Schaeffer wrote, "A Christian is a man who has a reason for dealing
with each created thing on a high level of respect."
Only
after man came to realize that he was poisoning his own environment by his
disrespect for nature did Christians begin to realize the sinfulness of their
disrespect. Only in the last few
decades have Christians begun to address the theological issues for respect for
nature. The first Earth Day was on
April 22, 1970. Since then there have
been many conferences on the theological issues in environmental ethics. Christians are becoming more and more aware
that if God needed Adam to care for a garden in a perfect environment, how much
more does nature need care in a fallen world where sin, corruption, ignorance,
and pollution abound?
Bruce
Allsopp wrote the book, The Garden Earth:
The Case For Ecological Morality.
Ecology and religion newsletters were started and terms like geopiety
were born. The religious concern for
ecology has changed the history of ecology in recent years. The concern at first was just for the
economic issues of being nice to mother nature. It was costly to be abusive of her. Now there is what is called Deep Ecology, and it goes beyond the
shallow self‑centered concerns to a concern for nature herself. In other words, deep ecology says we respect
nature, not just because we can make more money if we do, but because she is
worthy of respect as God's creation, and it is right to be nice to her whether
we profit by it or not. It says nature
is a living thing, and like all living things, it has a right to be
respected. It goes even further and
says that even non‑living things have a right to be respected as God's
creation. Everything God made has a
right to be respected for what it is, and to be treated in a way that is
consistent with the laws God gave to govern it and its purpose.
In
1973 Congress passed the Endangered Species Act that guarantees the right to
existence of any species threatened by extinction. You have a right to make a buck, but if by so doing you send a
part of God's creation into extinction you are now forced to seek another way
to get your buck, and respect the rights of nature. Many creatures have been saved from extinction because of this
new respect for nature. Christians are
not always on the side of nature, and have often taken the side of the
humanists who say that man is the measure of all things. If it is good for man, then let nature
perish. Man is made in God's image, and
his good should take precedence over any other creature.
There
are many court cases where it is man versus nature, and it would hard to give a
vote for nature and save a bird, or some other creature, at the expense of
man's right to build condos and make a mint, but it is happening, and creatures
are winning because more and more people are agreeing that nature has rights
that are God‑given, and man does not have the right to trample them under
his feet. In spite of the growing
number of victories for nature, and a growing ecological awareness, the world
is getting worse. Man is still an
irresponsible ruler, and his abuse has lead to widespread pollution that is
casting thousands of species into extinction, and is killing people as
well.
Some
feel that man has gone so far in his irresponsibility that we can expect an
ecological Armageddon. An unknown poet
laments‑
I was born in the last years of comfort,
And I'll die in the first years of dearth,
When the fullness of plenty has vanished,
And poverty darkens the earth.
My grandson will wrestle with problems
That only a madman would crave,
And meet them with measures so ghastly
I'm glad I'll be snug in my grave.
Others
are optimistic and say that man can still become a responsible ruler. He can work with nature to overcome the
problems he has created. Garbologists
who do archeological digs in the garbage dumps of our nation have proven that
the idea of biodegradable is largely a myth.
Trash that is buried and compacted so air and moisture does not get to
it remains trash. They have dug up newspapers
buried in the 40's and they are as good as new. Newspapers are the largest percentage of all landfills. The American people are responding to this
waste and are now recycling, but millions of trees need to be cut down each
month unnecessarily because of the waste.
All of us can make some difference by recycling. It is the least we can do to show respect
for the world of nature that we help to rule.
When
God said to Adam to fill the earth, he did not mean to fill it with newspapers,
beer cans, and toxic waste. He expected
the world to be filled with people who could care for His creation. As American Christians we have a greater
obligation than most to develop and ecologically helpful life style. False views of Christians have been a major
cause of the present problems, and a more honest biblical view compels us to do
a better job in obedience to God's will.
A world is a terrible thing to waste, and if we are responsible rulers,
we can help keep even this fallen world a place where man and nature cooperate
to the glory of God, and provide an environment where men can discover the
abundant life and gain the assurance of eternal life in Christ.
The
ark of Noah was going to be abandoned by both animals and man, but do you think
they were careless with it while it was their only environment for living? Do you think they chopped or drilled holes
in it, or lunged against its timbers to see if they would hold? You can count on it that they took care of
their environment for their survival depended on their doing so. We need to see our whole world as the ark,
and see it as our responsibility to treat it with respect as the source of our
survival until God makes a new heaven and new earth.
Dennis
Hayes was 25 when he founded the first Earth Day. He drove a Honda and often road a bicycle. He took his reusable bags to the grocery
store. He was very conservative in his
use of natural resources. As chairman
of the 1990 Earth Day Anniversary he knew his small efforts would have little
effect on the global crisis, but he plugged away because he had a 14 year old
daughter and he cared about her future.
The Christian is to care about future generations also, for it is the
golden rule to do unto others as you would have them do unto you. You do not want the people who lived in your
house or apartment before you to leave all their garbage behind, and have
poison and toxic waste all over the place to hazard the life and health of your
family. The next generation does not
want this earth left that way either, and it is our responsibility to see that
they have a world where healthy living is possible.
Even if
we had no obligation to people, we do have an obligation to God. Psa. 24:1 says, "The earth is the
Lord's and everything in it, the world an all who live in it." As good stewards of God's world we are
responsible to use it and care for it so that it works as He made it to work,
and so that it will be a place for the good of man and the glory of God. A polluted world where life is being killed
and degraded is not for God's glory. It
is sinful abuse, and a Christian is to have no part in it. The Christian is to work to maintain the
health and beauty of all that God has made.
Professor Paul Ehrlich of Stanford University, who is a leading writer
in the field of ecology, says that one American does 20 to 100 times more
damage to the planet than a person in the 3rd world. The problem is not poor people but affluent people who are
wasteful and who do not care that their waste robs the rest of the world of a
better life. Some might argue that
there are greater issues, and there is much to support this, but John Alexander
writes, "In my experience people sensitive to the beauty of nature tend to
be sensitive to justice and compassion."
He also felt that the issues dealing with race and poverty were more
important for Christians to pursue, but he had to admit that people who do not
care about the world they live in usually do not care about anybody else in
that world. People who care about ecology
care about the whole of God's creation, and that includes plants, animals, and
people.
We are
born to rule. Our eternal destiny is to
rule and reign with Christ over a redeemed universe, but we are made to rule
now in this fallen world where the only hope of the good life is responsible
rulers. Nobody can do everything, but
everybody can do something, and the greatest something any of us can do is to
be responsible rulers.
3. SANCTIFIED SILENCE Based
on Psa. 46:1‑11
You can learn in silence what sound can never teach
you. Howard Thurman tells of one of his
University students who was a deep sea diver.
He wrote of his experience of being on the bottom of the ocean. The water was clear and he was in the midst
of a coral rock garden. He sat down to
look around. Occasionally a fish would
swim up to take a look at him, and then pass the word to his friends, for soon
there were many curious fish about him.
As he
sat there, the beauty of the garden became more intense. Plants had opened up revealing what looked
like blossoms. He felt like he was in a
beautiful flower garden. It was
wonderful. He enjoyed it for a long
while, but then he realized he could not stay there forever, and he started to
go about his business. As soon as he
moved all the flowers disappeared. They
were living things, and they emerged only when there was silence and
stillness. The activist sea diver who
comes splashing through such a garden would never see its full beauty. He learned that there are marvelous things
you will never see unless you sit in silence.
Professor Johnson from Bethel taught us this is true on land as
well. Tens of thousands of people visit
Como Park, but only a few ever see the Ruby Crown Kinglet. The only way to see this tiny little bird is
to crawl into the hedges and sit in silence.
Soon this pretty little creature will come flitting right up to you, and
give you a view that the noisy people passing by will never see.
The
point of Psa. 46:10 is that there are things about the Creator, as well as His
creation, that can only be learned by those who have developed the discipline
of silence. "Be still, and know
that I am God." An unknown poet
wrote:
In every life
There's a pause that is better
than onward rush,
Better than hewing or
mightiest doing;
'Tis the standing still at
sovereign will.
There's a hush that is
better than ardent speech,
Better than sighing or
wilderness crying;
'Tis the being still at
sovereign will.
The pause and the hush sing
a double song,
In unison low and for all
time long,
Of human soul, God's working
plan
Goes on, nor heeds the aid
of man!
Be still, and see!
Be still, and know!
The
Bible has a great deal to say about the value of quietness, but it is greatly
neglected in our culture because we are a sound oriented culture. We specialize in making everything that
makes sound portable so that we can have the sound even at the beach, or out on
the lake, or camping in the woods. We
have made it possible to escape silence completely, even if we find ourselves
in the most remote area. We have made
it possible to banish silence from our lives almost completely.
There was
a tunnel down in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida where radio waves did not penetrate,
and there was a 20 to 30 second break as motorists went through. A man got permission to set up a system
inside the tunnel to give weather information so drivers would not have to
endure the agony of that few seconds of silence. We live in a culture which is anti‑silence, and the result
is, even Christians have a very difficult time identifying with a Biblical
values of quietness. Eccles. 9:17 says,
"The quiet words of the wise are more to be heeded than the shouts of a
ruler of fools." Because of radio
and TV we tend to hear the shouters and noisy voices rather than the quiet
ones.
Psa.
131:2 says, "But I have stilled and quieted my soul; like a weaned child
with its mother, like a weaned child is my soul within me." The peace and contentment of a satisfied
child is an ideal state of mind. The
crying aggravated child whose hunger pain makes it a noise box of perpetual
disturbance is not the ideal.
Christians tend to fall into these two categories: The bawling baby always discontent, and with
spiritual colic, who disturbs the family of God continually, or the contented
child who feels loved and satisfied, and gives pleasure to the family by
perpetual pleasantness. It takes a lot
of silent feeding on the milk of the word to be such a contented child. Most Christians in our culture do not know
how to enjoy the silence of being still and knowing God in this way.
Paul
wrote in I Thess. 4:11, "Make it your ambition to lead a quiet
life." He wrote to Timothy also,
and urged him to pray for kings and all in authority. Why? Because he goes on
to say in I Tim. 2:2, "That we may live peaceful and quiet lives in all
godliness and holiness." It is
obvious that the noisy and riotous lifestyle is not a Christian ideal. We cannot look at all the Bible says about
the importance of silence, but we want to focus on the fact that God so often
does His greatest works in silence. And
anonymous poet wrote:
Silently the green leaves
grow
In silence falls the soft,
white snow
Silently the flowers bloom
In silence sunshine fills
the room
Silently bright stars appear
In silence velvet night
draws near...
And silently God enters in
To free a troubled heart
from sin
For God works silently in
lives
For nothing spiritual
survives
Amid the din of a noisy
street
Where raucous crowds with
hurrying feet
And "blinded eyes"
and "deafened ear"
Are never privileged to hear
The message God wants to
impart
To every troubled, weary
heart
For only in a QUIET PLACE
Can we behold GOD
FACE TO FACE!
Now,
lest we idealize silence too much, as if it was an inherent virtue, and always
of value, we want to see some of the negative side before we pursue the
practice. Solomon said in Eccles. 3:7, that
there is a time to be silent and a time to speak. If you are silent when its time to speak, it is no longer a
virtue. So for the sake of balance we
need to look at the negative side.