3rd Sunday of Easter – Earth Sunday
Let there be Light adapted from Genesis 1:1-5
“In the beginning the earth was a formless void and darkness covered the face of the deep. God said, ‘Let there be light’; and there was light.
And, God saw that the light was good; and God separated the light from the darkness. 5 God called the light Day, and the darkness God called Night. And there was evening and there was morning, the first day.
Calling of the Waters adapted from Genesis 1:6-8
And God said, ‘Let there be a dome in the midst of the waters, and let it separate the waters under the dome from the waters above the dome. And, it was so.
God called the dome Sky. And there was evening and there was morning, the second day.
Forming of the Earth adapted from Genesis 1:9-13
And God said, ‘Let the waters under the sky be gathered together into one place, and let the dry land appear.’ And it was so.
God called the dry land Earth, and the waters that were gathered together God called the Sea. And God saw that it was good.
Then God said, ‘Let plants grow upon the earth: plants with seeds, and all kinds of fruit. And, plants grew upon the earth: plants with seeds, and all kinds of fruit.
And God saw that it was good. And there was evening and there was morning, the third day.
Sun, Moon, and Stars adapted from Genesis 1:14-19
And God said, ‘Let there be lights in the dome of the sky to separate the day from the night; and let them be for signs and for seasons and for days and years, and let them be lights in the dome of the sky to give light upon the earth.’
And it was so. God made the two great lights—the greater light to rule the day and the lesser light to rule the night—and the stars. God set them in the dome of the sky to give light upon the earth, to rule over the day and over the night, and to separate the light from the darkness. And God saw that it was good. And there was evening and there was morning, the fourth day.
Creatures of the Earth adapted from Genesis 1:20-25
And God said, ‘Let the waters bring forth swarms of living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth across the dome of the sky.’
So God created the great sea monsters and every living creature in the sea, and every winged bird. And God saw that it was good. God blessed them, saying, ‘Be fruitful and multiply and fill the waters in the seas, and let birds multiply on the earth.’ And there was evening and there was morning, the fifth day.
Hebrew Bible Reading adapted from Genesis 1:24-31
And God said, ‘Let the earth bring forth living creatures of every kind. And it was so. God made the wild animals of the earth of every kind, and God saw that it was good.
Then God said, ‘Let us make humankind in our image, according to our likeness; and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the wild animals of the earth.
So, God created humankind in God’s image,
in the image of God, God created them;
male and female, God created them.
God blessed them, and God said to them, ‘Be fruitful and multiply. ‘See, I have given you every plant yielding seed and every kind of fruit; you shall have them for food. And to every beast of the earth, everything that has the breath of life, I have given every green plant for food.’ And it was so. God saw everything that had been made, and indeed, it was very good. And there was evening and there was morning, the sixth day.
Charge & Benediction adapted from Genesis 2:1-3
Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all their multitude. And on the seventh day God finished the work, and God rested on the seventh day from all the work. So God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because that was the day that God rested from all the work that had been done in creation.
God’s Gift
This is a manuport. It’s from Limantour Beach in Marin County, California, which is where I was I was living before moving here to Montana. I specifically picked this up and took it with me as a memento of the California coastline, because I knew I was moving to a landlocked state, and I wanted something to remind me of the ocean and the beach, even though I didn’t actually go to the beach all that much. But, there is a world of difference between choosing to not do something, and actually not being able to do something. So, whenever I look at this rock, I remember that day on Limatour Beach: the briny smell of the sea, warm sand beneath my feel. The brisk cold wind and the horizon that just seemed impossibly far away.
This manuport, for the most part, has remained unchanged since the day I picked it up, which is important, because otherwise, it would no longer be a manuport. A manuport is the simplest of artifacts. The definition of manuport, according to Wikipedia, is a natural object that has been deliberately taken from its original environment and relocated without further modification. So, if I were to carve an image into this rock, or if I attached it to a stick to use it as a weapon or a tool, it would no longer be a manuport, because it would have been modified. A manuport is special because it is appreciated for what it is, not for what it could be. I learned about this word fairly recently, and it made me smile to think that this is something that human beings have done so often, and for so long that archeologists had to come up with a word for it. It’s something that connects all of us, through our millions of years of history, in every time and place, every continent, every country, people have always picked up rocks, or shells, or fossils, that they thought were neat, to keep them and to look at them, to appreciate them, without having to change anything about them.
There’s a manuport that was discovered in the 1920s at an archaeological site in South Africa that scientists believe was picked up 3 million years ago, and carried to the site where it was found. That is how long people have been making manuports! I can imagine a distant future in which a scientist might look at this rock, and realize that its mineral composition matches the geology of the western coast of the continent, rather than the mountain interior where we are now, and wonder about the person who brought it here.
People are people. It’s such a human thing to pick up a rock that we think is neat and take it with us. If you’ve been in my office, you would have noticed that I have many manuports. I have lots of shells, and rocks, and driftwood. I’ve always been a collector, and I especially love things from nature. I started collecting seashells when I was really little. And, I remember talking to my dad about wanting a better way to display my collection. So, we got all of my shells, and we started to arrange them on a piece of paper. And, when we finally decided on an arrangement that we liked, my dad drew lines around the shells, forming these rectangular shapes that the shells could fit into, and he took the paper and then built the whole thing out of wood. It was this tray with compartments made of thin wooden walls that I could put all of my shells into to keep them organized and so they would look nice.
My dad’s always been pretty handy, and he would often show his love for us by making things, which I know I did not appreciate as much as I should have at the time.
We’ve designed the worship service today around the creation of the world. It is such a beautiful story, about God’s power and creativity, about incredible forces, the laws of the universe, light and gravity, space and time, matter, life. Grand ideas, overwhelming possibility, the scope of which reduces us to a mote of dust. And yet, from a view of the entire universe, the focus of this story zooms in on our tiny planet. I don’t know how many of you have seen pictures that compare the size of the Earth to some of the biggest stars that we can see. If one of those stars was this big, the Earth would be so small you wouldn’t be able to see it. And, the focus of our story zooms in even more, to the creation of people, tiny infinitesimally small motes of dust walking on a mote of dust, and yet, the story says that we were created in God’s image. Our impossibly large, impossibly powerful God, made us, created us, in God’s own image, and is interested in what we are doing.
God made all of this for us. All of this power, all of these grand movements of the universe, our galaxy, our solar system, our world, all of it is for us, and it is so easy to forget that it’s a gift. And so, we don’t take care of it like we should. We don’t protect it like we should. We don’t honor it like we should, because we forget that how we treat this gift is a reflection on our relationship with God.
When my dad gave me the tray that he made to hold my seashells, I was so excited. All of my seashells fit into the spaces just so, and they all looked so nice arranged in the way that we had planned. And, I know it must have made him so happy to see me enjoying this gift that he made. Can you imagine what he would feel like if one day, I took a hammer and just smashed that tray to bits? What kind of message would that send? I would be telling him that I don’t appreciate it. I would be telling him that I didn’t like his gift. I would be telling him that I didn’t respect him.
What kind of message are we sending to God as we fill the oceans with plastic and fill the skies with carbon? What kind of message are we sending to God when drive plants and animals to extinction, as our actions lead to the collapse of ecosystems, as beautiful vistas are spoiled with buildings, and power lines, and pollution? That’s not the kind of message that I want to send to God. The God who has loved us our whole lives, provided for us and cared for us. The God who teaches us, who lived and died and lived again for us. The God who is always there for us, no matter what we do or where we go. I want God to know our love. I want to show God that I care about this gift that’s been given to us, that I respect it and cherish it. I want God to know that I think this gift represents our relationship with each other.
Taking care of the planet is a form of worship. And like all forms of worship, it’s not only good for our relationship with God, it’s good for us. As we clean up our world and make it beautiful again, we also make it healthy again. Our air and water should be clean, that should be a given. We shouldn’t have to worry about chemicals or radiation. We shouldn’t have to worry about more floods and more wildfires every year. God created this world for us, specifically for our needs. It’s only in the last few decades, because of the things that we’ve done, that it seems like the Earth is starting to become more difficult to live on. That was never God’s intention. We haven’t taken care of our gift, and now our gift is having trouble taking care of us.
The world is still a beautiful place; it’s not too late to save it. We worship God by taking care of the Earth, and if we take care of the Earth, the Earth will take care of us. So, worship God and show God your love. Take care of God’s gift to you, and in doing so, take care of yourselves and all of the people of the world. Amen.
~ Rev. Charles Wei
