Stewardship and Love
Scott Lyons
1/28/2012

One of the most polarizing words in our culture is environment. It is highly politicized, with extremes on either side. Where is the middle way, the Christian ethos that rightly regards the world and our relationship to it? We ought to be conservative in our use of our world and liberal in our love for it.

It is certainly not Christian to oppress and destroy Creation to satisfy our consumerism. We must do what we can to make it a better place and not do anything that makes the lives of its creatures miserable. We must preserve Creation, better it, and be mindful of what we will leave our children. The natural world was made for us, but it is not disposable. It is not made simply for consumption and profit. What we do with it must be sustainable and ethical. Our work must have an eye toward the common good. It must not neglect or oppress the poor among us. It was made for us and will be made new through us. We are part of it. It blesses God, and when we wound it, we wound that proclamation. We wound ourselves.

We should be careful of creating false dichotomies, such as arguing that evangelism is more important than environmentalism. Shouldn’t we do both? If we have the time to watch a game on TV, we have the time to do both. We can respect and care for the natural world as well as our fellow man. We are smart enough to do this—are we good enough? Sometimes, of course, we must choose a person over a pony, as Sam Gamgee must in The Fellowship of the Ring. But this does not happen often. We should try to love ponies and birds and dogs and plants as God loves them. It is okay to say that people are more important than animals or evangelism is more important than environmentalism, but then we must be sure to treat Creation with the dignity it deserves.

In a New York Times op-ed piece titled “Liking Is for Cowards” (May 28, 2011), Jonathan Franzen, the author of Freedom, describes how he had been involved in environmental issues when he was younger because he liked the environment. Eventually he became angry and overwhelmed over whether his efforts effected any change, and his environmentalism cooled. Then, after a decade or two, he fell in love with birds. Suddenly he wanted to protect the environment because it was the home of the birds he loved. Love demanded something of him.

Wendell Berry gives a similar focus in much of his work with his terrific sense of place, of home, of belonging. When he speaks out against those who misuse creation, you get a deep sense of the man wanting to preserve the land he loves and knows, the land that feeds him, that he lives on. He wants to protect and preserve home. This is no common idealism. It is felt; it is real. It is love.
Stewardship arises from heartfelt love, not a generic love of the world that we show off before others like participants in a beauty pageant. Perhaps only God is big enough to love the entire world because only he truly knows it, but I can only love the world around me: my monkey-like son, who climbs everything that can be climbed and swings from drawers and tabletops; my quiet, artistic daughter, who is inquisitive, smart, and in every way beautiful; the nikko blue hydrangeas outside my dining room window. I love the pint-size Carolina wrens that are all cocksureness and the brown thrasher that gives the neighbor cat grief for his curiosity. Stewardship is realized in loving the world I know—my neighbors, the creatures that live around me, the morning glory entwining itself through a rusted fence, the sleeping trees.

William Draper paraphrased Francis of Assisi’s “Canticle of the Sun” when he penned “All Creatures of Our God and King.” What follows is that hymn’s final stanza and refrain.

Let all things their Creator bless,
And worship Him in humbleness,
O praise Him! Alleluia!
Praise, praise the Father, praise the Son,
And praise the Spirit, Three in One!
O praise Him! O praise Him!
Alleluia! Alleluia! Alleluia!

Let us preserve God’s praise in the natural world around us. Let us delight in it.