NOVEMBER 10 2018
NOT HONORING THE EARTH MAKES GOD INTO AN IDOL
Both Dietrich Bonhoeffer and J.H. Bavinck regard us humans as part of nature: God, the Earth and Humanity are not only mutually dependent but are so intimately connected that they form an organic unity. Genesis 3: 19 unequivocally states that we will return to the ground out of which we are formed, for “earth we are and to earth we shall return.”
J.H. Bavinck writes in BETWEEN THE BEGINNING AND THE END, “A Radical Kingdom Vision”, that, “The word ‘adam’ reminded the Israelite immediately of the first Adam who was taken from the dust of the earth. That made the word eminently suitable to typify the human race in its unbreakable unity. The Israelite here sensed some¬thing of the fact that humans are earth-bound. A human being, ‘adam’, belongs to ‘adamah’, the life bearing earth. With every sinew of his existence he is tied to the earth, which bears him and feeds him. That is the reason why in the word ‘adam’ there is some¬thing of the strains of tran¬sitoriness, of perishability, of vulnerability and insignificance.”
Dietrich Bonhoeffer says essentially the same. In CREATION AND FALL, in a lecture he gave in the early 1930’s he wrote, “In my whole being I belong wholly to this world: it bears me, nurtures me, holds me……….The more I master it, the more it is my earth.”
With uncanny foresight Bonhoeffer in 1932 saw the dangers of technology: “Technology is the power with which the earth seizes hold of humankind and masters it. And because we no longer rule, we lose the ground so that the earth no longer remains our earth, and we become estranged from the earth……….There is no dominion without serving God. …Without God, without their brothers and sisters, human beings lose the earth….. God, the brother and sister, and the earth belong together.”
Just imagine that was written by a 26 year old theology professor in Berlin, more than 20 years before Jacques Ellul wrote his THE TECHNOLOGICAL SOCIETY in 1954.
Canada and the USA: so different. Vive la Difference!
I am very happy to live in Canada, where we still struggle to rectify the way we have treated our indigenous people, the original occupants of our nation, a country with its various climates, and thus greatly different approaches to life.
From them we have inherited the inclusive way of life, where every living thing is treated as holy, in contrast with us Western whites who came as conquerors, not only of their ecologically friendly existence but even more so as conquerors of nature.
Today’s all-encompassing crisis is telling us in no uncertain terms that we are wrong, have been wrong, and will perish when we persist in our destructive ways.
From 1861-65 there was the US Civil War between North and South, between the Confederates and Unionists. The issues then, basically centering on the way minorities were treated, have never been resolved.
In South Africa a similar conflict led to a Truth and Reconciliation Commission, which openly laid bare the differences and genuinely probed the basic fundamentals, to come to some lasting solutions. Canada followed a similar path.
Canada’s more conciliatory approach toward nature and our First Nation people, is in sharp contrast to the way our Southerly neighbor does its business.
In the USA there has never been a public discussion and an open and honest effort to bring genuine unity between the North and the South and consequently the USA still stands for DSA, the Divided States of America. Today this division is enhanced by religious differences, where the real schism centers in the way we see and treat creation.
All Christians believe that God created the earth, but, for reasons I have often outlined before most church people believe that, upon death, they go to heaven, leaving the earth.
Yet, we are here to serve, each other and also the earth.
We are here to serve, including creation. Matthew 20: 28, “The son of Man did not come to be served but to serve, and to give his life for many.”
The general misconception of Jesus’ mission is that he came to save souls, but John 3: 16 states that Jesus came to buy back the cosmos from The Evil One, who by hook and crook had attained temporary authority over the earth. Matthew 4: 8 describes this, “Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their splendor. “All this I will give you,” he said, “if you will bow down and worship me.” Satan’s grip on creation is confirmed in 1 John 5: 19.
Society in general and the church in particular has bought into this untruth, this LIE, that we can live separate from the earth, which, in essence means, that we can live without God, making that very God concept an idolatrous faith. Yes, NOT HONORING THE EARTH MAKES GOD INTO AN IDOL
That’s why a TRUMP can be endorsed by many in the church, a church that has no use for the earth, essentially no use for God, while using that very name as a talisman. Too often we are like a magician who pulls a rabbit out the hat. From it comes the saying Deus ex Machina, calling on God only when we need him.
We are smart.
We think we are powerful, and in a sense we are: we are very clever, we are very resourceful, very inventive, but we are not wise. Nobody can be wise without God, who is the source of All Wisdom.
Today all our ingenuity, all our smartness, all our braininess is being tested and found wanting, because we are convinced that we are gods and therefore need not pay attention to God, the creator of the earth.
NOT HONORING THE EARTH MAKES GOD INTO AN IDOL.
For many centuries we have managed without God. But now exponential growth has taken us in a surprisingly short time from a relatively empty world to a world full of people and their furniture. It is now full of our things but empty of what there was before, empty of God.
So what? the Christian Right argues. Why care for the earth? We take from it what we can, exploit it, and then ‘zoom’- we are swished off to heaven in the great Rapture.
That lack of wisdom is the reason why rural American folks have placed their trust in Donald Trump, a person who has fought to cancel the very medical insurance these people need, a president who has reduced the taxes on the rich and tried to eliminate the benefits for the down and out, proving that there is no wisdom without God.
They have forgotten that all white Americans are of immigrant stock, that all black Americans have been imported by the white people to make money.
When I was in grade school, as a 10 year old, in 1938, I was taught that people of color, whether black or brown were inferior to white. Trump has reinforced that notion, has promoted that lie in order to gain votes and create division, a purposeful ally of the Prince of Lies.
When I survey the world then matters are not good. David Brooks in his Friday column reported that in the last few months he had visited 23 states and found that the real divide is between rural and urban people. I remember traveling through parts of Wisconsin just prior to November 2016 when one of our grandsons got married. I noticed the TRUMP signs wherever there were three old cars in the driveway on a yard with a less than a luxurious dwelling, and neglected gardens. Likely these people lived on food stamps, draw some sort of Social Security, depend on Medicaid, and probably were in debt, most likely due to medical bills. Yet they voted Republican.
When I look around where I live in rural Ontario, then I don’t see the same scenario. True when I visit the medical clinic in Tweed, a municipality located in one of the poorest sections on the province, the same sort of people are visible: older, perhaps somewhat overweight, but there is an enormous difference: medical treatment is the same for all: rich or poor, educated or not, everyone is equal. The biggest worry in the USA is a medical emergency.
Years ago my wife had an acute medical problem while visiting our daughter in Minneapolis: we called the ambulance, received top care in the nearby hospital, the stay there was about 24 hours, and the bill was $12,000 US. Fortunately we had insurance, but for many in the USA the premiums are high, the deductible alone almost insurmountable, so they go without coverage. They have been brainwashed that the State is evil, yet only the state can provide the so needed care, and that care must be applied equally to all created matter, to people and nature alike: because without the earth, without taking care of the very substances of our body, water and soil, we die and religion becomes a sham because “NOT HONORING THE EARTH MAKES GOD INTO AN IDOL”.
God needs no sacrifices, but he wants faithful obedience. The great sacrifice has been made when Christ died on the cross to redeem creation. But idols need sacrifice all the time, and the true nature of The American Religion is evident from creation being sacrificed for the short-term benefit of the people.
When God issued the Commandments, he made provisions for any eventuality. In Leviticus 20:2 he decreed, “Say to the Israelites: ‘Any Israelite or any foreigner residing in Israel who sacrifices any of his children to Molek is to be put to death. The members of the community are to stone him.”
Our short-sighted society is committing that very act: by our actions, in our utmost idolatry, we are sacrificing everything living, including our children.
This is God’s world and we are responsible for how we treat it. This is such an elementary statement that it is hard to say more about it. Capitalism prides itself of being efficient. No system that uses resources at a rate that destroys natural life-support without meeting the basic needs of the people in the world can possibly be considered efficient.
Our ability and inclination to enrich the present at the expense of the future and of other species, is as real and as sinful as our tendency to further enrich the wealthy at the expense of the poor. To hand back to God the gift of creation in a degraded state capable of supporting less life, less abundantly and for a shorter future, is surely a sin.
If it is a sin to kill and to steal, then surely it is a sin to destroy carrying capacity – the capacity of the earth to support life now and in the future. To sacrifice future life on the planet to protect present prosperity and extravagance goes directly against the work of Jesus who came to save the cosmos.
We must face the failure of the economic growth idolatry. We must stop crying out to the growing economy “Deliver me for you are my god!” Yet, that is exactly what we have been doing. We have made God Almighty our IDOL. Instead we must have the courage and the faith to ask with Isaiah, “Is not this idol I hold in my right hand a LIE?” (Isaiah 44: 20).
That LIE is eminently embodied in the person of the president who only speaks truth when it suits him. For now he will use his still considerable power to promote right-wing populism, authoritarian, intolerant, and isolationist he is.
The Democrats – divided as they are – also are fanatic adherents of the GROWTH ECONOMY.
So what holds the future?
Revelation 18 tells the future:
In fear of her torment, they will stand at a distance and cry out: “Woe, woe to the great city, the mighty city of Babylon! For in a single hour your judgment has come.”
NOT HONORING THE EARTH MAKES GOD INTO AN IDOL.
The great city, the mighty economy, our capitalistic society, which we idolized, which we exploited, robbed of its essence, will collapse and in its stead will come THE HOLY CITY, God’s RENEWED CREATION.