What Is Our Legacy?

Genesis 1:27-31:
The passage I am about to read completes the very first chapter of scripture in the Bible. The chapter reminds us that all there is, is from the Creator God of the universe. The final creation is humanity, you and me. This passage was written to try and help us understand our place in this beautiful gift. As many say, “We, as human beings, are the first part of creation that can actually reflect upon this gift of life and seek to give it meaning.” Let’s hear what the Priestly writer has to say about our place in God’s universe.

Read Genesis 1:27-31

We heard two very important theological understandings expressed in these verses. First, we are created in the image of God, male and female. What does that mean? For the writer of this passage it would mean that we are all created and live our lives in this world as God’s representatives and God’s presence in the world. And what is our purpose? We are “To have dominion over all living things.” Dominion can have a very implication if we see it as exerting power to dominate and control. But biblically, it suggests more of us being benevolent monarchs as God’s presence. To have dominion means more to have the responsibility to take care of and protect all of creation. Certainly the world and all that’s in it is a gift to us for the living of our lives. While we are present, this gift is also ours to tend and keep healthy.

SERMON:
I love bumper stickers, and I often marvel at how those who write them can get so much meaning in such a few words. Obviously, some of you would suggest, not a talent I possess. One sticker I enjoy is one I often see on the back of a camping trailer or RV. “I am spending my children’s inheritance.” I take delight in it as it suggests to me here is someone or a couple out enjoying themselves and their lives while they still have their health, energy and resources. I plan on spending as much of my children’s inheritance as I can for as long as I can.

But, as I was thinking about the sermon this week, this bumper sticker came to mind in a somewhat different way. When I see how quickly we are using up the natural resources in creation, and how it is already getting harder and harder to find new oil reserves, and if I have heard correctly, most of the earth’s oil will be gone in less than 100 years. We know, especially here in Prescott, how it is getting harder and harder to find new sources of water, and globally how we are soiling the water we have. I wonder what it means in this way to be spending our children’s inheritance? And for sure what it means to be spending our grandchildren’s inheritance.

I was listening to CNN a couple of weeks ago, and one of the commentators was lamenting about the economic crisis we are facing, not just here but around the world. He was frustrated because he said, “We have a goal in this country where each generation, where parents and grandparents try to leave the possibility for a better life to the next generation.” Obviously he was speaking economically and materially. It has been the goal to leave this kind of legacy to our children and grandchildren. As he said it, it caused me to pause and ask, “What is the legacy we are leaving to the coming generations?”

As many of you know, I have been focusing on the biblical understanding of the Hebrew word shalom in much of my preaching and ministry. One of the primary reasons is, shalom is a synonym for the word salvation in our New Testament scripture. This focus is about understanding how God calls us to be saved. They both mean to bring healing, wholeness-to people and to all of creation-and well-being-both physically, economically, and spiritually to those we meet. The word describes what it means to be in dominion, to be God’s representatives in this God’s creation, doing God’s will. Biblically, our calling is to go into the whole world preaching and teaching the good news. We are commanded to bring God’s total commitment to shalom, to saving creation in all its aspects, to all living things.

As I have shared, one of my favorite thoughts about who we are and our relationship to God, and as being Gods representatives in the world is a thought by biblical scholar Walter Brueggemann. He says, “What God does best is to trust us with our moment in history.” I modify it to say, “to trust us with our moment in God’s story.” I marvel at that thought. God trusts me. God trusts us. To trust means to believe in deeply, to have faith in. God has faith that we will be the people who bring shalom to creation. Jesus, himself, says, “Blessed are the shalom makers, for they shall be called the children of God.”

Today is Earth Day Sabbath, and it is an important place to wrestle with what it means to be people of shalom. It is a time we stop and reflect upon one aspect of our legacy to our children and grandchildren as the people of God and as the representatives of God in this God’s creation. This is our time to care for the creation entrusted to us in our moment in God’s story. Traditionally, we have called it an issue of stewardship. Are we being good stewards of God’s gifts?

The hard part is we can see that this is indeed a spiritual issue, and a stewardship issue, but it is also a huge challenge. It is an issue that can only be solved as the community called human kind. This issue causes us to pause and see ourselves as the family of God maybe as no other issue can. We know that ravaging the rainforests in Brazil affects the quality of our air. I am from upstate New York. We had lakes in the Adirondack Mountains that died because of the acid rain created from the emissions of factories to our west. We know the large amounts of CO2 affects the climate everywhere. It is why they cal it Global Warming and not Europe Warming or Asia Warming.

The issues we face at times need our global family to pull together and resolve them together. I can buy a hybrid car as a part of addressing this issue, I can install solar panels to produce electricity, I could probably even start riding my bike a little more often. Actually, riding it once would be more often. But as important as these choices may be as a contribution to the hope of shalom, these alone will not solve the problem. We need comprehensive approaches to this important and significant issue. The hard part is many people interpret this as getting into politics. I know some of you have been concerned that I have been somehow political in things I have been sharing. I want to assure you nothing could be further from the truth for me. What I see and understand is these issues call us to live as the family of God and as the community called the church in the most profound ways. I see this living the spiritual calling of shalom, being the children of God.

I share what I do this day, as a person of faith who sees our call to be the people of God, created in the image of God, who have been given dominion over the earth as one of the greater spiritual issues before us. I pray that we, together, will see this as a way to unite ourselves profoundly as the family of God, recognizing we all need each other as the children of God.

I can only imagine what it was like to live through WWII. I know it defined a whole generation of people. There was a common cause that united everyone to collectively face a threat to the very quality of life itself. Everyone joined together and made the sacrifices to meet this common challenge. It was a shared commitment to a life threatening crisis. I marvel how this event kept a generation united, and how it still bonds people to this day. I do not believe anyone saw it as a political issue, but an issue of the human family. But an issue where our leaders united the peoples of the world to face a common crisis. In many ways, it is the epitome of what t means to live shalom. The goal was to protect the ideals of freedom, justice and liberty for all people.

I can tell you, as I talk to my children, there is no more important issue for them than the health of our earth. They know it is the source of life. I truly hope, no I truly believe, that this issue is one of those defining crises that will unite the family of God around the world. It is an issue that will seek strong leaders to help a global community to bring shalom to all of God’s creation. It is an issue that will unite the family of humanity to a common cause and purpose. It may be the greatest spiritual issue facing us today, but as it seems to be in the way of God, it is when we are challenged that we rise to the height of who God created us to be, and we join together as the family of God.

I pray that our legacy will be one that says, we responded to our moment in God’s story. I pray that we will be seen as people of shalom in its deepest and greatest sense. I pray that when our children and grandchildren look back upon our lives and our legacy they will be able to say, we took seriously our call to have dominion, to accept responsibility for our moment in God’s story. That our legacy will be that we were committed to the wholeness of life in all of creation.

Sermon delived by Rev. George Cushman on April 20, 2008.