Joining the Hymn of All Creation
Then I heard every creature in heaven and on earth
and under the earth and in the sea, and all that is in them, singing,
“To the one seated on the throne and to the Lamb
be blessing and honor and glory and might forever and ever!”
-Revelation 5:13
Welcome to the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America's Lenten e-mail series, Living Earth: A 40-day Reflection on our Relationship with God's Creation. This year’s theme, “Joining the Hymn of All Creation” reminds us that our relationship with our neighbors, our world, and all creatures, great and small, is a gift of communion given us by God from creation’s beginning. In Genesis we hear the call to “tend and keep” the earth (Genesis 2:15), but in our sin we have turned our backs on the call to be God’s stewards and have rejected the gift of living as part of one whole, healthy earth community. As Lutheran ethicist Larry Rasmussen notes “[w]e are most ourselves when we are most intimate with the rivers, mountains, forests, meadows, sun, moon, stars, air, soil, rocks, otherkind, and humankind.” [Rasmussen, Earth Community, Earth Ethics, (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 1996) 326.]
Through the course of these reflections we invite you on a journey of urgency and hope: Together we will give thanks for God’s gifts of abundance; face the hard facts of our misuse of creation; read of signs of hope for a new way; and learn how we can live into God’s promise to make all things new in Christ. Each week you will find resources for learning and suggestions for individual and communal action focusing on a range of environmental issues. Every Wednesday reflection provides a link to Creation Waits With Eager Longing, a resource that includes outlines for worship appropriate for a group, and each Sunday will bring news of Christians practicing their faith by caring for creation. Weekly themes of Reflection, Remembrance, Rediscovery, Repentance, Reconciliation, and Recommitment lead us finally to our celebration of Easter, when we rejoice in the good news of God’s power for redemption, renewal and the reconciliation of all things.
We hope you enjoy this series. Look for your first reflection tomorrow on Ash Wednesday.
Writer: Rev. Yvette J. Schock. Contributor: Kathleen Wood. Design: Brewer Communications, Inc. Produced by: Advocacy Department, Church in Society Program Unit, ELCA. Theme photo © iStockphotos/ooyoo. Earth photo courtesy of NASA. Road photo © iStockphotos/ATVG. Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright © 1989 by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the USA and used by permission. All rights reserved. Web sites linked from this message reflect the positions of the outside organizations and may not necessarily reflect an official position of ELCA. Copyright © 2009 Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. All rights reserved.
