October 1, 2023
Rev. Mary Erickson
Hope Lutheran Church
Stewardship Sermon – Week One
Genesis 1:24-31; Matthew 6:25-34
Fearless Living
Friends, may grace and peace be yours in abundance in the knowledge of God and Christ Jesus our Lord.
Fall is such a beautiful season in our region of the country. Earlier this week, I had to drive up to Minong for a meeting and the leaves on the trees north of here are really putting on a show.
Fall is a time when nature’s riotous display simply won’t let us ignore it. We marvel at its beauty.
When I was in seminary I had a professor by the name of Steve Charleston. Several years later he would be appointed a bishop in the Episcopal church.
Bishop Charleston is Native American, a member of the Choctaw nation in Oklahoma. In one of his classes, he mentioned how we can be literally “out of touch” with nature. “How long can you go without touching the earth?” he asked. “You can literally go from your house, into your car, and drive across miles and miles. When you get out, you step on the surface of a parking lot and enter another building. You can go days without ever touching the earth.”
His message really struck me, and it’s stayed with me ever since. Fortunately, there are moments when nature simply won’t allow us to ignore it.
Fall is one of those times. It says, “Hey, look at me! You live on this beautiful earth! You have a beautiful earth home! Walk in my blessing way.”
Today we begin our fall stewardship emphasis. The overall theme is “Fearless Generosity.” This morning we begin with our connection to the earth and all its creatures. We have a call to earth stewardship.
We hear the account of creation. God brings all creatures into being, from the tiny ant to the enormous elephant. The final act of creation is the appearance of humanity. Humanity is the capstone, the final flourish.
Like all the other animals, like the plants and lakes and stars and faraway galaxies, we are part of God’s creation. We’re God’s creatures, too. This foundational understanding ties us together with all that is. Because God made this earth, we honor it. And more than honor, we cherish it.
It's good for us to pause regularly and often to remember this. We see God’s abundance in creation. We appreciate the lush variety of species, we marvel at the delicate balance of the ecosystems. We see how God provides abundantly so for all our needs.
Both creation accounts in Genesis include a charge to the human beings. We are to care for the earth and its creatures. We’re charged with tending the garden.
God has placed us in charge of overseeing creation. We’ve been appointed stewards over this beautiful creation. What a responsibility!!! God took a decided risk by placing us in charge. It reminds me of when a child turns 16 and gets their driver’s license. And then soon after their parents do a little something. They hand the car keys to their child.
What will their son or daughter do when they’re behind the wheel? Will they be able to maneuver through unanticipated circumstances? Will they pay attention? Will they come home safe? Will they get in an accident?
The parents don’t know, but nevertheless, they turn over the keys to the family car to their child!
When God placed us in charge of caring for creation, it was kind of like we were handed the keys to the world. What will we do?
In some ways, we have accomplished remarkable things. I was reminded recently of how marvelous our advancements in medicine are. My grandfather was a pharmacist. When I was growing up, we had the old brass mortar and pestle he used to mix up medicines by hand in the 1920’s. Nowadays, our cupboard of medicines has multiplied to an astonishing level.
We’ve made incredible strides in our understanding of medicine and in the other sciences. We’ve sent satellites and telescopes far into space. They’ve helped us understand more and more about the origins of the universe. We’ve engineered dams to mitigate flooding and to harness hydraulic energy. Crop management and agricultural science have boosted our ability to feed the world.
In many ways, we’ve been faithful to our call as stewards of the earth. But in other aspects, we have gravely imperiled our earth home and its creatures. Whole species have become extinct; we’ve affected the climate, polluted waters, stripped landscapes, compromised whole ecosystems. We’ve even destroyed the atom to kill our brother.
But still, God charged us to care for the earth! Despite our potential to neglect this charge, God made a fearless decision to entrust us with the world. According to God’s higher wisdom, we are the stewards of this awesome planet. Each one of us is called to be faithful stewards of our earth home. This we can only do only one day at a time.
The passage we hear this morning from Matthew’s gospel guides us into fearless living. Jesus addresses the morbidity of anxiety.
Anxiety – fear – is a powerful motivator. We wind up going down pathways we never dreamed of. Anxiety drives us to circle the wagons to protect ourselves. We make short term decisions because surviving today is more critical than planning for a good and healthy tomorrow.
That anxiety shapes the decisions we make, decisions we make about earth stewardship. But we have been called into fearless living. Jesus counsels us to take a lesson from nature itself. Look to the birds. They don’t plant crops, they don’t gather grain into silos. They trust that God will provide.
Look to the meadow flowers, he says. Or, for us, as we’re surrounded by the beauty of autumn, look to the trees. Look to the trees, festooned in their brilliant autumn finery today. But tomorrow, their faded brilliance will be raked into piles and burned on a crisp October afternoon.
Look to them, Jesus says, and ask yourself a question: aren’t you of way more valuable than they are? Don’t you think, therefore, that God will care for you, too?
Jesus calls us to trust in God’s lovingkindness and never-ending providence. Jesus calls us away from our anxiety and into fearless living.
We are the creation of our creative God, who made us and placed us in our beautiful earth home among the spinning galaxies. We have been called to be faithful caretakers of this magnificent biosphere. As we live into our calling, we trust in the good God who first entrusted us. By faith, we choose not to allow our anxiety to order our days. Faith calls us into fearless living. Faith guides the choices we make for the future of the coming generations and the future of our planet. We trust in God. And we trust that in God, all our tomorrows are known.
