i am reading a book by eugene peterson called 'Christ plays in ten thousand places - a conversation in spiritual theology'. phew. even the title takes a minute! it's a vastly more intellectual read than i usually endeavor upon, and i've found it very slow going... but only because it's so rich & thoughtful. it's hard to "quote" because the ideas build on one another and are not easily encapsulated. but here is a little excerpt that i think is appropriate as we each embark upon our week.
"there is a great deal of so-called creation appreciation, or "love of nature", that prefers to look the other way when men and women appear on the scene. genesis 2 will not permit it. men and women are as integral to creation as the garden with it's trees and rivers, its animals and birds.
several years ago one of my students who lived a distance away and rode a crowded bus to the college each day said to his wife as he went out the door one morning, "i'm just going to go out and immerse myself in nature today." the next day his parting words were the same. on the third day, she called him back. "don't you think you ought to go to class today? a couple of days of walking in the woods or on the beach is okay, but don't you think enough is enough?"
he said, "oh, i've been going to class every day."
"then what," she said, "is all this business about immersing yourself in creation?"
"well, i spend fourty minutes on the bus each morning and afternoon. can you think of a setting more thick with creation than that - all those people created, created in the image of God, created male and female?" "
whether you believe God created man as part of a literal 6 day creation, or created him over eons of careful and intentional evolution is not the point of this little story. the point is we are all headed into a sea of creation tomorrow... schools, jobs, grocery stores, gyms, offices, malls. how would our time there be different if we realized it? we all stop in awe to appreciate the beauty of the mountain range, or the waves on the sand... how will we react to the creation we encounter tomorrow?
6 comments:
I'm finding that His creation that gathers at the green room on Monday nights is particularly colorful ... always captivating.
mmmmmm. nice.
(breathe it in)
I like this one. Well, I like them all, but I really liked this one :o)
I love to people watch, not because I'm curious as to what people will do or say, but because people are such a beautiful part of creation. My favorite, actually. It is what makes me a good photographer. In photography, you can't accurately capture the nature of people if you don't see people as nature.
mmm. i love this. probably because i love people.
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