Rejoicing and Delighting in Creation

Scripture: Proverbs 8: 22-36; Colossians 1: 19-20

Sermon: Rejoicing and Delighting in Creation

Topics: creation, delight, wisdom, thistles, garbage, dance

Preached: June 8, 2008

Rev. Mike Abma

Proverbs 8: 22-36

²² The Lord created me at the beginning of his work,

   the first of his acts of long ago. 

²³ Ages ago I was set up,

   at the first, before the beginning of the earth. 

²⁴ When there were no depths I was brought forth,

   when there were no springs abounding with water. 

²⁵ Before the mountains had been shaped,

   before the hills, I was brought forth— 

²⁶ when he had not yet made earth and fields,

   or the world’s first bits of soil. 

²⁷ When he established the heavens, I was there,

   when he drew a circle on the face of the deep, 

²⁸ when he made firm the skies above,

   when he established the fountains of the deep, 

²⁹ when he assigned to the sea its limit,

   so that the waters might not transgress his command,

when he marked out the foundations of the earth, 

³⁰   then I was beside him, like a master worker;

and I was daily his delight,

   rejoicing before him always, 

³¹ rejoicing in his inhabited world

   and delighting in the human race. 

³² ‘And now, my children, listen to me:

   happy are those who keep my ways. 

³³ Hear instruction and be wise,

   and do not neglect it. 

³⁴ Happy is the one who listens to me,

   watching daily at my gates,

   waiting beside my doors. 

³⁵ For whoever finds me finds life

   and obtains favour from the Lord; 

³⁶ but those who miss me injure themselves;

   all who hate me love death.’

Colossians 1: 19-20

¹⁹For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, ²⁰and through him God was pleased to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, by making peace through the blood of his cross.

This is the Word of the Lord

Thanks be to God

INTRODUCTION — WISDOM and CREATION

The book of Proverbs is a very practical book.

Wisdom takes on the role of a teacher, a person, a woman, almost a mother,

who again and again talks about the way life works,

the way we were created,

and the way to get along with other people – our neighbors.

There is the way of wisdom and the way of folly.

The way of wisdom is to be righteous, the way of folly, to be wicked;

The way of wisdom, to be honest, the way of folly, to cheat;

The way of wisdom, to be generous, the way of folly, to be stingy;

The way of wisdom, to be humble, the way of folly, to be arrogant;

The way of wisdom, to be quiet, the way of folly, to be loud.

So it goes through this whole book:

if you want to get along with other people,

this is the right way to live… that is the wrong way.

In Chapter 8, Wisdom broadens her perspective.

She doesn’t only talk about how to get along with the neighbors.

She also talks about how to get along with the neighborhood.

Chapter 8 is all about Wisdom and Creation.

That word Creation has more than one sense, doesn’t it?

When we hear the word Creation,

we often first think about the story of Creation – how things came to be.

But the word Creation also refers to the beauty of Creation – the created order of things.

That is the sense of Creation in this chapter.

From the beginning, Wisdom was right there bringing order to things.

Before there were deep seas, high mountains, rolling fields,

Wisdom was right there planning things out with the Creator.

In verse 30 it says:

I was there beside him, like a master worker.

The Hebrew word for master worker is amon.

It is a rather obscure Hebrew word.

Check the footnote in the pew Bible and it will tell you that another possible translation of this word is “little child.”

Other translations will use words like “darling.”

But what is the meaning here?

What role is Wisdom playing?

I think the best way to picture Wisdom is as a living blueprint, a model, a standard that God used as he created all things.^[1] The picture we are given is of God creating all things,

having Wisdom right there beside him

making sure things are the way they should be,

making sure living creatures fit together in their delicate ecosystems,

much the way a builder is always referring to the blueprints.

And so, when the atmosphere of earth was created,

it was precisely proportioned to be 21% oxygen –

any less, and we would all have breathing problems,

any more, and the whole planet could become one fireball.

When the oceans were created,

the salt content was very close to 3.4% – 3.5%,

again, any more or less, and life as we know it in the oceans

would not be possible.

Wisdom — the blueprint.

Wisdom — the way things are supposed to be.

And Wisdom rejoices and delights in this world

when things are the way they are supposed to be.

Our text says that we are happiest when we keep her ways,

when we listen to her voice and learn her lessons,

when we delve into the deep structure of biology,

and discern the delicate balance of ecosystems,

to figure out how things flourish in our world.

Find wisdom, and we find life and God’s favor.

Neglect wisdom, and we will only injure this planet and ourselves.

Listen and learn from wisdom

for happy are those who keep her ways.

LOVING CREATION IN THEORY

Many of the sermons preached have to do with our relationship with other people:

our spouse, our co-workers, our classmates, our neighbors.

We are told to be slow to anger,

to listen before we speak,

that a soft answer often turns away anger.

That is the way of wisdom.

But what exactly is the way of wisdom in our relationship with God’s creation?

When Paul prays that all Christians

Be filled with the knowledge of God’s will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding so that we may lead lives worthy of the Lord….

what does this prayer mean in terms of how we treat this world we live in and on?

First of all, in confessing that God created the heavens and the earth,

we are confessing that this whole world is God’s handiwork.

It is God’s masterpiece.

To love God is to honor and respect what he has made and fashioned and

formed.

Second, in confessing the Jesus Christ died to save the world,

we are confessing that he died to save more than human souls.

If we were to keep reading Paul’s letter to the Colossians,

we would read that wonderful passage describing Jesus as the one

in whom and through whom all things were made.

We would read that through Jesus,

God was pleased to reconcile to himself all things, all things,

not just human souls, but all things, by making peace on the cross.

The way of Wisdom is to begin seeing the world the way God sees it:

to delight and rejoice in the way God created it;

to weep over it, when it is destroyed, or abused, or polluted;

and to work to restore it to what God created it to be.

That is the way of wisdom.

Listen and learn from wisdom

for happy are those who keep her ways.

LOVING CREATION IN PRACTICE

I think we can all say Amen to that because we are still in the realm of fairly abstract theology.

But what does theology means unless it begins to live and breathe in our lives?

So let me take a real example from close by.

Dave Warners, who teaches biology here at Calvin, told me there is a federally protected species of thistle here in Michigan called the Pitcher Thistle.

It is a threatened species. There are not many of these plants in the whole world.

That is partly because it has a very limited habitat.

The sand dunes along the Lake Michigan shore are one of its few habitats.

Now say some people want to build a brand new golf course among the sand dunes of Lake Michigan. And say that they plan to build right where there is a healthy colony of Pitcher Thistles.

What is the way of wisdom?

One answer was given by Charles Krauthammer in TIME magazine a while back.^[2]

His response was this: we protect the environment only if there is a direct benefit to humankind.

But if there is no direct benefit, then what is the point.

So, if we need oil from, say Alaska, and caribou are in the way – well, we need oil.

Or if we need to log trees and some spotted owls are in the way – well, we need those logs.

Or if we would like to play golf on the lake shore and some pitcher thistles are in the way – well, what is going to help the economy more, golf or thistle plants?

Now I have picked a thistle and golf on purpose.

I have no innate love for thistle plants.

I do, however, like playing golf.

So in a tug-of-war between a thistle plant and golf, I know which I like more.

But still, what is the way of wisdom?

Many of us Christians are quickly up in arms when God is not given full credit for creating all things.

Are we as quickly up in arms when one part of God’s creation is threatened or endangered?

Don’t we confess that God keeps his eye on all things, even the lowly little sparrow?

Don’t we confess that God cares for all things, even the lilies of the field?

If God cares about sparrows and lilies,

don’t we think he also cares about polar bears in the arctic,

and pitcher thistle plants in the Michigan sand dunes?

Don’t we think he cares enough about them that it would be painful to him

if they were needlessly erased from his creation?

The way of wisdom is discovering how to live in harmony with God’s creation.

It is to pay attention to how this planet works,

to study its blueprint so to speak,

so that we do not mess things up too badly,

and so that we actually allow life to flourish as it should.

As John Calvin himself noted, the way of wisdom is learning to enjoy the

fruit of creation without damaging or hurting creation’s fruitfulness.

The way of wisdom is to actually enhance Creation’s fruitfulness.

It is also to stand in awe of the beauty of creation:

to be more impressed by the power and information contained in a

tiny seed, than in the latest Intel microchip.

Listen and learn from wisdom,

For happy are those who keep her ways.

THE WAY OF WISDOM — LIVING BY THE RULES

When I was a kid, my parents had rules for me when I was visiting elsewhere.

The rules involved how to treat the people you were staying with – always be polite, always say thank you. The rules also involved how to treat the place you were staying:

1) only take your share – don’t hog, hoard, or take more than you need.

2) clean up after yourself — don’t leave a mess, make your bed.

3) keep the place in as good a shape as you found it, even better than you found it.

What if we applied some of these simple rules to living in God’s creation?

What if we only took our share – not any more than we really needed?

What if we made it a point to always clean up after ourselves.

What if, wherever we lived, we worked hard to make the place more lovely than the way we found it?

I think this would have a real impact on life.

Take the whole area of garbage.

There is that cute Honda Civic commercial – have you seen it?

One person keeps dropping trash out of his car window.

Another, in a Honda Civic of course, keeps collecting all his dropped trash.

At the end of the commercial, the Honda owner presents the trash dropper with a big sculpted bouquet of all the garbage with a note: “Here, you dropped this.”

It is a cute commercial.

But how about a lifestyle that simply produces less trash?

How about following the basic rules so that we reduce, reuse, recycle and compost more and more, all in an effort to keep this creation as clean as possible?

Can we honestly say we are living a Christ-centered, Creation-loving life when we are piling several garbage bags per person on the curb every week?

Listen and learn from wisdom

for happy are those who keep her ways..

Recently I read about a 500 acre farm in Virginia that tries to farm by following the ways of wisdom.

Joel Salatin, the owner of the farm, truly tries to honor his animals as creatures that reflect the creative love of God. His animals are not pets. They are farm animals. But he tries to use the best of the land to bring out the best in his animals. And he tries to use the best in the animals to be beneficial to the land.

So his cow herd is moved from pasture to pasture with moveable fences, always eating fresh grass – the cows need no extra hormones, and the fields receive no artificial fertilizers.

His chickens follow the cows, eating the bugs – the chickens are healthy and

happy and the fields need no pesticides.

And his pigs apparently produce amazing compost.

Then there are the different crops he grows.

Unlike many farms that specialize in only one thing, one crop, Joel has a whole variety of livestock and crops, each one in some way benefitting the others in what he calls a barnyard dance of delight to God.^[3]

Sounds kind of fun, doesn’t it?

We may not have 500 acres, but in our own lawn and gardens of say 5000 square feet, what could we do? We can we do to delight and rejoice in the beauty of creation right in our gardens, and in our own neighborhoods?

Listen and learn from wisdom

for happy are those who keep her ways.

RECEIVING AND BEING A BLESSING

Happy are those who keep her ways.

That word keep in verse 32 is an interesting word.

In Hebrew it is the verb shamar.

At the end of many worship services there are words of blessing.

Often the words of blessing are from Numbers 6:

The Lord bless you and keep you….keep you…it is the same Hebrew word: shamar.

What does it mean that the Lord keeps us?

I think it means that God cares for us, protects us, tends to us,

watches over us, keeps his eye on us.

That word shows up much earlier in the Bible.

In the Garden of Eden,

Adam and Eve are given the job of tilling and keeping the garden

(Gen 2:15).

Again, the same Hebrew word for keep.

Even as the Lord blesses us and keeps us,

we have the task of blessing and keeping his Creation,

of caring for it, protecting it, tending to it, watching over it.

The only way we can do this well is by listening to and

learning from and keeping to the way of wisdom.

That is the picture the Bible gives: God, we his people, and his Creation,

all dancing this wonderful dance of blessing, delighting in one another,

being blessed by one another.

May the dance continue.

Amen

1. See Al Wolters, Creation Regained, pp. 30-31 for an elaboration of this view of wisdom. ↑

2. Charles Krauthammer, “Saving Nature, But Only For Man,” TIME, June 21, 1991. ↑

3. In “Barnyard Dance: Farming that Honors Animals” in Christian Century Jan. 23, 2007. ↑