1.
Grace,
mercy, and peace to you from God our Heavenly Father and our Lord and Savior
Jesus Christ. The message from God’s
Word this morning comes from the Bible Lessons for today. It’s entitled, “Managing God’s Gift of the World,” dear brothers and sisters in
Christ.
2.
Stewardship.
It’s a word that brings different reactions. Maybe you hear that word and
wonder, “What does it even mean?” Maybe
you hear the word “stewardship” and think, “Oh no! It’s that time of year
again? How far behind are we in this year’s budget? How much will we need for
next year’s budget?” Or maybe you hear that word and grab your wallet to keep
it safe from prying offering plates!
3.
Well,
here’s news for you. “Stewardship” is not all about
money. Money is only part of the picture. “Stewardship” involves all of our Christian faith and life. It describes how we
believe and live as God’s created, redeemed, and sanctified children in all of
life. We often use the term
“stewardship” to translate the Greek word oikonomia.
That Greek word literally means “the
management of a household or family.” The Old English word from which we
get “stewardship” means the same thing. It’s what the housekeeper or the butler
would do in their service to the lord of the manor. The lord of the manor owned
the mansion and the whole estate. The housekeeper or the butler managed what
belonged to him.
4.
So
it is for us Christians. Our loving triune God—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit—is
the “lord of the manor” for the heavens and the earth and everything in them. We
manage what God Himself owns. In this stewardship series we will focus on the
big picture of Managing God’s Gifts. Today, we begin with God’s gift of the
world, all of His physical creation in all of its material beauty. Psalm 24
sings the glories of our heavenly King: “The
earth is the Lord’s and the fullness thereof, the world and those who
dwell therein”
(Psalm 24:1).
5.
In
order to appreciate fully God’s gift of His world and everything in it, we need
to go back to Genesis chapters 1 and 2, before the fall into sin. There we hear
how God created everything—the heavens, the earth, light, dark, sea, sky, land,
vegetation, fish, birds, all the animals and critters, and even us human
beings—all of it, out of nothing. Only God can do that! And since He created it
all, He owns it all. Then notice what
our mighty, heavenly King did. He turned management of His good creation over
to His human creatures. He entrusted His whole created estate to their
management, or stewardship. He told Adam and Eve, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and have
dominion over the fish of
the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that
moves on the earth” (Genesis 1:28). In Genesis 2, God explains what this
means: “The Lord God took the man
and put him in the garden of Eden to
work it and keep it” (Genesis 2:15).
6.
Subdue God’s good
creation? Have dominion over
heavens and earth, over land and sea, over fish, birds, and animals? Some may
balk at that. Maybe you have some misgivings too. It sounds so abusive, so oppressive.
It can be that, but only after Adam and Eve plunged
us into sin and brought death into the world.
But, in God’s good order, the
words “subdue” and “have dominion over” meant nothing more
than receive, guard, keep, use responsibly, manage well, take care of—that is,
practice good stewardship. God wants us and all people to work
and keep His world of physical, material things, both
animate and inanimate. He wants us to manage it all, and manage it well.
7.
It’s
what we confess in the explanation of the First Article of the Apostles’ Creed,
where Martin Luther instructs us: “I
believe that God has made me and all creatures; that He has given me my body
and soul, eyes, ears, and all my members, my reason and all my senses, and
still takes care of them. He also gives me clothing and shoes, food and drink,
house and home, wife and children, land, animals, and all I have. He richly and
daily provides me with all that I need to support this body and life. . . . All
this He does only out of fatherly, divine goodness and mercy, without any merit
or worthiness in me. For all this it is my duty to thank and praise, serve and
obey Him.” This is good stewardship—good management—of God’s gifts:
receiving them from Him, thanking Him for them, and using them as He intends.
8.
The
problem is, we now live in a sinful world corrupted by death, with poor
management of God’s good world. We fallen sinners routinely abuse the gift of
God’s good earth. We toss our candy wrappers or our cigarette butts on the
ground with an out-of-sight-out-of-mind neglect. When we repaint the living
room, we may not properly dispose of the unused paint or paint thinner. We have
huge companies that look for inexpensive ways to dispose of waste materials
from their factories and end up polluting God’s earth with toxic sludge or smog.
9.
Enter
the environmental movement. They tell us we must protect the environment. We
must learn to recycle. We must drive our cars less, or at least drive more
fuel-efficient and cleaner cars. We must “Save the Earth!” or “Save the
Whales!” or “Save the Rain Forests!” We must be more “green,” that is, aware of
how our actions, our use of materials, and our disposal of materials impacts
planet Earth. These can be good practices. Good management of God’s gift of the
world wants to take care of the many things, creatures, and resources that God
gives.
10.
But,
where we run into problems, is when the environmental movement turns planet
Earth into a goddess to be worshiped and protected at all costs. Maybe you’ve
seen the bumper sticker that says “Love your mother” right next to a picture of
planet Earth—or the one that says “Walk gently on Mother Earth,” again, right
next to a picture of planet Earth. The idea is that Earth—also called “Gaia”—is
the goddess, and we must do homage and protect her. Good management of God’s
earth, however, does not mean deifying the created
order.
11.
Nor
does it mean exploiting the land, the sea, or their many resources, as if
physical things do not matter. When we mindlessly litter, when we waste food,
when we poach animals, when we flush out or bury toxic waste, we are playing
God and forgetting that we are but managers of God’s good world. A manager who
wastes or spurns the Master’s possessions deserves only to be fired. God’s Word gives us a completely different
way of managing God’s good gift of the world and everything in it. In our
Gospel, we hear how our Lord Jesus Himself respects the created order of His
Father. We can even rejoice that He also uses the created order to deliver the
gifts of His salvation!
12.
Jesus
had been teaching for 3 straight days, and the people had been gladly hearing
and learning the Word of God from Him. But by that time, they were hungry. If
Jesus had told them to go home to get supper, they would have fainted on the
way. So our Lord once again shows His deep compassion. He took the seven loaves
and the few small fish—created things—gave thanks for them, broke them, and
gave them to the disciples to give to the crowd. And all 4000 people in the
crowd that day ate their fill and were satisfied.
13.
Our
Lord Jesus Himself practices good management—of God’s material world. He uses
the gifts of creation to feed and satisfy these 4000 people. “God certainly gives daily bread to everyone
without our prayers, even to all evil people.” So we, God’s managers, learn to
pray “that God would lead us to realize this and to receive our daily bread
with thanksgiving” (SC, explanation of the Fourth Petition). Managing God’s
gift of the world means receiving His material world, in all of its
many-splendored wonder, with thanksgiving and using it for our benefit and the
benefit of people around us.
14.
Since
we don’t always do this, and since we too often neglect God’s good world, and
since we may even be tempted to deify God’s good creation, we look to Jesus not
only for daily bread, but also for His mercy and forgiveness—His “bread of
life.” This Jesus, who fed the crowd of 4000, also came to redeem and restore
us and all of God’s creation. This Jesus, “true God, begotten of the Father
from eternity,” is also “true man, born
of the Virgin Mary” (SC, explanation of the Second Article). This Jesus Himself
had and still has “body and soul, eyes, ears, and all [His] members, [His]
reason and all [His] senses” (SC, explanation of the First Article).
15.
This
Jesus received all these gifts of God’s created world and managed them in order
to save and redeem you. His physical body was cruelly whipped. His physical
head was crowned with thorns. His physical hands and feet were pierced and
fixed to a cross. His voice cried out, “It
is finished” (John 19:30), to proclaim you forgiven and redeemed. And, on
top of all that, this Jesus rose victorious from the grave, with His physical,
material body. His resurrection on the third day also becomes the first day of
a new, restored creation. This Jesus even uses things of His creation to
deliver His salvation directly to you: water for your Baptism, to make you His
child; sound waves for you to hear His Absolution; and bread and wine in His
Supper to give you forgiveness, life, and salvation.
16.
Your
Lord Jesus redeems you in body and soul, so that you may live once again as His
faithful stewards, or managers, of His world. Let’s listen to St. Paul’s words
from 1 Timothy 4:4: “Everything created
by God is good, and nothing is to be rejected if it is received with
thanksgiving.” You and I have been redeemed
by Jesus Himself to care for His creation—to manage the gift of His world.
17.
Instead
of deifying the created order, we treat it with proper respect, because “the earth is the Lord’s and the
fullness thereof”
(Psalm 24:1). Instead of wasting, we conserve. Instead of spurning physical
things, we delight in all that God gives in His created order. Instead of
littering or polluting, we find ways to properly and safely dispose of trash or
toxic waste. Instead of abusing or poaching animals, we care for them, and,
yes, even use them for food, as God has given (Genesis 9:3). We can delight in
God’s good creation. By His grace, we can manage God’s gift of the whole world. Amen.
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