[TBC: In the July 1997 issue of the newsletter, we made note of the words of the late Carl Sagan, who declared that "any efforts to safeguard and cherish the environment need to be infused with a vision of the sacred." A concerned Nazarene church member recently drew our attention to a statement from page 59 of “Creation Care: Environmental Stewardship for the Church of the Nazarene,” released in 2005.]
“In this most critical moment in Earth’s history, we are convinced that the central moral imperative of our time is the care for Earth as God’s creation. Churches, as communities of God’s people in the world, are called to exist as representatives of the loving Creator, Sustainer, and Restorer of all creation. We are called to worship God with all our being and actions, and to treat creation as sacred. We must engage our political leaders in supporting the very future of this planet. We are called to cling to the true Gospel – for ‘God so loved the world’ (John 3:16).”
[TBC: In the July 1997 article (“The Greening of the Cross”), Dave noted, “Reverence does not pertain to things but to persons. To reverence the impersonal creation instead of the personal God who created us is a perversion designed for escaping moral accountability to the Creator. God indicts those who worship the creation instead of its Creator (Rom 1:18-23) and warns of the corruption of morals and behavior which results (24-32).”]
