Before the fall of man into sin, people were in perfect relationship with God, with one another, and with creation (Gen 1-2). When sin entered the world through Adam, all three of those relationships were damaged (Gen 3). Since it is the time of the fall harvest, I recently had the opportunity to share at a church more about the third of those--man’s relationship with creation--and how restoration in that relationship relates to other areas of our faith. Here are my thoughts.
The broken relationship between man and land is a complex global issue. The way many cash crops are produced are almost exclusively in large, single crop plantations that have a predominantly negative effect on the ecosystem. Some of the most biodiverse tropical forests are being clear cut, critically endagering animals, contributing to soil and water pollution, and leading to erosion. Another common practice is intensive mining, where ecosystems or people are uprooted to drill into the ground and extract all of a resource until it is gone, leaving behind an area uninhabitable to people and most animals. This sounds more like exploitation, abuse, and selfishness instead of the dominion, stewardship, and care we are called to.
These agricultural and mining practices not only damage the ecosystem, but are detrimental to people. As plantations expand, they often illegally seize land, displacing entire communities. Other rural families see this and feel they have no other choice but to sell out and become subsistence farmers or give into the short term benefits of monoculture or mining concerns. This in turn leaves the people with little option but to take up manual labor jobs that underpay and exploit, or to abandon their communities and flee to the city to look for work.
Now, as passionate as I am about ecology, we are not going to SE Asia primarily because of land use issues. We are not even going primarily because of social issues. We want to go because there are peoples there who have never worshiped the Lord, and as the Moravians famously said, we go “that the Lamb who was slain would receive the reward of His suffering.” But, the question that now presents itself is whether the issues of ecology and international outreach can be isolated.
Unreached people and people groups are unreached because they are hard to reach. This difficulty comes from the fact that all three of the damaged relationships mentioned above create barriers. Instead of worshiping the one true God, they are directing worship at idols or other gods; instead of living in true harmony with one another, they have damaged relationships with other people in the form of clan, tribal, or class conflicts and in false honor codes; but, they are also hard to reach because the damaged relationship with the land is leaving their physical needs unmet. If the goal of global work is to complete the great commission, then attempts to reach these people must address all three of these broken relationship and bring promise of restoration on every side. In order to see a harvest of souls, we need to address the physical harvest these people see and experience.
Thankfully, the message that we bring does exactly that! Christ’s death on the cross removed our guilt and shame, allowing us to become right with God and enter into relationship with Him. By defeating Satan in the resurrection and sending His Spirit, He empowered His people to live in peace and harmony with one another, operating as a body. As He fulfills His promise to write His law on our hearts, we can know His will and wisdom to steward the land faithfully, restoring that relationship. And the hope of Christianity is that all of these will be fully restored to perfection (Rev. 21)--living in the full, physical presence of the Lord, in perfect harmony with all of His people, in a new, perfected creation! Glory to God!
Before the fall of man into sin, people were in perfect relationship with God, with one another, and with creation (Gen ). When sin entered the world through Adam, all three of those relationships were damaged. Since it is the time of the fall harvest, I recently had the opportunity to share at a church more about the third of those--man’s relationship with creation--and how restoration in that relationship relates to other areas of our faith.
The broken relationship between man and land is a complex global issue. The way many cash crops are produced are almost exclusively in large, single crop plantations that have a predominantly negative effect on the ecosystem. Some of the most biodiverse tropical forests are being clear cut, critically endagering animals, contributing to soil and water pollution, and leading to erosion. Another common practice is intensive mining, where ecosystems or people are uprooted to drill into the ground and extract all of a resource until it is gone, leaving behind an area uninhabitable to people and most animals. This sounds more like exploitation, abuse, and selfishness instead of the dominion, stewardship, and care we are called to.
These agricultural and mining practices not only damage the ecosystem, but are detrimental to people. As plantations expand, they often illegally seize land, displacing entire communities. Other rural families see this and feel they have no other choice but to sell out and become subsistence farmers or give into the short term benefits of monoculture or mining concerns. This in turn leaves the people with little option but to take up manual labor jobs that underpay and exploit, or to abandon their communities and flee to the city to look for work.
Now, as passionate as I am about ecology, we are not going to SE Asia primarily because of land use issues. We are not even going primarily because of social issues. We want to go because there are peoples there who have never worshiped the Lord, and as the Moravians famously said, we go “that the Lamb who was slain would receive the reward of His suffering.” But, the question that now presents itself is whether the issues of ecology and international outreach can be isolated.
Unreached people and people groups are unreached because they are hard to reach. This difficulty comes from the fact that all three of the damaged relationships mentioned above create barriers. Instead of worshiping the one true God, they are directing worship at idols or other gods; instead of living in true harmony with one another, they have damaged relationships with other people in the form of clan, tribal, or class conflicts and in false honor codes; but, they are also hard to reach because the damaged relationship with the land is leaving their physical needs unmet. If the goal of global work is to complete the great commission, then attempts to reach these people must address all three of these broken relationship and bring promise of restoration on every side. In order to see a harvest of souls, we need to address the physical harvest these people see and experience.
--Richard
Photo by Rod Long on Unsplash