Speak to him and say: ‘This is what the Sovereign LORD says: ‘I am against you, Pharaoh king of Egypt, you great monster lying among your streams. You say, “The Nile belongs to me; I made it for myself.” – Ezekiel 29:3

Today’s Scripture Reading (May 22, 2014): Ezekiel 29

In the Russell Crowe film, Noah, the creators of the movie have an interesting view of the battle between good and evil. In a world dominated by the evil descendants of Cain, and the fallen angels known as the Watchers (a variant on the biblically based Nephilim), the earth is filled with darkness and death. It is a place where the riches of the earth are being used up, and the descendants of Cain are forced to explore more and more of the earth - using up more and more of the world’s precious resources. But Noah, a descendant of Seth, refuses to allow his family to take anything from the earth that they cannot use. Even the flowers of the field are sacred and not to be picked. And when Noah meets with his grandfather, Methuselah, Noah is given a seed. When Noah plants the seed, the dark lifeless environment is quickly exchanged for a green forest. Death is defeated in favor of life, evil is subdued in favor of what is good.     

I am coming under the conviction that what seems to have been the traditional response to environmentalism just might be wrong. It is like we miss the first chapter of the Bible. In the opening words of the Bible God pronounces everything that he creates as good, and then the combined product of creation as very good. Have we somehow we have missed that? One of the prevalent arguments among some Christians is that God has given the resources of this planet to us – that the earth is essentially a holder for these gifts from God, and when we have used up the resources of the world that God has given to us, then the earth, which we seem to believe has been made disposable, will simply be thrown away. But the question that more and more Christians seem to be asking is – if the world has been created as a disposable cup to hold a finite number of resources, why did God pronounce that creation was very good. And while we definitely do not believe that we are disposable, other than the statement that we are created in the image of God, the Bible does not seem to differentiate between us and the rest of creation – we are all simply pronounced to be good.

But beyond that, God seems to have a different reaction toward what he has made. As Ezekiel begins to prophecy against Egypt, part of the complaint is that the Pharaoh seems to believe that the rivers that flow through his territory belong to him, but God disagrees – the rivers, and really the resources of the planet, God has made for himself. It is part of what God has considered to be good.

So maybe it is not surprising that the movie “Noah” features a strong environmental theme. Noah, the protector of the planet, like Adam before him, is an environmentalist. He is a protector of the resources of the earth, resources that have never belonged to him, but instead belong to the one who created them in the first place. It is something that we need to be reminded of as we continue to use the resources of our planet.

Tomorrow’s Scripture Reading: Ezekiel 30