What message do you have for the future of the earth? “Armageddon,” or “I’m a garden”?
The battle of Armageddon frightens people who don’t understand John’s vision. It’s not a picture of a terrifying future. It’s a promise: the kingdom of God overcomes everything the world can throw at it. John sees that the combined force of all the armies in the world cannot bring down the King of Kings or block his reign. Continue reading “It doesn’t end with Armageddon”
My Dad was a farmer. So was his Dad. They didn’t like “greenies” as they called environmental protesters. But they held the farm across generations, so they wanted to treat the land in a sustainable way.
My Dad always ploughed across the slope, so the furrows held the water, not down the slope where the water would wash the soil away. He hated overstocking: he reckoned farmers who carried too many head per acre had more droughts than those who looked after the land. In a time when many farmers burned off the stubble after harvest, he ploughed it back into the soil. Periodically he even spelled the paddocks (leaving then fallow).
He wasn’t perfect, but he taught me to respect the land, to see it as a gift from God for us to use and care for. It was just a small farm tucked away in a little valley with a creek running down between the mountains. When I go back there, I still feel that love of the land, a deep connection to country. Continue reading “Tenants on God’s farm”
When God is king, earth is his kingdom.
As I write, I’m looking into a green forest, with an ocean in the distance. I’m on holidays, enjoying my children and grandchildren. It feels like the kind of wild natural extravagance and intimate communal joy God always intended for his earthly realm.
