Creation and Sabbath, Part 2

[0:00] Let us pray. O God, our Father, Almighty Maker of heaven and earth, and of all things visible and invisible, we come to you in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, and trusting you in the power of the Holy Spirit that we will be guided to say that which is appropriate and helpful.

[0:39] In Jesus' name. Amen. For those of you who missed last time, this is a good strategy because you get a quick overview in the second talk, so you can freely miss the first one and just get an efficient review of the first time.

[1:17] We considered the fact of our faith in God as Creator, the extent to which that expression of our faith permeates our prayer book, permeates our lives around the communion service.

[1:41] the Trinitarian nature of that creation, the fact that Jesus, the Word, was present at the beginning, as we checked with John chapter 1 and Hebrews chapter 1, and that he will be present at the end in the new heaven and the new earth, as described in Revelation 22.

[2:09] We discussed the question of beginnings, the inappropriateness of science, and the impossibility of science being able to address the issue of beginnings.

[2:29] And we addressed the question of the purpose of creation. Also in our open exchange, after the presentation, we moved into the topic of perspectives on the creation account in Genesis.

[2:46] Nothing could have been clearer during the recent visit of a distinguished professor at UBC, to whom I alluded last time, but that many of our leading intellectuals worship at the altar, which is known as there is no truth.

[3:05] Almost precisely the same condition was expressed amongst the Athenians, who Paul addressed in Acts chapter 17, when he said, Men of Athens, I perceive that in every way you are very religious, but what you worship as unknown, this I proclaim to you.

[3:35] What Paul is saying to this intellectual audience is that they have a distinctive perspective, or if you like, a set of assumptions and prejudices, and he is challenging them to examine those assumptions, because he has met with the risen Christ on the road to Damascus, and he wants to introduce them to this unknown God.

[4:02] So these were the kinds of thoughts that were interspersed with the occasional heretical comment, as I was informed after the talk, but today I would like to develop the thought of the vital importance for us as Christians to link more fully our understanding of creation and redemption, and one way of doing just that is by thinking more carefully about the Sabbath principle.

[4:40] We start off again this week with Genesis chapters 1 and 2, the end of chapter 1 and the beginning of chapter 2, as you see on the overhead, and the link that is made so explicitly there between the Sabbath and the creation.

[5:03] and the statement of the Ten Commandments, you will recall the very close connection that is made in this creation ordinance of the Fourth Commandment, and I wonder how many of us have puzzled over the fact that this commandment is by far the longest of the Ten Commandments.

[5:37] Now, length doesn't necessarily mean importance, but I think it does indicate that there is a significant link which needs to be addressed here.

[5:49] We see here how the commandment to keep the Sabbath holy is a creation ordinance.

[6:02] That is to say that the link between creation and the Sabbath principle is explicitly made. But also you will recall, those of you who know your Deuteronomy well, that there is a different rationale for the Fourth Commandment given in Deuteronomy Chapter 5.

[6:25] And I'm grateful to Shin for directing me to this last time. In Deuteronomy Chapter 5 and verse 12 in specifying the details of the Fourth Commandment, the purpose of keeping the Sabbath is to remember that you were a slave in Egypt.

[6:46] and that the Lord brought you out from there. And here the link between the Sabbath and redemption is explicit. So I've been reflecting on the way in which this Sabbath principle connects both the creation story and the redemption story.

[7:09] What precisely is this connection? Why is it that so many of us I speak for myself here but think I'm not alone but I will be informed I'm sure if I am.

[7:25] What is it that so many of us have entirely missed? As I noted last time at least those of us who attend the Tuesday lunch our Bible study have entirely negative recollections of the way in which our childhood Sabbaths were celebrated.

[7:46] My thesis then is that the connection here is that the Sabbath is an integral part of the creation story as of the redemption story and that we need to inquire more deeply into the nature of this connection.

[8:05] And not only is the Sabbath an integral part of the creation story and the redemption story but that it in turn has explicit ethical implications for the way in which we live our lives.

[8:20] And I will try to unwrap this this morning. Let us start with the question what was God doing on the seventh day of creation?

[8:39] The first point to make is that he was not doing nothing. That I think may have been the main lesson that I was taught about the Sabbath.

[8:53] Don't move. Don't do a thing. You'll be in trouble. The second thing we are told that God saw everything that he had made and it was very good.

[9:11] Thirdly we are told that on the seventh day God finished his work. Not on the sixth day. He finished his work on the seventh day. fourthly we are told on the seventh day God rested.

[9:34] And again Bill's biblical knowledge came to my rescue last time when he talked about the nature of this rest and we'll say a few more words about that in a moment.

[9:51] fifthly we are told that God blessed the seventh day. And sixthly we are told that God made the seventh day holy.

[10:07] So God was actually very busy on the seventh day in the sense that there was a lot of active participation in the creation story on the seventh day.

[10:21] let us try to think for a moment if it's appropriate to try to put ourselves into the frame of thinking that God must have had as he reflected on his creation.

[10:45] He must have been excited. so extraordinarily thrilled by the intricacy of his creation by the beauty of it by the generosity of it as it was expressed.

[11:07] it seems as if the denial of celebration on a seventh day is the very opposite of what God must have experienced.

[11:26] of course it does say in the commandment that you shall not do any work. But to emphasize that negative seems to me to be the source of a major mistake.

[11:44] The reason for not doing any secular work was to free us up for worshipping, for thanking God for his creation and the fact of our deliverance from slavery.

[12:02] It wasn't either or, it was creation and redemption. So our deliverance from slavery is as real as the deliverance of the children of Israel from the Egyptians.

[12:26] Indeed, it's far more profound because it constitutes the delivery of the whole of humanity, potentially, from the slavery of sin.

[12:41] So that's the first point. God was not doing nothing on the seventh day. He was, it would seem, reflecting on how this beginning of creation ultimately was going to be vindicated, both through the redemption story and through the new heaven and the new earth that would appear in the last time.

[13:14] God saw everything.

[13:30] The idea here seems to be that God's work in creation is transparent and speaks of him. I'm not speaking here about a pantheism or a worshipping of creation.

[13:49] I'm thinking of the way in which God viewed his creation as one way of communicating with his people.

[13:59] thirdly, that God finished his work on the seventh day. The contemplation and the pleasure of that contemplation were an integral part of the creation.

[14:19] It's a thought that I think is important as we think of what it is that is the purpose of this seventh day.

[14:36] The contemplation of God's handiwork in creation, the contemplation of our rescue from slavery. These were a part of the creation from the very beginning.

[14:55] Then the theme of God resting on the seventh day. This is the theme that, as Bill reminded us, is taken up so beautifully in Hebrews chapter four and verse nine.

[15:12] So then, there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God. the meaning of that rest is that we cease from spiritual striving and sharing in the everlasting joy that God entered when he rested on the seventh day.

[15:36] Can I say that again? The meaning of the Sabbath rest is a ceasing from spiritual striving and sharing in the everlasting joy that God entered when he rested on the seventh day.

[15:55] So there's a ceasing from spiritual striving in the sense that it is a finished work in which our faith rests.

[16:05] rest. It's a ceasing from spiritual striving in the sense that we don't have to work hard at it. That is to say, we don't have to work hard at achieving the rest because it is God's work.

[16:25] There are lots of other things we have to work at to follow from this, but the Sabbath rest for the people of God, it seems to me, has then been monumentally misinterpreted to mean don't do anything.

[16:40] What it means is that rest is an active rest, a joyful rest, a ceasing from striving in the spiritual sense of worrying about whether or not I'm worthy enough, whether or not the work of Christ is adequate, whether or not I'm included, this spiritual striving has ceased, the Sabbath rest is upon us.

[17:16] Just further to this, God blessed the Sabbath. I discovered in my searchings that the word to bless derives from a secular Germanic root, and of course this does not relate directly to the word that is translated, blessed.

[17:39] But in the Germanic root, the word blessed means to mark with blood. And in primitive tribes, well, north western Europe was primitive even at that time.

[18:02] Among primitive tribes, the marking with blood was to ascribe sanctity. So there's a clear link in the thought here of the way in which God blessed the seventh day.

[18:23] That there is an implication of the shedding of blood that was going to be necessary. And the blessing which imposed sanctity on the day and on the principle was established.

[18:40] Finally, God made the Sabbath holy. holy. And again, the word whole comes from the same Germanic root which means unimpaired or inviolate.

[18:55] Unimpaired, the sense of being the best. Inviolate, the sense of being absolutely perfect.

[19:10] God made the Sabbath holy. So, there's actually a huge amount in these few verses in Genesis chapters 1 and 2 if we reflect on this as being a set of active verbs describing how God was reflecting on his creation and indeed anticipating the need for the redemption of mankind.

[19:40] So, one could spend a lot of time on that alone, but I believe this is only the beginning of a contemplation of the role of the Sabbath.

[19:54] Because many of the ethical implications of honoring the Sabbath are developed much later in Leviticus. as many of you will know in Leviticus chapter 25 there is an extension, maybe an extension, maybe simply making explicit what was already in the Sabbath concept already from the beginning.

[20:19] We should note in passing that already in the fourth commandment livestock and sojourners were called on to keep the Sabbath holy, but that sort of mention of livestock and sojourners is perhaps sometimes seen as an aside, but in Leviticus chapter 25 verse 2 that the land shall keep a Sabbath to the Lord, every seventh year there shall be a Sabbath.

[20:49] of solemn rest for the land. The agricultural societies which are present in the 21st century have less direct awareness of this, but of course the whole system of letting the land lie fallow was at the basis of medieval and earlier agriculture.

[21:19] the land and incidentally we are reaping the results of ignoring that principle. if you think of the enormous amount of nitrate that is poured on the agricultural soils of the American Midwest and the exhaustion of the agricultural soils, but more importantly what happens to that nitrate as it enters the Gulf of Mexico and forms a dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico, you can see that the over exploitation of the land and the ignoring of the Sabbath principle brings with it significant negative results.

[22:11] the solemn rest for the land is very alien to our contemporary sense of industrialized agriculture and I think we are reaping the rewards from that.

[22:29] But if you pursue the chapter of Leviticus 25 yet further, you will find of course that in verse 8 you shall count seven weeks of years, seven times seven years, so that the time of the seven weeks of years shall give you forty-nine years, and you shall consecrate the fiftieth year and proclaim liberty, throughout the land to all its inhabitants.

[23:05] It shall be a jubilee for you. The concept of a joy-filled Sabbath, a jubilee, a feast, and the freedom of all slaves in that year, the whole idea of the liberty that is implied in the Sabbath principle, is then extended to this year of jubilee, the fiftieth year, following the seven times seven, forty-nine years, for those of you whose mathematics is weak, just a reminder.

[23:51] what I read all this saying, and again you have the opportunity to correct me in the time of discussion, is that the people and the livestock and the land and the fruit of the land are to receive the blessing of the Sabbath.

[24:17] And in return the people are to respect the creation ordinance of God by taking care of all created things. At this point in time you will be aware that Canada sits close to last in international ratings of her concern for and stewardship of God's creation.

[24:43] At last time of calculating we were 57th out of 58 nations that subjected themselves to this environmental sensitivity index.

[24:55] Whatever the accuracy of that index, and there could be lots of debate in this room about the accuracy of it, do we, as God fearing and creation respecting Christians, believe that this is good enough?

[25:15] Well, moving on to Matthew chapter 12 where Jesus interprets the Sabbath for the Pharisees, you will recall the occasion where Jesus says, I tell you that something greater than the temple is here, and if you had realized that I desire mercy and not sacrifice, you would not have condemned the guiltless.

[25:49] For the Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath, and it is indeed lawful to do good on the Sabbath. Now, of course, we all say, well, the Pharisees were a bunch of, well, I won't use a word, but they were very misled in their interpretation of the Sabbath, and we tend to miss the point that it applies to us also.

[26:18] It is lawful to do good on the Sabbath. It's just a really, sounds like a silly point, but if we spend our time attending to ourselves, and only ourselves, this would seem to be a misuse of the Sabbath.

[26:44] So it's my hunch, and you'll notice, it's a modest statement, it's my hunch, that the reason so many of us were so miserable on Sundays, in our youth, was that we overlooked completely the connection between the creation story and the redemption story.

[27:05] As today's conservative Christians, who have a priority to communicate the redemption story, we are in the same danger of losing sight of the creation story as were the Pharisees.

[27:19] That sounds like a harsh word, after, well, a contentious annual meeting this week, but nevertheless, it seems to me, we have to take to heart that there are some things that are not quite right in our midst.

[27:40] Mercy towards our fellow beings and created things, and not the performance of ritual sacrifice, are matters of high relevance in our current environmental crisis.

[27:54] It seems to me that if creation and redemption are seen to be closely coupled, which they are, by the way, in our communion service, where the whole of the tenor of our worship in a communion service is that we worship the God of creation, we worship the God of redemption, and the whole of the connection is integral.

[28:21] people. But if creation and redemption are seen to be closely coupled, the importance of not disfiguring God's creation beyond what is absolutely necessary for survival becomes apparent.

[28:36] there is this wonderful verse in Colossians chapter 1 and verse 15, where Christ is the image of the unseen God and the first born of all creation.

[28:53] For in him were created all things in heaven and on earth, everything visible and everything invisible. You see, the prayer book actually does, it's consistent with the scriptures, everything visible and everything invisible.

[29:15] Thrones, dominions, sovereignties, powers, all things were created through him and for him. We're talking about Jesus Christ, our Lord.

[29:33] before anything was created, he existed and he holds all things in unity. As he is the beginning, he was first to be born from the dead so that he should be first in every way, because God wanted all perfection to be found in him and all things to be reconciled through him and for him, everything in heaven and on earth, when he made peace by his death on the cross.

[30:01] It's the most beautiful passage linking in an absolutely fundamental way the creation and the redemption.

[30:17] If I could summarize my thoughts on this, again you may have concerns about the application of some of this, but let us think more carefully about the Sabbath rest.

[30:35] Let us think more about the proclamation of liberty, more about the celebration of freedom, more joyful expression of our faith, and more respect for all created beings, especially in our individual lives as lived in society.

[31:01] It also seems to me that we could recast the global environmental challenges of our time in a totally new Christ-affirming, Christ-centered, and life-affirming outreach.

[31:19] After all, all things, whether visible or invisible, were created through him and for him. So I may have slightly the wrong balance in this presentation, but you will see that it's colored very much by my own professional interests in environmental degradation.

[31:47] But it's also driven by a concern that we don't talk enough about this as Christians. And so if you can bear with me on this, and I know that some people will say, well, there's old Slymaker on his hobby horse again.

[32:07] You've heard it before. But it is a new thing to see, for me, to see the Sabbath as the key to this link.

[32:19] book. And it was very clear to the children of Israel, extraordinarily clear, the more you look through the book of Leviticus especially, and it seems to me that we have lost something of that perspective.

[32:36] So my general theme, as I reflect on these two presentations, is that the contemplation of God's creation is something that needs to be reactivated.

[33:02] Christians were in the lead in the 1800s, not only in contemplating creation, but in making the world aware of the greatness and the generosity of God in his creation.

[33:20] We're no longer in the lead. Perhaps being in the lead is not the issue, but the fact, are we actually in the procession? creation. And I just throw that out as a challenge to myself and to all of us, because I think we can make a start by a very simple thing that Professor Conway Morris was anxious to do, and I mentioned this last time, to say, at all times speak about creation and not nature, because the word creation contains within it confession, and the word nature implies randomness and chance.

[34:05] So that if one is concerned about being less eloquent than one might be in witnessing for the faith, using one word might not be beyond the limits of most of us.

[34:19] so as to then, but not to stop at that, but see that creation is so integrally connected to the redemption story that that flows, and the discussion that should follow would then be, I think, helpful.

[34:39] So the theme is to think more carefully, certainly than I have done before, about how God perceived this Sabbath principle, and the extent to which it ties together these big stories of our life as Christians.

[35:06] The creation and the redemption, and the new heaven and the new earth to which we all look forward.

[35:19] So, we can perhaps discuss, and I fully anticipate disagreements, but I hope you can see the reason for raising this issue of thinking more carefully about the Sabbath.

[35:50] Yes, Harvey? Could you give us a quick loss on that passing phrase in moments that the Christian has been subjected to this activity? What does that mean?

[36:02] What point is in the direction that it mean? I'm only superficially able to comment.

[36:16] The fact that the creation has also participated in the fall is evidence that one cannot draw guidelines or permanent principles from looking at creation.

[36:36] The futility which is expressed in creation is a result of the fall. So, it seems to me that there's a strong tendency among some to say whatever nature does, we should follow.

[36:54] That is not the Christian approach to creation. We contemplate the original creation as perfect, and we contemplate the purpose of that creation eventually to be the new heaven and the new earth, which is also perfect.

[37:10] But in between the beginning and the end, there's a sad story. Sad in the sense of the defamation of the face of creation, as indeed the defamation of our own characters and the need for redemption.

[37:27] But nature or creation does not achieve its redemption until the last time.

[37:40] Is that what you were working towards? I mean, there are lots of examples of futility if one goes through the the geological record, as we have it, extinctions, losses of species, more lost species than there actually exist at the present time on the surface of the earth.

[38:12] Lots of examples of futility and the way in which the predator-prey relationships are expressed in ecology, the aggressiveness of fallen animals and indeed the undue aggressiveness of people having no respect for animals.

[38:39] But it seems to me that's a detail under the umbrella, which is that you can not draw general principles or laws from the state of nature at the present time.

[39:00] But the contemplation of the perfection of nature, the perfection of the creation, is something that is available to us.

[39:14] Does that make sense? Does that make sense? Well, it must have been even more heretical than last time.

[39:30] Yes, Sam? I'd like to think for a minute out loud about how you talk about your Tuesday group not having too many possible thoughts about how the Sabbath was celebrated.

[39:47] I recall many years ago watching the movie Chariot and Pyre. And in that, there was a comment where Eric Little was at a Sunday service and there was a young kid kicking a soccer ball around and he said, the Sabbath is not a day for playing soccer.

[40:05] And I kind of wonder if that's what your Tuesday group is recalling about in their youth. But I'm cautious when I want to measure too much by the way children think.

[40:22] And I wonder if your Tuesday group is thinking about the way they perceive their childhood Sabbath days celebrated now as adults, or if they're perceiving them through the eyes of a child.

[40:39] Because I think it's difficult to do what you're suggesting and always engage a child so that they'll think positively about it.

[40:51] And some of it will be rules, and they'll be only able to see them as rules. And I remember a comment made by C.S.

[41:01] Lewis, and I forget where it was made, and I thought about this comment a bunch over the last six months maybe, and it's just come to my mind for various reasons, not just in this context, but I can't remember where it was made, so if anybody can remember, I'd appreciate them sharing it with me.

[41:19] But he made the comment saying about a child, or about a young person, that they are not yet of an age to which they learn to think very much about anything.

[41:38] No? And that's true, I think, of young people. I mean, there are a few, I guess, precocious young people, well advanced beyond their peers. I think, I guess, David Hume, I mean, that guy was, I think, in university when he was 12, so I don't know if that's the type of he was intellectually advanced, but I don't know if that necessarily means he was able to think a lot about other things.

[42:05] Well, Sam, this is a brilliant observation. One might have even thought that you had been at the Tuesday class to make that comment, because, indeed, happily, the members of the group talked with enthusiasm about their Sabbath experience at St. John's.

[42:24] time. And so, it is a reflection of one's youth, but I think youth are not quite as thoughtless as you're suggesting.

[42:37] I think they feel an atmosphere, they detect, they certainly detect warmth and joy, and I think that was the missing ingredient.

[42:53] So, you're right, my observation is just specifically it was really very negative for people's early years. I'm just cautioning again, using the children as a measure and trying to satisfy them.

[43:07] I mean, you can throw a baby with the bath water and say, well, the children have to be amused. The only difficulty about that position is that we were expected to come to a profession of faith and to make, in my particular church, a public profession of faith.

[43:28] And that does not really go along with the idea that we were unthinking, I mean, you're thinking, I think, of a much earlier stage than this.

[43:41] faith. And I think we were equally miserable at the time when we made our public profession of faith, because I think that there was this lack of understanding of this.

[43:53] And I mean, as I say, I may be off on a wrong tangent here, but it just seems to me that the fact that this connection was never made, in my particular circumstance, doesn't necessarily mean to say that this is true for everybody.

[44:06] But it has certainly helped me in thinking about this and in seeing not only a connection between our own internal Christian worship and experience, but also the reflection of this in the broader ethical application.

[44:35] Yes, please. So does anybody have a good idea about what a dad should look like? Good question.

[44:48] I'm glad to say this question was addressed to the whole group. Sheila has the answer. Sure I will. Maybe it is partly an answer, because the thing that struck me as you were reading from Genesis that had not struck me before, is that God looked at his creation and saw that it was good.

[45:15] He evaluated it. I think the evaluation principle is something that we are invited to do in our Sunday services when we get to, I forget what it's called, is it the confession?

[45:29] That invites us to review the things we have done that we should not have done, the things that we have not done, that we should have done, and reminding us that there is no help in us without God's help.

[45:42] And so our evaluation would not be quite the same as his, but I think that that is built into our Sabbath worship and maybe that needs to be expanded in our own Sabbath thinking.

[45:56] Thank you. Thank you. Well, that sets off another train of thought with the role of the Gloria, the excitement of the Gloria after the completion of the communion.

[46:15] And I said on one occasion when I brought at a communion service that people looked as if the world was caving in as they were reciting the Gloria.

[46:33] So there seems to be a misfit there. As you know, in some of the liberal churches, at that point people start dancing in the aisles.

[46:45] And given that my wife has suffered many times from my dancing, I'm not going to recommend this, but the thought is there that this was an enthusiastic celebration of the Gloria as we have come to the end of a most extraordinary feast.

[47:09] to look miserable at that point seems like missing the point. Yes, please. I was actually discussing with a friend recently about the singing, not at St.

[47:23] John's where the singing on Sunday morning is praising God, but in other places sometimes some of the singing is praising God, but making requests for ourselves. And this person was objecting to that.

[47:35] But really, I'm thinking now, if Jesus says it's lawful to do good on the Sabbath, that gives a lot of scope there for praying for each other, especially if Sunday morning is the only time the church gathers together, then you can be praying for each other and asking God to help us as well as praising Him and doing good.

[48:00] For instance, today I'm thinking there's a lot of people here that are having people in their homes, you know, perfection lunches and things like that. So doing good on the Sabbath, there's a whole lot of scope there for activities there.

[48:14] Very helpful. Thanks for that. Yes? I hear you saying, it seems to me there's two topics here.

[48:26] Well, one is how Christians should be more concerned with the environment, and the other is the Sabbath. I mean, I'm not quite sure how to go together.

[48:37] The other is Beth and I saying, well, what do we do on the Sabbath? But, you know, I know environmentally, I think sometimes evangelical Christians have come to a place where they don't worry so much about the environment because it's God's environment and whatever is going to happen is going to hang.

[48:58] I don't agree with that. And I was just going to give you an example. I went to Ottawa this week to visit my daughter and she stayed with a wonderful young couple who are devout Christians, three young kids.

[49:12] And, you know, I looked that couple and how they lived and how environmentally conscious they were. I mean, it's just amazing that the young women washes out all the bags, the baggies and stuff like that, hang them up and they approach you to cause diapers and, you know, they really were environmentally conscious and they do not cook on the Sabbath.

[49:34] They use laptops on the Sabbath. But they did not hold their children down, three, I mean, children, five, three, and a baby. The Children of Joy. It was a joyous day to most Sabbath.

[49:46] It was really a good example and I thought, well, there's an example of Sabbath. They didn't do a lot, but it was a joyous day. The church was joyous.

[49:57] It's a great example. Well, I appreciate that comment. Now, if you are hearing two stories from me, then it means I have not succeeded. Because it is my concern that there are two separate stories and that people don't bring the two together.

[50:14] The burden of my thinking in preparation for this talk was that we need to bring them together and recognize that they are integrally connected. So, I'm sorry if I didn't get that across, but it's a big issue, it's a big challenge, how to connect these things in an active and celebratory way.

[50:42] Yes, ma'am? I bring up the issue of pre-millennials thinking that the world is going to be destroyed and Christ returns and the thinking was that we don't have to care for our creation.

[51:00] how do you answer those people? Well, from now on I shall give this little talk. Did you hear the question at the back?

[51:18] Pre-millennialists reckon that the earth is going to hell in a hand basket anyway, and therefore why worry? And why spend so much time on environmental concerns?

[51:31] Well, the first point is that it's God's creation. However badly it's been disfigured, it's not our job to make it worse. Second point, the whole of the role of Christians in society is as salt and as leaven.

[51:54] One would presume that this had something to do with preserving the good things. So it seems to me that you really have a cop-out on several grounds in that position.

[52:08] It's a cop-out in terms of one's responsibility to creation and one's responsibility to fellow beings. Yes, we are to be stewards.

[52:21] Yeah, exactly. So I think they miss the point. They are not exercising stewardship. Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. Phil? If the six days leading up to the Sabbath have been lived in any reasonable measure in the spirit of the first two commandments, whatever we do, then the idealistic Sabbath that you've outlined, which God has designed, would be a celebration, a mini celebration, rather than a time for repentance and confession.

[53:09] It would be a celebration. Am I wrong there? All right there? Well, I think that's the direction in which I'm heading, but I'm also conscious of the fact that we can't celebrate until we've repented.

[53:23] Is it the Sabbath that day? Well, it seems to me that we can't repent frequently enough. And therefore there's lots of time on the Sabbath to celebrate as long as we have remembered to repent.

[53:43] It doesn't seem to me that that's contradictory to the idea of celebration. I'm idealizing and you are saying I'm idealizing. Yes, yes, yes. It's all prayed up before we spend six days.

[53:56] So we spend six days repenting and then we're fine on Sunday. It doesn't sound quite right. I don't know. Yes?

[54:15] Do you know about this organization? It's a Christian organization that has to do with, I can't think of the name of it, they have a place out in the delta.

[54:30] Yes. Arosha. Arosha, yes. Yes. What do you think of that? I think it's an outstanding operation. very dedicated people.

[54:42] Every one of them is an active Christian and it's the most environmentally conscious Christian group that I'm aware of. And it does not in any way detract from their emphasis on the need for redemption.

[55:04] That seems to me to be the key issue if the creation story becomes one that is exclusive and forgets the redemption story, well then we're in trouble.

[55:18] But the combination of the two seems to me to be the point I'm trying to make. And Arosha does this in spades.

[55:29] And I would recommend if you haven't been there just to make a visit or at least take a look on the website. it's A-R-O-S-H-A. Google Arosha and you'll get more information than you probably need.

[55:46] It's R-O-C-H-A. A-R-O-C-H-A? Yes, okay. Right, okay. You mentioned one scientist that has helped you along the way here.

[56:02] You mentioned one fellow. Have you been helped by Francis Schaeffer? Who else can help us here to further us along our bibliography?

[56:14] Yeah, well John Paul Kinghorn is my favoured assistant. That's a polite way to put it.

[56:25] Sir John. John Paul Kinghorn has an abiding interest in the connection between his science and his faith.

[56:38] He's written a book a year since about 1980 so that the region's store is bulging with Paul Kinghorn books. This man is a fundamental particle physicist and he's written recently on the subject of the relationship between quantum mechanics and Christian faith.

[57:02] Most unlikely topic. But he has profound insights into the relationship. he does not specifically emphasize the environmental aspects.

[57:17] But the most inspirational Christian writing, I think, we've talked about before is Buma Prediger, hyphenated name of a professor in the United States who has written on the contemplation of all things bright and beautiful and has got a very elaborate and detailed discussion of the relationship between the creation story and the redemption story.

[57:55] Then there is a man called DeWitt who some of you may have heard of who has initiated a community of Christian environmentally sensitive people in the state of Ohio.

[58:14] And there is a community which has 25,000 to 30,000 people which is living sustainably and carefully on the land.

[58:26] Now, clearly, it took some significant capital investment to get the thing started. But it's a major example of what can be done at a scale that is quite unimaginable to most of us.

[58:43] So that this is a very strong witness. This person has made several visits to Vancouver. He's a favourite visitor at Regent College.

[58:59] I guess that's okay, Jim. It's okay to say it, yes, it's not a secret. So there are these examples, and increasingly I think in Europe, and you mentioned Francis Schaeffer, that's an example of his community, certainly one which has incorporated urban Christian living in a very major way.

[59:27] thing. But I think it's just a lot of these thoughts that are bubbling up around us, and we need to just be sensitive to that. and I think it's a modern extension of the principle of looking after the poor.

[59:49] And we're not terribly good at that, but nevertheless, as the way in which evangelical Christians succeeded in getting slavery removed, as a major example of social action, so I think we are getting examples of Christian action in relation to the poor, meaning the weak, meaning the parts of creation that can't answer back in many cases, and inspiring a sensitivity to that part of creation which we have lost touch with, I think, in the last 200 years.

[60:39] Well, I think that as I make bolder and bolder claims about 200 years of history, it's time to stop. Thank you.

[60:52] Thank you. Thank you. for Son of a