Creation

 I did a little substitute teaching between this church and my previous one. I was covering an 8th grade science class and learned the terms autotrophs and heterotrophs. Autotroph are organisms that create their own food, like plants using photosynthesis. Heterotrophs need an outside source for its food, which is the majority of the animal kingdom. I asked the youth is a Venus Fly Trap plant and autotroph or a heterotroph? Any ideas? I looked this up this week, the Venus Fly Trap doesn't need the insects to survive but uses them for nutrients, so it is classified as a carnivorous autotroph. 

If you took all the humans, all eight billion of us, and put them on one side of the scale and all the ants on the other scale, all 20 quadrillion of them, which would be heavier? We are, even though there are 2.5 million ants for every person. How much of the fresh water in the world does Lake Superior hold? Ten percent. Which mammal lays eggs? Platypus. How long did a day take 4.6 billion years ago when the earth was formed? Six hours, the moon is slowing the earth's rotation. 

There is much to be said, has been said, and will be said about our ongoing and worsening global climate crisis, however today, we are going to focus on how amazing our world and creation truly is. Let us celebrate, let us have some awe and wonder for the planet on which we live. It is truly amazing the way our universe and solar system and planet are organized to that we may have life. We have to close enough to the sun so that we get heat, light, and energy and we have to have protection from the radiation the sun also gives through our ozone layer. If we take an apple to represent the world and cut it into fourths, three of these chunks are the water, the oceans and seas. Of this fourth left, half is the desert and mountains and places too hot or too cold to grow. Now we cut this into fourths again because three fourths are not fertile to grow crops which leaves us with 1/32 and just on the surface. And what is America's biggest crop that we grow? Lawn grass (Just had to throw that in)

The second creation story found in Genesis is envisioned by the rural folk. There are seeds and rain and humus/adama by which things will grow. After creating Adam out of the adama, or the human out of the humus. God, plants seeds and watches them grow. Then, they sit down and once again form the humus, the soil, the clay into shapes of animals, breathes into them and asks humans to name them. This is a labor of love, very hands on, and there is no separation between God and the world, for God walks and moves and creates upon it, not from a distance, not as a thought experiment, not as random chance. God literally gets their hands dirty playing and creating in the dirt.

In the creation story told in the Gospel of John, we find that the Word, the Logos, the Conversation was with God in the beginning, and the Logos was light and the Logos became flesh and dwelt among us. All things that were created, were created by God and by the Logos, nothing that was created wasn't created by God and by the Logos. This means, this means that all creation has purpose, has intent, and belongs here. The common refrain is asking about the purpose of mosquitoes, but all life is part of God's creation. How it all works together and fits together and is reliant upon each other it truly a miracle. For without microbes, soil, ants, pollinators, flowers, plants, animals, fish and that is, there would be no humans. Not that we are the top or the epitome of creation, but we were created out of soil, rich, thick, life giving soil, just like all animals, just like all plants need it to live and thrive. 

In the second creation story, we are called to till and care for creation, the Garden which is filled with all good things. Let us love this creation that God has created. Let us care and tend it like the God who creates and blesses and gives us the compassion and tools to love this planet. Let us remember that out of soil we have come and back to soil our bodies will go. Let us breathe deep with gratitude and awe the breath of God that fills our lungs and gives all life. Amen.