Our gift to creation

     There is a great line in the Letter to the Romans of today's liturgy (Rom. 8:19) that says "...creation awaits with eager expectation the revelation of the children of God ...".  We look at the awesomeness of creation with its power and beauty, with its capacity to overwhelm and inspire, and whether you approach creation from the perspective of creationism or evolution or a more sensible blending of the two, from a theological or scientific approach, the reality is mind boggling.  As people of faith who place God at the heart of that creation, it seems so far beyond us that creation itself would eagerly await anything that we possess.

     So for the author of Romans to say that creation awaits a revelation that comes from us, who are a part of that very same creation, is hard to comprehend.  And yet that is what the scriptures remind us.  What is this revelation that creation waits upon?  It is the introduction of the author of all things, the relationship that we have experienced with the living and life giving Word of God, the true place of a creator God within the framework of all that is.  And it is something that only we can bring to this creation. It is more than just a word, or a concept, or a belief or idea.  It is the transforming power of the Word of God in our lives that will allow us to become the stewards of creation which was the first "job" that we were entrusted with.  In Christ we becomes stewards.  In Christ we become builders of a new world.  In Christ we are the source of God's life giving and creative love transforming not only ourselves but the world in which we live. 

     The world today, both humanity and creation itself, is treatened and stands in peril.  The reason is simple - too many of us have not become that fertile soil that allows the Word of God to take root and produce a yield of a hundred or sixty or thirty fold.  We become too distracted, too shallow, too beset with the world to let the Word come down, transform and bring life before returning to the Father.  Now is the time, though, to change.  That is the reminder of the word that we hear today and the challenge to act upon that word.