My Ordination Paper

As part of preparing for my ordination, I wrote a long paper about a whole bunch of my beliefs on a variety of topics. Since I've got this thing written, and I at least think it's fairly interesting on a theoretical level, I'm going to post it, section by section to my blog. So, here's the first installment:

Creation and Providence

God created the world out of love for us. Everything we have is from God: the earth, living beings, our own selves. God hasn’t stopped creating, either—God continues to shape and guide the world even today. Evolution, for example, which has taken place over the course of hundreds of millions of years, is the result of God’s constant creative activity.1 Old species die and leave room for new; parents pass on advantageous traits to children. Opposing this process is the simple physical principle of entropy: the universe has a tendency to disorganization. Drop a bottle of ink into a tank of water, and the ink spreads out and scatters. A similar process is happening as we speak, in the constant expansion of the universe. Evolution is a miracle because it counteracts this tendency toward disorganization and uniformity. Instead of producing progressively simpler and more homogenized animals, evolution develops more and more complex creatures. God’s creative activity is at the heart of this trend.

As partners in God’s creative activity, we can affect our environment. However, we do not have God’s permission to abuse the creation. While the creation supports human life, it has beauty, purpose and value beyond this. One way that I live out my respect for the creation is through a simplified lifestyle. Each decision I make about what I will buy or what I will throw away has consequences for our environment, and I try to make decisions that protect and preserve natural resources. So for example, I make my household cleaners at home using natural ingredients. Similarly, in the wake of the coal mine accident in West Virginia last year, I’ve been wondering how we can move to sources of energy that do not destroy our mountains and put people in harm’s way.

God provides for us in many ways: in the creation itself, in the gifts of family and friends, in our capacity to have a relationship with God, even in the gift of our very selves. In terms of our bodies, I think there is often a temptation to regard only the mind as concerned with spiritual matters – for example, in the assertion that children should not take communion because they don’t understand what it means. However, when God saves us, God saves our whole selves, body included. Living the life of the spirit means living a life of care for the body as well as the mind.

Giving our wealth and our labor to others are important ways to express our gratitude for God’s generosity, and they are vital to a living faith. The point of giving back is not that we are repaying God what we owe; we will always be indebted to God. Rather, the spiritual practice of gratitude helps us recognize how much God really does to us.

This is particularly important in our society. Every day I see hundreds of advertisements. Each one of them is aimed at making me think about something I don’t have, but presumably need. Very few tell me to be happy with what I already have. Practicing gratitude is countercultural, but it is important to Christian life as a way of staying focused on what truly matters—God, family, friends—rather than on the things that moth and rust destroy, the things that thieves break in and steal. Believing the advertisements can only lead to dissatisfaction (and credit card debt).