Faith & Worship

 

Just a few years after Darwin published ‘On the Origins of Species’, in another book called ‘Man and Nature’ which was first published in 1864, the scholar George Perkins Marsh challenged the general belief that human impact on nature was generally benign or negligible, and insisted that ancient civilizations of the Mediterranean had brought about their own collapse by their abuse of the environment. By deforesting their hillsides and eroding their soils, they had destroyed the natural fertility that sustained their well-being.

We are quite a few years on from that time, and yet the discussion does not appear to have moved on very far. As Christians we begin our scriptures with a picture of God’s creation and the place of humankind and the various creatures that live above us, alongside or beneath us in the soil or oceans.

This study does not offer a definitive answer the question ‘Why?’ but instead looks both at Scripture and a selection of nature facts and articles, and invites those taking part in the individual studies to think about the issues that are being raised today by environmentalists throughout the world, and come to a better understanding of what their own relationship with all of God’s creatures should and could be.

It is formatted such that each individual study can be easily printed off on sheets of A4 for distribution to a group. You only need one copy of the study per group!

The studies have enough material to keep a group going for an evening and comprise

1) All Creatures, Great and Small

2) Creatures of Worth

3) Creatures for Food and Sacrifice

4) Care for all God's Creatures

There are also some leader's notes and suggested prayers to use within the meeting.

View a sample from the book (pdf) via this link

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