Inviting Creation to Worship

Derrick Weston

Every good superhero has an origin story. Over the last year and a half, one of my emerging heroes is Doug Kaufman, the executive director of the Anabaptist Climate Collaborative. I’ve had the pleasure of working with Doug in several capacities recently, and in our work, he often tells a “conversion” story that explains how he got into the work he is doing now. Doug is a part of a tradition that does baptism by immersion, meaning that the person being baptized must have their bodies fully submerged into a body of water such as a tub, a pool, lake or river. During his pastorate in Indiana, he discovered that he could not perform baptism for his community in a nearby river because the levels of pollution were too high. This discovery started him on a journey to work with others on finding ways to clean the river and to think more broadly about the ways that our faith challenges us to interact with God’s creation. For Doug, the waters of baptism ceased to be an abstract theological idea or a metaphoric symbol of our belonging. They were real, tangible, and embodied. They were reflections of the ways that humans have mistreated the world we inhabit and taken for granted the gifts that God has given us. For those of us who are more used to sprinkling infants with a couple of drops of water, we can easily lose sight of the ways that baptism not only connects us to Christ and the communion of saints but also to the waterways that give us life. For Doug, this abstraction of our relationship to water has completely disappeared. 

This story raises several questions for me, but primary among them is what role creation can and should play in our worship and in our sacraments. Undoubtedly, creation will show up. One of our most common attributions to God is Creator of heavens and earth. And yet so often, we let creation’s influence on our liturgy end there. We have designed our worship spaces to separate us from the natural world. We have been satisfied with pastoral scenes printed on our bulletins or splashed on our screens while largely ignoring the geographies in which we live our lives of faith. How can creation figure more prominently in our worship? How do we offer more than lip service to this world that God has entrusted to our care? 

The importance of these questions is slowly becoming more obvious. This summer was the hottest summer on record. It is also most likely the coldest summer most of us will experience in our lifetimes. Extreme heat has become a leading cause of death in many vulnerable communities. Our weather patterns have become more erratic and less predictable. Extreme weather events like hurricanes, droughts, and forest fires are becoming more prevalent. We are seeing extinction-event levels of biodiversity loss across the globe. All these factors combined affect our water quality, our air quality, food production, and transportation. We can no longer deny that our activities are having an adverse effect on the environment, nor can we deny the injustice of the fact that those least responsible for these effects are feeling them first and most severely. 

Scientist Gus Speth is quoted as saying, “I used to think the top environmental problems were biodiversity loss, ecosystems collapse and climate change. I thought that with 30 years of good science we could address those problems. But I was wrong. The top environmental problems are selfishness, greed and apathy . . . and to deal with those we need a spiritual and cultural transformation and we, (lawyers) and scientists, don’t know how to do that.”¹ While science may not be equipped to lead the revolution of values that our current climate crisis requires, the church very much is. We can speak to our ecological predicament as the spiritual crisis that it is. We can educate, equip, and mobilize followers of Christ to be a part of finding actionable solutions to the challenges that we face. We can speak against the greed, selfishness, and apathy that are at the heart of our perilous situation. And the best place to start this work is in the context of worship. 

My primary work these days is at Creation Justice Ministries, an ecumenical organization whose mission is to help Christian communities and individuals live in better relationship with God’s creation. In that capacity, I have seen that the churches that have the most commitment to being a part of finding climate solutions are the ones who hear about these issues from the pulpit and experience them through their liturgies. Sadly, this experience is a rare one for most congregations. When we ask participants in our programs how often they have heard about the climate crisis from the pulpit, the most common answer is “never”; the second most common is “once a year on Earth Day.” When we ask preachers about why they may not be speaking on these topics from the pulpit, they express worries about being too political, fears of being too uninformed on the science, or they simply state that there are bigger concerns in their communities. Helping Christians to see that caring for creation is both part of the mandate to love our neighbor and crucial to our own well-being in our daily lives is at the heart of the work that we do. Helping preachers and other worship leaders to bring these issues into focus in the context of worship is crucial to creating meaningful engagement both for individual Christians and whole communities of faith. 

A Brief Overview of the Doctrine of Creation 

As the theological education coordinator for Creation Justice Ministries, I have had it reaffirmed for myself that our climate crisis is first and foremost a theological issue. It’s not that good theology will save us outright, but examining the theologies that have gotten us to this point and considering the correctives required to get us where we need to be is an essential practice. Good theology may not save us, but better theology is a good place to start! In his foundational systematic theology book Faith Seeking Understanding: An Introduction to Christian Theology, Daniel Migliore outlines five ways that Christian theology has been a hindrance to the church being a primary actor on the ecological stage: 

1. Anthropocentrism—A belief that the creation primarily exists to serve the needs and desires of humanity. This denies creation as an actor and, of course, denies God’s role as the central figure in the story of redemption.
2. Power as domination—Our misunderstandings of what power is and how it should be used is a major contributor to our abuses of the natural world. 
3. Denial of interconnectedness—Humans rarely think of ourselves as part of an ecosystem. Instead, we think of ourselves as being outside of (and often in control of) natural cycles. 
4. Assumption of limitless resources—This assumption has been the engine for consistent extraction with little thought toward the future.
5. Unchecked consumerism—The assumption of limitless resources has led to a belief that we can consume as many of those resources at any rate we deem fit.² 

Migliore suggests five themes about the doctrine of creation that have emerged both in Scripture and in our traditions that can be used as a roadmap to get to a more whole and just relationship with creation:

1. God is the central figure of creation. To claim God as Creator is to state that it is God who is outside of creation, free, and transcendent. It also means that God creates from generosity and hospitality. God creates from an overflow of the shared love of the Trinity and invites all of creation into that shared love. 
2. The world as a whole and as individual beings are radically dependent on God. In that dependence, however, is a freedom that we can choose to live in communion with God and the rest of creation. 
3. Creation, despite its limits and imperfections, is good. This is both a rejection of a dualism that says that “spiritual” things are good and “physical” things are evil, and a recognition that creation is good, despite whatever utility it might have for humans. Creation being good does not free it from the effects of sin but does speak to its inherent worth. 
4. Creation was made for coexistence and interdependence. All of creation is designed to live in communities and ecosystems with mutual benefit.
5. God created with a purpose. The world is not meaningless, as some propose. For Christians, that purpose is made clearer in the life, death, and resurrection of Christ.³

From this brief explanation of theological themes, we can already see a vision emerging of what God intends for our relationship with creation. We now turn our attention to how those theological concepts might inform our practice of worship. Much of this work starts with understanding the Bible as a text that is rooted in creation. As scholars such as Dr. Ellen Davis remind us, our Scripture was written in an agrarian culture where the concerns of the people and the concerns of creation would have been deeply understood and deeply intertwined. She introduces her influential volume Scripture, Culture, and Agriculture: An Agrarian Reading of the Bible with the explanation that “agrarianism is a way of thinking and ordering life in community that is based on the health of the land and of living creatures” and that this line of thinking is “the way of thinking predominant among the biblical writers, who very often do not represent the interests of the powerful.”⁴

There are many texts we could use to illustrate the ways that creation can be deeply interwoven throughout our worship, but a text that has been particularly helpful for me in thinking about the role of creation in worship is the story of Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem, a version of which is found in all four Gospels. This is a text that we likely hear once a year, is well known by most in the church, and yet the ecological implications of it are rarely explored. 

“The Lord Has Need of It” 

The story of the triumphal entry begins with Jesus sending two of the disciples on a mission:

When they were approaching Jerusalem, at Bethphage and Bethany, near the Mount of Olives, he sent two of his disciples and said to them, “Go into the village ahead of you, and immediately as you enter it, you will find tied there a colt that has never been ridden; untie it and bring it. If anyone says to you, ‘Why are you doing this?’ just say this, ‘The Lord needs it and will send it back here immediately”’ (Mark 11:1–3).

The first appearance of a nonhuman member of creation in the story is a colt. Matthew’s version of the story reminds us that this incident has echoes of Zechariah’s prophecy (Zech. 9:9). The humble colt is a contrast to the use of horses for war. Christ’s interaction with creation is different from the ways empires, such as the Roman Empire of Jesus’ day, would interact with other members of creation. We are reminded that while humans often use the natural world for war and extraction, God’s intentions for creation are for peace and healing. That “the Lord has need of it” was a sufficient answer to the colt’s owner is another reminder for us; all of creation belongs to God. “The earth is the Lord’s and all that is in it, the world and those who live in it” (Ps. 24:1). Christ has every right to use that which belongs to God as he sees fit. And yet there is another important aspect to this story. Jesus tells the disciples that to remind the owner of the colt that he will send it back immediately after he has finished making his grand entrance into the city. Creation belongs to God, but we have a role to play. So much of our current ecological crisis can be linked to a theological misunderstanding of the word “dominion” that appears in Genesis 1:27–28:

So God created humankind in his image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them. God blessed them, and God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it; and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the air and over every living thing that moves upon the earth. (emphasis added)

To blame our current ecological crisis on a misunderstanding of a single word in a single verse would be overly simplistic, but it speaks to the larger issues of our misunderstanding of power which is thematic throughout the scriptural witness. We have confused “dominion” with domination. Rabbi Yonatan Neril in his Eco Bible collection quotes Rabbi David Sears in saying that dominion “comprises a form of stewardship for which humanity is answerable to God. . . . The Divine mandate for (humans) to dominate the natural world is a sacred trust, not carte blanche for destructiveness.” Perhaps then the best way to understand our dominion is to see it as a responsibility entrusted to us by the One who created out of love.⁵

We are reminded of that love elsewhere in the first creation story in Genesis. Not only does creation belong to God, but God delights in creation. Upon the completion of each day of creation, God declares each created thing to be “good.” In worship we can join in God’s pleasure over the good world that God created. Baba Dioum, a Senegalese forestry engineer and founding member of the International Union for the Conservation of Nature, once stated that “in the end, we will only conserve those places that we love.”⁶ Cultivating a love for God’s creation can be a primary aspect of our worship service as we sing hymns like “For the Beauty of the Earth” and “All Things Bright and Beautiful.” We sing these songs both to remind us of God’s goodness and of creation’s inherent worth. 

“They Spread Leafy Branches That They Cut in Their Fields” 

Jesus’ entrance into Jerusalem can be described in many ways: street theater, protest march, peaceful parade. But ultimately what it amounts to is an outdoor worship service. People gather alongside the road and begin shouting their praises and laments (“Hosanna” means “Save us,” after all) as Jesus is ushered into the city atop a donkey flanked by his disciples. People are bringing their hopes and fears into this communal outdoor space, hoping that their voices are heard by God. And being a people who largely live lives outdoors, they cut the branches from the fields they are in as they witness Jesus passing by.  

The great author, poet, and farmer Wendell Berry makes a strong case for considering the location in which our engagement with Scripture takes place: 

I don’t think it is enough appreciated how much an outdoor book the Bible is. . . . It is best read and understood outdoors, and the farther outdoors the better. Or that has been my experience of it. Passages that within walls seem improbable or incredible, outdoors seem merely natural. This is because outdoors we are confronted everywhere with wonders; we see that the miraculous is not extraordinary but the common mode of existence.

It is our daily bread. Whoever really has considered the lilies of the field or the birds of the air and pondered the improbability of their existence in this warm world within the cold and empty stellar distances will hardly balk at the turning of water into wine—which was, after all, a very small miracle. We forget the greater and still continuing miracle by which water (with soil and sunlight) is turned into grapes.⁷

Bringing worship outside ultimately leads to creation being a part of the worship service. The branches from fields are such a key part of this celebration that we refer to it as Palm Sunday. Creation becomes a part of the community gathered in praise of God. 

“If These Were Silent, the Stones Would Shout Out” 

Creation Justice Ministries collaborates with the Anabaptist Climate Collaborative and the Duke Marine lab to host pastoral care for climate retreats. This three-day retreat brings Christian leaders together to learn from climate scientists and biblical scholars about ways to address our climate crisis in our congregations. We conclude each day with a worship service inspired by the Church of the Wild model created by Victoria Loorz. The worship isn’t simply held outside, but it invites participants to listen to the ways that creation might be speaking to us if we simply stop to listen. During one of our recent retreats, we found the time that was set aside for listening to creation interrupted by a small pod of dolphins surfacing every so often to make their presence felt. It’s not an overstatement to say that the dolphins were members of our worshiping community in that moment. 

Luke’s version of the triumphal entry tacks a piece on to the end of the story which is helpful for our conversation. Some Pharisees, we are told, were so scandalized by the scene being made by Jesus and his disciples (and likely fearful that they would be somehow associated with the crowd) that they ordered Jesus to shut the whole thing down. Jesus’ response to this request is as enigmatic as anything he says throughout the Gospels. “If these were silent, the stones would cry out” (Luke 19:40). Was Jesus simply being hyperbolic? Possibly. Was he being comedic? Perhaps. We shouldn’t downplay Jesus’ use of humor in his rhetoric (and the idea of singing stones is funny!). Is Jesus simply making a point to the Pharisees about the importance of what the disciples and the gathered crowd are doing? Again, it is possible, but for one second, let’s imagine that Jesus was being literal in this moment. The implication here is that when we as humanity abdicate our responsibility to worship, whether in praise or in lament, creation will stand up and do the job for us. 

The idea that creation itself can join in the act of worship is not foreign to the biblical texts. The psalmists often employ language of creation joining in a chorus of praise to God:

Make a joyful noise to the Lord, all the earth;
break forth into joyous song and sing praises.
Sing praises to the Lord with the lyre,
with the lyre and the sound of melody.
With trumpets and the sound of the horn
make a joyful noise before the King, the Lord.

Let the sea roar, and all that fills it;
the world and those who live in it.
Let the floods clap their hands;
let the hills sing together for joy
at the presence of the Lord,
for he is coming to judge the earth.
He will judge the world with righteousness,
and the peoples with equity. (Ps. 98:4–9)

The prophet Isaiah famously casts an image of creation rejoicing in a time of restoration: 

For you shall go out in joy,
and be led back in peace;
the mountains and the hills before you
shall burst into song,
and all the trees of the field shall clap their hands.

Instead of the thorn shall come up the cypress;
instead of the brier shall come up the myrtle;
and it shall be to the Lord for a memorial,
for an everlasting sign that shall not be cut off. (Isa. 55:12–13)

Perhaps in the context of our climate-changed world, it is crucial to consider that creation may not just be joining us in praise but also in lament for the ways that we have misused power to make creation do what we want it to. It was within the context of the Roman Empire, a force that filled the waterways with warships, deforested to build siege weapons, and promoted forced agriculture to feed its cities, that Paul writes: 

I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory about to be revealed to us. For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the children of God; for the creation was subjected to futility, not of its own will but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay and will obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God. We know that the whole creation has been groaning in labor pains until now; and not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the first fruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly while we wait for adoption, the redemption of our bodies. (Rom. 8:18–23)

Are the extreme temperatures that we experience increasing each year not creation groaning? Is creation not groaning through violent storms, severe drought, and increasing wildfires? Paul’s hope was that those groans he witnessed in creation were the birth pangs of new life to come. Can we cling to that same hope? In her book Creation-Crisis Preaching: Ecology, Theology, and the Pulpit, Leah Schade asks us to consider as an eco-justice principle that creation has a voice and that “Earth is a subject capable of raising its voice in celebration and against injustice.”⁸ Paul’s words about the life, death, and resurrection have effect for more than just humanity. They also suggest that creation is waiting for us to take up the responsibility we were given back at the world’s formation.

Creation in Font and Table

I chose the text of Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem because Palm Sunday is one of the rare Sundays when we purposefully invite pieces of creation into our worship service. I want to conclude by returning to where I started. Our sacraments, both Baptism and Communion, offer us an opportunity to consider creation more deeply in the context of worship. While we may not create the experience of submerging ourselves into our water ways, we can, as we welcome new members into the family of faith, consider the role that water plays in our communities and in our world. We can consider who has access to water, the state of our waterways, the creatures that depend on the health of our waters, and we can consider the health of the rivers, lakes, and oceans that we are leaving behind for those being baptized, often our children. We can consider as we come to the table that Christ compares his body and blood to bread and wine, not wheat and grapes. In this way we are called to consider the gifts of God’s good creation molded by human art, a reminder that we are a part of that good creation. The gifts that creation has to offer are celebrated in our sacraments as is the responsibility to honor those gifts. I believe we can do that by honoring the robust theology of creation that exists within our tradition and the equally robust theology of eco-justice that is emerging. We honor creation by preaching on its concerns more than once a year, recognizing that its concerns are our concerns. We can honor creation by bringing it into worship through our sacraments, through blessings and remembrances of animals, by filling our spaces with beautiful living things beyond Palm Sunday. And we can honor creation by following Wendell Berry’s advice and taking our Bibles outside with us and inviting creation to worship alongside of us. Worshiping outdoors may also mean moving into spaces of advocacy where we can speak words on creation’s behalf that it cannot speak for itself. 

The language of a “climate-changed” world is verbiage that I have adopted in the last year and a half. There is no need to speak of climate change as a future reality. It is here with us, and we see its effects daily. The nonhuman world suffers the injustice of acts committed by human hands, and the most vulnerable of humanity bears the brunt of the effects created by the powerful. In the face of such an emergency it is unthinkable that the church would be silent and inconceivable that our worship would not reflect the direness of the situation. Before the stones cry out, may we be a people who lift our voices with, in, and for God’s good creation.

Notes

1. Shared Planet: Religion and Nature, BBC Radio 4 (1 October 2013).

2. Daniel Migliore, Faith Seeking Understanding: An Introduction to Christian Theology, 2nd ed. (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2004), 94–97.

3. Migliore, Faith Seeking Understanding.

4. Ellen Davis, Scripture, Culture, and Agriculture: An Agrarian Reading of the Bible (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2009), 1.

5. Yonatan Neril, ed., Eco Bible: An Ecological Commentary on Genesis and Exodus, vol. 1 (Jerusalem: Interfaith Center for Sustainable Development, 2020), 34.

6. Quoted in JoAnn M. Valenti and Gaugau Tavana, “Report: Continuing Science Education for Environmental Journalists and Science Writers in Situ with the Experts,” Science Communication 27, no. 2 (2005): 300–310.

7. Wendell Berry, Sex, Economy, Freedom, and Community: Eight Essays (New York: Pantheon Books, 1994), 103.

8. Leah D. Schade, Creation Crisis Preaching: Ecology, Theology, and the Pulpit (St. Louis: Chalice Press, 2015), 33.