Every year at this time, I get asked, “Where do you buy your plants?”  My answer reveals much about what I think of God’s first Commission for man.  We were Created to BE Stewards.

Genesis 2:7 the LORD God formed the man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being. 8 Now the LORD God had planted a garden in the east, in Eden; and there he put the man he had formed. 9 And the LORD God made all kinds of trees grow out of the ground– trees that were pleasing to the eye and good for food. In the middle of the garden were the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil… 15 The LORD God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it.

It makes me smile that God’s first job for mankind to do was to enjoy gardening within God’s sanctuary.  He didn’t create us to just view the garden.  He created us to work it and take care of it: stewardship!

For us, stewardship is more than just money or time.  Despite the million sermons on stewardship that focus on giving to the Church and the need to scale back our lifestyles to give more by way of a financial tithe, stewardship is far bigger than paid pastors often admit.  Stewardship is not synonymous with stingy or cheap…even if it results in the noble goal of supporting missionaries or the Church.

Big picture stewardship is what we see in the Parable of the Talents: putting God’s resources to work as if God Himself were putting them to work (Matthew 25:14-30).  Do we ever see a penny-pinching God scaling back and being miserly in order to bless someone else?  Or do we see a God with infinite resources looking for faithful stewards on whom to lavish it?  We act sometimes as though Church-supported missionaries are the only people God cares about…or that vocational missionaries are the only ones sent to reach a world in need of God’s love.

Stewardship involves discerning where God wants us to invest what He has given to us.  So, sometimes I try to save money and grow things from seed or buy things at a “big box” store like Home Depot where I worked for several years.  Other times, I will buy plants and other products from smaller independent stores where their livelihoods depend on shoppers willing to spend more for a product to keep them in business.  There are times that I will buy things from places that are little “mom-and-pop” stores where I pay a premium for something truly unusual in order to preserve their niche in the marketplace and put food on their tables.   

Today, I will pick up flowers I ordered from a local food pantry called COOL (Christian Outreach of Lutherans).  Even though I don’t go to a Lutheran church, I love people who do and the people they help through their food pantry.  Yes, I may pay more for the joy of helping their fundraiser, but this is all part of being a steward.  Maybe you have a fundraiser in your area that does something similar.

We can witness to a world in need of God’s love through how we spend money.  When God gives resources into our families, He is using us as His hands and feet to supply the needs of others.  Church supported ministers and missionaries, yes, I don’t want to diminish that.  But people with financial needs work at Home Depot, small independents, premium outlets, and go to food pantries.  God is providing for them through us…just as others are God’s instruments to provide for our needs.  We are not to bury our talent in the local church institution and burden it with caring for every family—everywhere—and to put food on everyone’s tables. 

God commissions us all for fruitful Kingdom work in many places—we were Created to BE Stewards.

As I’ve pondered the American reaction to the death of Osama Bin Laden, I’ve been trying to decide what word would characterize my reaction. Rejoicing isn’t right. Happy isn’t right. Celebrating isn’t right. Glad. Gratified. Grateful…none of these are exactly what pinpoints what the reaction ought to be because of this:

Like it or not, Bin Laden was made in the image of God.

That’s what the Bible says.

Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, in our likeness, and let them rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air, over the livestock, over all the earth, and over all the creatures that move along the ground.” (Genesis 1:26)

 Isn’t it interesting that before God ever made you, He had in mind that you would bear His image?

• Before His hands picked up the dust and formed you?
• Before He breathed life into you?

 Before you were born, He created you—and all the rest of mankind—to bear His image.

For us to rejoice in the death of Bin Laden is for us—in a strange way—to rejoice over the destruction of the image of God in another person. Make no mistake: Bin Laden was destructive, dangerous, and had nothing but contempt for his fellow human beings. His actions were wicked, evil, horrific, reprehensible, and brought deep sorrow to thousands of innocent people. Yet, under all Bin Laden’s sin, the image of God was there because he was human and God had created him.

For that reason, we cannot trivialize death of any human being, even in light of Jesus’ mission of destroying the devil’s work.   Jesus destroyed the devil’s work by the power of His love and grace.

Issues like how a Christian should respond to the death of Bin Laden should not divide Christians from one another. We can be satisfied that God used human agency to accomplish His justice. We can honor the bravery of the Navy SEALs and the careful planning. We can be grateful that peace among men has one less enemy today. We can praise God that God alone is righteous and that His grace saves sinners—just like us—who repent. We can ask for hearts that can somehow love our enemies.

We can do these things by remembering that we were CREATED TO BE…God’s Image Bearers.

1 John 3:5 But you know that he appeared so that he might take away our sins. And in him is no sin. 6 No one who lives in him keeps on sinning. No one who continues to sin has either seen him or known him. 7 Dear children, do not let anyone lead you astray. He who does what is right is righteous, just as he is righteous. 8 He who does what is sinful is of the devil, because the devil has been sinning from the beginning. The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the devil’s work. 9 No one who is born of God will continue to sin, because God’s seed remains in him; he cannot go on sinning, because he has been born of God. 10 This is how we know who the children of God are and who the children of the devil are: Anyone who does not do what is right is not a child of God; nor is anyone who does not love his brother. 11 This is the message you heard from the beginning: We should love one another. 12 Do not be like Cain, who belonged to the evil one and murdered his brother. And why did he murder him? Because his own actions were evil and his brother’s were righteous.

From before you were born—from the day you were made,

God knew who you were CREATED TO BE. 

You were not created to be static—like a rock which is acted upon by its environment of rain and ice and the winds of time.

You were not created merely to be alive—like the trees or the flowers of the field, growing but living at the mercy of the weather.

You were not created simply to be alive and thinking –like dogs or horses or dolphins or doves.

You were created to BE. 

To be is a linking verb, but can also be used existentially.  It also has dynamic and stative uses.  One grammar web site writes:

The verb “To be” is said to be the most protean of the English language, constantly changing form, sometimes without much of a discernible pattern. Considering that we use it so often, it is really too bad that the verb “To be” has to be the most irregular, slippery verb in the language.

I like to think of “To be” as organic and intrinsically part of the human condition–our state of existence and life itself.  Organic has a punctiliar sense to it—a point in time, an origin.  But organic also implies a living quality–movement, progression, dynamism—that shows we were not meant to be victims of the elements.  Rather, we are to engage life.  We are created to BE.

• To be—as a point of origin.
• To be—as an ongoing linking verb.

We are created in the image of God, our Creator. 

 Our Creator—without beginning or end—calls Himself “I AM.” 

Exodus 3:14 God said to Moses, “I AM WHO I AM. This is what you are to say to the Israelites: ‘I AM has sent me to you.'”

Given that we are made in I AM’s  image, what action verbs will you choose to link with your BE? 

Let’s ponder today what stewardship of this life entails and what it means that we are CREATED TO BE .