creation on Performance

John Coltrane stands out as one of the giants of 20th-century jazz. His legacy is a generation of hearts touched and the light of God shining through his songs. Yet, for years, his work was haunted by...

Ancient Lens What's the historical context? Dissolving the Divisions Generally speaking, the Psalms divide the people of the earth into two groups: “Israel” and “the nations.” Psalm 98 surpr...

It's easy to attack and destroy an act of creation. It's a lot more difficult to perform one.

What you do in the present by painting, preaching, singing, sewing, praying, teaching, building hospitals, digging wells, campaigning for justice, writing poems, caring for the needy, loving your neig...

Power is the ability to make something of the world.

Stewardship means to consciously take up our cultural power, investing it intentionally among the seemingly powerless, putting our power at their disposal to enable them to cultivate and create.

Leader: O Lord, how manifold are your works! In wisdom you have made them all; the earth is full of your creatures. Here is the sea, great and wide, which teems with creatures innumerable, living thin...

Theologian Terence Fretheim points out that God called creation “good”—that is, beautiful, praiseworthy, purposeful—but not “perfect,” which would mean without flaw, complete, without a chance for thi...

In this short excerpt, the scholar and Anglican clergyman N.T. Wright discusses the famous “weight of glory” passage in 2 Cornthians 4:17: For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an ...

People: Praise the Lord in His mighty heavens! Leader: Praise the Lord for His mighty deeds! People: Praise the Lord according to his excellent greatness! Leader: Praise the Lord with trumpet sound...

We praise you today, Lord, for Your incredible power. With mere words You create, transform, and sustain life. As we experience Your presence in this place we ask that You would use Your power to work...

Gracious God, when I think of how you created all things in a step-by-step manner, I am reminded of my own impatience. There are so many times, Lord, when I want you to move at my pace, not yours. I c...

Plenipotentiary Anyone know what a “plenipotentiary” is? Try that compound Latin word on for size! It is derived from the Latin words plenus “full” and potens “power.” It refers to a person who p...

You may feel as if you are sitting still right now, but it’s an illusion of miraculous proportions. Planet Earth is spinning around its axis at a speed of 1,000 miles per hour. Every 24 hours, planet ...

The world is an example of the workings of God, because while we observe the work, the Worker is brought before us.

Two Latin words are used to describe useful and beautiful things: util and frui. Util means useful, beneficial, helpful. Frui means enjoyable, pleasurable, and delightful. The created world is both fr...

Good farmers, who take seriously their duties as stewards of Creation and of their land's inheritors, contribute to the welfare of society in more ways than society usually acknowledges, or even k...

But let me point out something we almost always fail to notice. We can only be tempted to something that is good on some level, partially good, or good for some, or just good for us and not for others...

You, Lord God, made the eternal fabric of the world appear, and you created the earth. You are always trustworthy, you judge fairly, excellent and marvelous in your power; wise in creating and careful...

Good God, We have a lot going on. You are a God of grace, And we are made in your likeness. Let us then be people of grace. Meet our human concerns with the fruit of your Spirit: Love for ourselves...

All: Powerful God, we praise You today for Your sovereignty. You rule over all creation. Through the breath of Your Spirit, You give us life. Through the death of Your Son we find acceptance with You....

Our faith is not a matter of our hearing what Christ said long ago and “trying to carry it out. The real Son of God is at your side. He is beginning to turn you into the same kind of thing as Himself....

Place is a quintessentially human concept in that it is part of our creatureliness. E. Casey, who has done the most comprehensive work on the philosophy of place, notes that “to be in the world, to be...

Scripture’s proclivity for a new creation Some people have an aversion to describing a future day when the troubles of this world will have passed into oblivion, the kitchen-table expression being “p...

I love watching young boys and girls build things with Legos. Their small, creative masterpieces cannot help but reflect their image-bearing nature and remind us we were all made to make things. When ...

Nothing is more precious than teeming, overabundant resource-destroying human life. (For humor/contrast)

jobs concluding, stages finishing, grieving over, grudges over, blaming over, excuses over. O God, grant me your sense of timing. In this season of ...

Where his activity is recognized, there is ‘new creation’ (2 Cor. 5.17): his active presence is associated with an entirely new frame of reference for perceiving human agency and human hope.

After finishing a major project, have you ever stood back, taken in what you have accomplished, and said to yourself, “That’s pretty good”? I’ll admit that I have on numerous occasions, especially aft...

Seeing that wealth is neither to be avoided nor praised but rather stewarded wisely and generously, how should we think about material wealth creation? This is an important question worthy of thoughtf...