August 7, 2022

Honouring all creatures

Preacher:
Passage: Genesis 1:26-31; 2:5-7; 49:5-6; Deuteronomy 25:4; Matthew 6:25-26; 10:29-31
Service Type:

Theme: Made from the dust, both humans and animals have the breath of life; live in harmony with creation

Whoever lies with an animal shall be put to death. - Exodus 22:19
You shall do the same with your oxen and with your sheep: seven days it shall be with its mother; on the eighth day you shall give it to me. - Exodus 22:30
If you see the donkey of one who hates you lying down under its burden, you shall refrain from leaving him with it; you shall rescue it with him. - Exodus 23:5
If you come across a bird's nest in any tree or on the ground, with young ones or eggs and the mother sitting on the young or on the eggs, you shall not take the mother with the young. You shall let the mother go, but the young you may take for yourself...- Deuteronomy 22:6-7

Whoever is righteous has regard for the life of his beast, but the mercy of the wicked is cruel. - Proverbs 12:10
And the LORD said, “You pity the plant, for which you did not labor, nor did you make it grow, which came into being in a night and perished in a night. And should not I pity Nineveh, that great city, in which there are more than 120,000 persons who do not know their right hand from their left, and also much cattle?” - Jonah 4:10-11

"Christians, of all people, should not be the destroyers. We should treat nature with an overwhelming respect. We may cut down a tree to build a house, or to make a fire to keep the family warm. But we should not cut down the tree just to cut down the tree...We have the right to rid our houses of ants; but what we have no right to do is to forget to honour the ant as God made it, out in the place where God made the ant to be. When we meet the ant on the sidewalk, we step over him. He is a creature, like ourselves; not made in the image of God, it is true, but equal with man as far as creation is concerned. The ant and the man are both creatures." [Francis Schaeffer, Pollution and the Death of Man (1970)]

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