Today’s excerpt from Paul’s letter to the Romans brought to mind a TED talk recently shared with me by my son – my son, the rancher.  He is presently employed by a fully operational and profitable “teaching” ranch (like teaching hospitals) located in the Western United States.  The ranch is at the forefront of a few in the U.S. actively employing new, environmentally sensitive methods for beef cattle raising, horse management, and seasonal crop growth within a ranch for-profit business model.  In preparation for his new position as a Wrangler, my son has been reading a vast array of research and case studies from all over the world.  On that reading list was the TED talk that he shared with me last week.

First, the passage from Paul’s letter that lead me to recall the TED lecture:

Romans 8:18 I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory about to be revealed to us. ¹⁹For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the children of God; ²⁰for the creation was subjected to futility, not of its own will but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope ²¹that 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. ²²We know that the whole creation has been groaning in labour pains until now; ²³and 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.

These labor pains and the groaning of the earth is what I heard Dr. Allan Savory describing in his lecture. I myself grieved and groaned at the images Dr. Allan Savory displayed of the Lord’s earth.  It is drying up.  No matter where you sit on the global warming-climate change issue, if you are a believer, you would be hard pressed to see the photos of the earth from where our Abba Father sits and not weep at the decay wrecked upon the once fertile, green lands.

This TED talk (TED Talks:  Ideas worth spreading)proposes a solution to one aspect of the earth’s groaning, the drying up or desertification of grasslands.  In so doing so it reports the journey Dr. Savory and others took to get to the solution – to come back, if you will, to the natural order of things.  It is a biblical story and journey.  From creation to fall to mis-informed and observed attempts to restore, to resignation, to forgiveness, redemption, and finally, restoration.

From where I sit it is a chapter in the journey – this one through the desert  – as humans wreak havoc on themselves and the world by messing with the natural order almost to the point of destruction before coming back, seeing GOD in it, finding HIS way, restoring, redeeming themselves before HIM.  Order emerging from chaos.  God’s way.  God’s plan.  God’s will.  For all of us.  For all of His creation. 

Yes.  I saw and heard all this in the lecture.  I wonder if you do, as well.

Lectionary Readings:  AM Psalm 69:1-23(24-30)31-38; PM Psalm 73
Jer. 22:13-23; Rom. 8:12-27; John 6:41-51