From the Pulpit: For God So Loved the World

We've all heard John 3:16. What if, Vicar Dana Corsello asked, "for God so loved the world" meant not just people, but the earth they live on?

Preaching from Psalm 8 that extolls the magnificence of God’s creation, Dana reflected on her recent visit to Asheville, N.C., where she barely escaped the wrath of Hurricane Helene. It showed her, she said, the fragility of the planet and our responsibility to clean up the mess we’ve made.

The promise in John 3:16 that “God so loved the world” actually means that — not just the people in it, but the world itself.

This now brings me back to the Psalm and the two seemingly contradictory truths: It reveals human beings are laughably insignificant; we are specs in the big picture of God’s grandeur, but we are at the same time glorious because God considers us partners and co-creators, caretakers, and stewards of all that God has made.

It’s fitting that the Episcopal Church’s season of creation will culminate this afternoon with the celebration of the Feast of St. Francis and the blessing of the animals. You see, Psalm 8 is a wake-up call, the inconvenient truth of the Bible. We religious folk too easily forget that we are dependent on God in Christ even as we exercise the dominion God gave us over the earth.

Well then, what do we do? First, we must not despair. Despair begets paralysis, and paralysis robs us of agency.

Second, we must clearly see what we have wrought and make amends by pursuing restoration. We have enjoyed the feast generously laid out for us by Mother Earth, but now the plates are empty and the dining room is a mess. It’s time we started doing the dishes in Mother Earth’s kitchen.

The Psalm teaches us that the relationship between the self and the world is reciprocal. As we work to heal the earth, the earth heals us. As Christians, we must believe that our redemption is tied to the redemption of all creation. How do we know this? Because God so loved the world.