I didn’t grow up green

I watched segments of Blue Peter and Newsround about the ozone layer, and tried to remember to check if my drinks cans were steel or aluminium for recycling purposes (using the fridge test), but that was about the extent of my commitment to, or understanding of, green issues.

I never heard about care of creation or ethical lifestyles at church (beyond the discussion of personal purity), although I think my parents bought fairtrade.

But today I have become a passionate advocate for living more compassionately on the planet, which means for me a journey towards serious lifestyle change.

Seeking righteousness and justice

Let me try to explain how I got here:

It came about first because of hating injustice and poverty. Working for the charity Tearfund I have spent the past six years seeing poverty, in all its forms, up close. And I have thought long and hard about its causes. I have wrestled with the heart-breaking inequalities of our world (and read plenty in the bible about how God hates injustice – see for example Isaiah 61:8).

I pray, as Jesus taught us, ‘your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven’ (Matt 6:10). And I want to believe, as Jesus evidently did, that it is possible to live that kingdom-way here and now, to seek righteousness and justice (the word used in Matthew 6:33 means both) and to love my neighbour as myself (Matt 22: 37-39). And when it comes to the planet, it’s obvious in many communities I’ve visited that when we abuse the planet, it is people in poverty who pay – those who can’t escape floods or who depend on regular rain to grow crops to feed themselves (just a couple of the consequences of climate change). So I feel compelled to protect the planet not only by God’s command in Genesis to rule and steward the earth, God’s love-invested creation, but also by an obligation to love my neighbour (Genesis 1:28).

How can we protect the planet?

There is giving to be done, out of my (comparatively) extraordinary wealth. There is campaigning to be done, so that the world’s governments pass fairer laws and protect the natural resources we are using up. Fairer laws would enable people to escape a life of poverty (we got them to cancel third world debt!). But what about the question of how I live?

People often tell me that the things we do – for example recycling, eating organic, cutting down on our meat consumption, growing veggies, clothes-shopping in charity shops – aren’t going to make a significant difference in the scheme of things. People’s lives won’t be made more equal, the planet won’t be rescued, hardly anyone will feel more of the love of God. Which is fair criticism. But when did discipleship become simply about final outcomes and external change?

God looks at the heart

Back in 1 Samuel, God warned the prophet, ‘People look at the outward appearance but the Lord looks at the heart’ (1 Samuel 16:7). Moreover, we are called to be heralds and prophets of the kingdom of God. I believe that means living with integrity, compassion, generosity, and with a profound sense of our responsibility to love God and all that he has created as ‘good’ – which includes the physical world and everyone made in his image.