DAY 4

Image by Casey Yee

Connecting with Creation

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A Greeting
O my strength, I will sing praises to you,
for you, O God, are my fortress, the God who shows me steadfast love.
(Psalm 59:17)

A Reading
Then God said to Noah and to his sons with him, ‘As for me, I am establishing my covenant with you and your descendants after you, and with every living creature that is with you, the birds, the domestic animals, and every animal of the earth with you, as many as came out of the ark. I establish my covenant with you, that never again shall all flesh be cut off by the waters of a flood, and never again shall there be a flood to destroy the earth.’ God said, ‘This is the sign of the covenant that I make between me and you and every living creature that is with you, for all future generations: I have set my bow in the clouds, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and the earth.
(Genesis 9:8-13)

Music
You may wish to try playing today's music and the video at bottom at the same time.



Meditative Verse
May my teaching drop like the rain,
my speech condense like the dew;
like gentle rain on grass, like showers on new growth.
(Deuteronomy 32:2)

A Prayer
Gracious God, your amazing love extends through all time and space, to all parts of your creation, which you created and called good. You made a covenant with Noah and his family, putting a rainbow in the sky to symbolize your promise of love and blessing to every living creature, and to all successive generations... As people of faith, we are called into covenant. Your covenant of faithfulness and love extends to the whole creation. We pray for the healing of the earth, that present and future generations may enjoy the fruits of creation,
and continue to glorify and praise you.
- from “Caring for Creation: Making the World Safe for Children,”
a resource of the National Council of Churches, found on earthministry.org

Verses for the Day
As for me, I was like a canal from a river,
like a water channel into a garden. I said, ‘I will water my
garden and drench my flower-beds.’ And lo, my canal
became a river, and my river a sea.
(Sirach 24:30-31)

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Image by Casey Yee

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Today’s reading is one of several times in Scripture that God expresses a desire to be in covenantal relationship with God’s people. This covenant is made with Noah, after the devastation of the flood that led to Noah’s evacuation, migration and endless journey by sea. Although we often see it characterized in children’s books and toys with a sense of playful innocence, the story of the flood is a very challenging one, in which we hear how the world appears to vanish and then is restored. One pair of each species, including humankind, is preserved by God so that life can go on. In this story, even God has a moment of regret, followed by a commitment to renewal, and more importantly to upholding humankind always. A covenant is a commitment between agreeing partners, to faithfully uphold each other not just in specific legal terms, but with the whole heart. A covenant is a pledge that lives in and with God. Water often participates in a sign of covenant, as in the waters of baptism. From the living waters of the Gihon Spring to the rivers of Revelation, water in Scripture is a marker of life and healing. Therefore we are familiar with a biblical story in which water holds portents of death and destruction and also of transformational healing. On Saturdays and Sundays this Lent, we are taking time to reflect on the journey of the week, looking back and previewing what is ahead. It is also a time of reflecting on how the Lenten projects of other years have reflected on the same issues that concern us today. On the first Saturday of the first devotional project in 2011, the short reflection responded to the earthquake and tsunami that had devastated Japan the day before. (See that page here.) People around the world watched in horror as videos emerged online of entire communities being swept away. In 2015, we revisited that page and also visited the Yakushima wilderness, an UNESCO Man and the Biosphere reserve on the island that lies at the southwesternmost tip of the Japan in the East China Sea. (See that page here.) In 2011, the reserve largely escaped the impact of the tsunami but in 2015 the island was experiencing sulfur pollution arriving downwind from manufacturing plants in mainland China. Today, the white pines are still affected by pollution, but the reserve itself remains a well-preserved oasis that speaks to the raw beauty of God’s Creation. It has endured more than twenty-five hundred years of human and ecological history and is one of the few places in the world where there is no sign of tree cutting. Noah lives to see a green leaf in the beak of a bird. We too can find new life. As we journey with climate change, we can choose to continually recommit ourselves in faithful covenant to each other and to our neighbour Creation. When we join with others to think about practices for coping with climate change, we are making our own bow in the sky. What is your covenant with God in regard to the climate? Can you form one in prayer today?

A HIKE IN YAKUSHIMA ISLAND BIORESERVE



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LC† Reimagining Justice is a project of
Lutherans Connect / Lutheran Campus Ministry Toronto,
supported by the Eastern Synod of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Canada.
Join us on Facebook and follow us @LutConnect

DAY 3

Image Source

Oceans and Plastic: 3

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A Greeting
Turn, O God, save my life;
deliver me for the sake of your steadfast love.
(Psalm 6:4)

A Reading
God scatters the snow like birds flying down,
and its descent is like locusts alighting.
The eye is dazzled by the beauty of its whiteness,
and the mind is amazed as it falls.
God pours frost over the earth like salt,
and icicles form like pointed thorns.
The cold north wind blows,
and ice freezes on the water;
it settles on every pool of water,
and the water puts it on like a breastplate.
(Sirach 43:17b-20)

Music



Meditative Verse
From whose womb did the ice come forth,
and who has given birth to the hoarfrost of heaven? 
(Job 38:29)

A Poem Prayer
With wide-embracing love
They spirit animates eternal years
Pervades and broods above,
Changes, sustains, dissolves, creates and rears

Though Earth and moon were gone
And suns and universes ceased to be
And thou wert left along
Every Existence would exist in thee

There is not room for Death
Nor atom that his might could render void
Since thou are Being and Breath
And what thou are may never be destroyed.
- by Emily Bronte
found in The Flowering of the Soul: A Book of Prayers by Women
ed. by Lucinda Vardey

Verse for the Day
We will never turn back from you;
give us life, and we will call on your name.
(Psalm 80:18)

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Microplastics embedded in sea ice found in the Arctic.
(PhysOrg)

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In the past two days, we have seen how plastic is finding its way into our oceans, and can be found even at the very bottom of the sea. This third and last day of Oceans and Plastic explores the plastic that is embedded in Arctic sea ice and the unwanted changes wreaked on the Arctic by global warming. The image immediately above is a sheet of Arctic sea ice gathered by scientists, which shows entrapped particles of microplastics. It was found deep inside an ice block. (Source) Sampling from five different Arctic regions, these scientists found approximately twelve thousand bits of microplastic — per litre of ice, making Arctic sea ice many times more a repository for plastic garbage than even the Pacific gyres that were mentioned yesterday. Andrea Sparrow is a photographer and videographer with the Arctic Arts Project, a group of visual arts communicators who, working with scientists and educators, make “immersive” visual art that is both beautiful and informative about climate change in the Arctic. In the video below, Sparrow narrates what she herself witnessed on a field expedition in Greenland while a series of images that she and others captured, unfolds visually. “We simply don’t have time to make slow changes to our way of life,” says Sparrow. These deeply unsettling words challenge us in every possible way, even as we are awestruck by the beauty of the images that Sparrow and others captured. How can it be possible that such catastrophic reality lies embedded in such a wondrously beautiful place? In today’s reading, we hear the Wisdom writer Sirach describing the birth of Creation, and in particular God’s formation of winter elements. He too uses vivid imagery to capture our imagination. “From whose womb did the ice come forth?,” asks Job referring to God in a whole chapter of rapturous wonder at Creation. In Psalm 139, the psalmist tells us that each of us, also, was formed in the womb of the earth. All of these biblical writers are reminding us that when we seek God's help, we are returning to the origin of our being, and no request is too great. How does this motivate us today? How can we be comforted by knowing that God is present with us as we move to make change?

A CREATIVE PROJECT
This video was prepared as a presentation for a conference of the
International Union for the Conservation of Nature in August, 2019.
Note: mobile users may need to tap several times to make video play.

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LC† Reimagining Justice is a project of
Lutherans Connect / Lutheran Campus Ministry Toronto,

supported by the Eastern Synod of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Canada.
Join us on Facebook and follow us @LutConnect