There are many Christians today who view the natural world as God’s glorious creation, worthy of protection from human plundering. Unfortunately, this view seems rare in Oklahoma. I want to tell you a story about a much more common view in my home state.
I recently got a water heater installed, and I had to listen to the two plumbers preaching at me during the installation. It was a lecture, not a discussion; they frequently prefaced their statements with “I don’t know what other people think, but here’s what I think.” Then they would tell me Biblical things that may or may not actually be in the Bible.
Somehow we got to talking about trees, particularly the largest ones such as the giant sequoia trees in California. One of them told me exactly what would go through his mind as he stood at the base of a giant sequoia. He said that his mind would be calculating the number of board feet of timber in the tree and how much he could sell it for. That, to him, was the major inspiration stirred in his heart by the tree. Many other Christians have thought that large trees were wonderful expressions of God’s greatness. But not so for Oklahoma fundamentalists.
I could have told him something of practical value: not just how awe-inspiring sequoia trees are, but how much financial benefit that living trees provide for us. As I have often said in my blog and website entries, trees put oxygen in the air, remove carbon from the air, prevent floods and mudslides, build up the soil and allow water to percolate into the soil. That’s just a start. I’ve written a whole book, Green Planet, about it. Of course I did not say this to him, because he had proceeded on with a story about how fast he could cut down a big sycamore tree like the one in my back yard, and then went on to tell me how much God hated Obama’s health care plan.
And then he was done. At least he did not charge me extra for the time he spent preaching at me.
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