gifts or stewardship?

[SonicBOOM]

here's something a little diffrent. There's a popular idea among Christain circles that we are stewards of the earth and everything in it, but everything ultimitly belongs to God. I however I always thought of it more as his gift to us. The reason here is a steward is often more of a servent term and it often has strings atatched. It creates a burdon much more than it creates joy. We get so concerned about using things unwisely that we lose the ability to enjoy anything. Jesus calls us sons and daughters and he also calls us freinds. A gift is something you give to your son/daughter or your freind. I was thinking about this and I thought it might make a good discussion.

Would you define the earth as God's gift to us or would you define it as stewardship?

I will post the definition of each word below as a sort of guide.


Steward -
One who manages another's property, finances, or other affairs.


Gift -
Something that is bestowed voluntarily and without compensation.

 

[0n3]

THis makes me think of the parable of the talents in Matthew 25. (I am not saying that if we are not good stewards that we are automatically going to be "cast into outer darkness where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth." as the 3rd servant is though.) But basically, God has given us the gift and responsibility of not only the earth, but also of knowledge, money, etc. When we think of all that God has done for us, and everthing He has entrusted to us, why would we not want ot be good stewards of it to the best of our ability? God wants us to enjoy life, but He also says to "work out your salvation with fear and trembling.(Phil.2:12)"

Another way to look at it is this: If one of your grandparents or parents gave you an extremely valuable family heirloom as a gift, and they asked you to treasure it, you wouldn't say, "man, this is no fun having and I can't enjoy it, because I have to be too careful wiht it. I think I'll wear it, or take it with me the next time I clean the garage or fix my car or something." You would wreck it if you weren't careful, which would defeat the purpose of ever even having it.

Another way to look at it: Being a good steward is asked of all christians, and without free-will, it would be required and forced on everyone. It's kind of like God's gift is that we get the choice to be stewards. By not making us love or serve Him, He makes it a possiblility that we can.

 

[SonicBOOM]

agreed and I think this is one of the ways we can love God. I think the danger comes when we look at this as a duty rather than an act of love. Sense I've become a Christian I've became very careful about how I treat the earth and how I treat my body. The reason here is I know in my heart these are gifts from God and I love him profoundly for what he's given me... so it comes natural to me to take good care of his gifts. I think if we get into the legistic mindset of a literal steward we can become so overcome with fear of "doing it wrong" that we not only lose the joy but we lose the actul desire to take good care of things. As a result I fear we might become even MORE distructive twoard God's gifts to us.