Evangelicals and Creation Care
Dear Friends,
Greetings once again from the Care of Creation family! In particular, we want to say a special ‘Hello’ to our new friends who have joined our mailing list recently through visits to our website. “Evangelicals and creation care” has been a theme of great interest in the media over the last two months, culminating with Bill Moyer’s On America presentation, “Is God Green?”. We have seen a substantial increase in traffic on our website in that time, and quite a number of those visitors have added yourselves to this electronic mailing list – so, “Welcome!”
We don’t bombard people with emails here – one about every six to eight weeks is our normal frequency – and we also love to hear back from you. If you are new to the list, and want to share a bit about yourself, or find out more about us, by all means reply to this message and we’ll be glad to carry on a conversation with you. We also hope you’ll consider joining our financial support team – but more about that a bit later.
“Farming God’s Way” in Kenya
It’s been a busy fall for Craig and Tracy Sorley, who head up Care of Creation – Kenya, our main project outside of Nairobi. Where we have been primarily focusing on tree planting up to now, Craig is working on new initiatives involving appropriate agricultural techniques. We call it “Farming God’s Way”, based on a book by the same title by Dan Fountain, with whom Craig has been consulting and partnering on a new edition of the book. The team is now working on a balanced approach to Kenya’s environmental problems: “Planting God’s Trees, Harvesting God’s Water, Farming God’s Way.”
The rest of the team continues to be busy: Patrick, who joined the team in the Spring, spends much time on the (dangerous) roads making outreach visits to schools and churches, many of whom have or will soon be establishing their own tree nurseries. Francis, long-time assistant to Craig, is working in managing the demonstration nursery at Brackenhurst International Conference center, where upwards of 20,000 tree seedlings can be produced annually to assist other organizations in establishing their own nurseries. (Want to help us grow baby trees? See below). And special guest Sarah Zomer is a Canadian college intern who has spent this fall semester with us, gathering data on how effective our recent conferences have been in encouraging churches – and people – to begin working to heal God’s creation. We hope to be able to share some of her data with you in the coming months.
Care of Creation’s 1st Publication: “Our Father’s World” to be released mid-December
One of our desires when we began Care of Creation was to establish a solid theological foundation for what we call creation care or Christian environmental stewardship. Director Ed Brown has just completed a new book that establishes that theological foundation. We are happy to be able to announce that this will be available within the next three weeks. The full title is Our Father’s World: Mobilizing the Church to Care for God’s Creation. David Howard, former President of Latin America Mission and Director of Urbana 73 and 76 has read the book and says this:
This book is a remarkable combination of a broad spectrum of the environmental crisis in the world today coupled with a deep understanding of God’s desire for His creation as developed in the scriptures. It is full of well written illustration sthat show what the Church (universal) and church (local) needs to do to obey God’s commands and desires for His world. I highly recommend this book as both easily readable yet profound in its challenge to Christians and others today.
We’ll send an announcement when this is available for purchase on our website. List price will be $14.95 (paper), but we will make it available for a special “book launch” purchase price during the month of December of $10.00 including shipping.
(Special note to our student friends: Our Father’s World will be available at the Urbana 06 bookstore for the same price. Come and visit Ed at the Care of Creation booth in the Exhibition Hall and get your book signed – no extra charge!)
Speaking of Urbana…
Ed and Susanna will be representing Care of Creation at Urbana 06, InterVarsity’s triennial college student missions conference December 27-31 in St. Louis. Well over 18,000 students are expected, and Ed will be presenting a seminar on Missions and the Environment during the conference.
Urbana is a pivotal event for many students who will serve in cross cultural ministries later on. We believe this is a crucial opportunity to work to increase awareness of environmental issues – and what the Bible has to say about them – to both the next generation of missionaries and church leaders, and to representatives of other mission agencies who will also be there in force. Pray that God will guide and give us influence during these five intense days.
And in the new year…
Early in the new year, Ed and Susanna will be traveling to Kenya for a week of prayer and planning with the Care of Creation – Kenya team. We have accomplished Phase I of our initial organizational plan, and it is time to develop a strategy to carry what God has given to us to other countries in East Africa, and perhaps beyond. You can be part of that by praying with us, and by joining in supporting our work.
Among other projects (contact us for a comprehensive list of fundraising goals) we will be looking to raise $200,000 to construct and Environmental Education center to serve as a ministry base for Care of Creation – Kenya. Please pray with us for God’s direction and blessing on this project – and if you have any contacts with organizations or funding agencies that might be interested in partnering with us in this way, please let us know as soon as possible!
How about helping us plant trees?
There are a number of organizations that offer you the opportunity to support a child for, say, $25.00 per month. We think we can match that offer: The same $25.00 per month ($300 per year) will help us plant 200 trees that will be providing benefits for hundreds of children for generations: by stabilizing soil, improving water supplies and cleaning the air. With enough partners we can plant more than 20,000 trees – and even more important, while doing that we will be encouraging churches and schools to establish their own tree nurseries as well. (If you use the website, use the comment section to tell us you want to participate in our tree planting sponsorship program.)
Join our support team!
Many of you receiving this already support one or another of our staff members: Craig and Tracy Sorley in Kenya, Ed and Susanna Brown in Madison, or Jan Korbel, raising support now to join the Kenya team early in the new year. Thank you!
But if you don’t yet support us regularly, may we encourage you to both consider making a one-time year end gift and becoming a monthly support partner? You can make donations on our website (here) or send a check to Care of Creation, PO Box 44582, Madison WI 53744. All gifts are tax deductible in the US and Canada. We can accept credit cards on the website (through Paypal) and we can set you up for automated Electronic Funds Transfers as well.
Thank you for your interest, your friendship, your partnership and your prayers. Happy Thanksgiving!
In Him,
Ed Brown and the entire Care of Creation Team
Care of Creation
608-469-7821
careofcreation@gmail.com
www.careofcreation.org
