Today I drove slowly with the window down. The air was both warm and crisp at the same time and the brilliant winter sunshine glinted off the water of Canyon Lake, as we descended the winding road into tiny Tortilla Flats, Arizona. Our good friends were in the back seat, there were good prospects of an ice cream cone ahead, and my wife was talking happily in the seat beside me. Despite her pain…or perhaps because ofher pain…she was having a good time…and consequently, so was I. I had told someone earlier this morning, that as Christians we should live every moment as if it were our last; but too often we just don’t do it. You’ve heard the expression that some people are “so heavenly minded they are no earthly good.” Well, it struck me today that perhaps the opposite is also true. Some of us are “so LITTLE heavenly minded, we are no earthly good.” Were we to see this life as just a small piece of eternity, a prelude to something more, we might well cling to it less, but value it and enjoy it more.

    We Christians have inherited a rich legacy from our Jewish roots. That legacy pays attention to the present, the physical, thepractical, and the personal. But we neglect it. More often, we are shaped instead by the powerful impact of a generally contrasting Greek point of view, especially in the way weeducate. That view points us to the future, to the abstract, to the ideal, and to the general instead. Greekthinking has certainly promoted the advances of science and technology from which we all benefit. But it isolates usfrom the here and now. Our Jewish heritage reminds us that everything matters, including the simplest elements of ourworld and the daily activities of our lives; eating, gathering or celebrating. They are sacred. In other words they can allpoint beyond themselves to God.
   

    Jesus Christ was a Jew and I don’t think that’s incidental. He came in a present, physical,personal form we call the incarnation. It is no small thing that the Good News did NOT arriveonline by email or on paper in a letter or book. The Good News is a person. By dignifying ourhuman frame, His incarnation reminds us that we are not mere souls, nor mere bodies, but wholepersons. Everything about our lives matters.

    So He came to redeem and restore not justhuman souls, but complete human persons,
body and soul. And what is more, to redeem and restore all of His creation, even down to thesimplest elements of a winter Arizona afternoon.

     Last month, along with 86 other evangelicalleaders, I signed the Evangelical Climate Initiative, taking a stand against the humancarelessness that is destroying our environment. Some may say my action seems at best apremature conclusion in the face of ambiguous science on global warming. And at worstsome would say my public position is a tragic misplacement of priorities in a world full ofdying sinners.

    We are not worshippers of nature whether pantheists, transcendentalists, animists or anyother kind. But it is time we who follow Jesus Christ remember that he was a Jew, and that ALL of creationis the object of His love. Everything matters. May we learn to see THAT makes it sacred. May we become moreheavenly minded, so we can see and effect greater earthly good.