Bishop Ward explores Season of Creation and the beauty of the world around us.
What am I doing outside as I speak to you today? I’m celebrating the beauty of creation, giving thanks to God, and I also want to speak with you about the Season of Creation, first designated by the Uniting Churches of Australia sometime ago, and then adopted and adapted by other churches including our own United Methodist Church.
You can find resources for the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd, and 4th Sundays of the Season of Creation. The 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and 4th Sundays of September. These resources can be used at any time during the year of course to explore with your congregation the biblical texts that celebrate creation.
We give thanks for the way that our Lord Jesus Christ outside pointed to trees and bushes and birds and flowers in order to teach the secrets of the realm of God. We also give thanks for Blessed Earth and Nancy and Matthew Sleeth who continue to teach through Spirited Life of the Duke Endowment to our clergy and in our districts.
At Annual Conference they gave wonderful presentations which are archived on the Conference website. Use these resources to increase your engagement with the vast number of biblical texts that are rooted in creation.
There is much that we learn as we look at these passages of scripture, and our hearts are enlivened, praise God, when we look outside on a beautiful day and see a brilliant sunrise, a glorious sunset, a beautiful moon, a radiant sun.
In all these ways we are blessed, may you be blessed in this season of creation wherever you find yourself on this good earth.