Being Involved in Creation

I have been working this idea around in my head for a long time, and I'm sure if you read other blog posts of mine they have echoed this idea. It is simply this: that we are not separate from creation but completely involved in it, and God is involved in creation and can be clearly seen through all of creation.

Rob Bell does this amazing talk called 'Everything is Spiritual' where he tries to de-construct our dualistic mindset with regards to God and us, or the spiritual and the natural. Instead the message of Christianity and the new creation is a story of the joining together of that which is 'Spiritual' with the 'Natural'. The incarnation points clearly to the idea that their is supposed to be an inter-locking between this world, and the world to come.

And this understanding must influence the way we see the world, other people and the rest of creation. People are not the sum of their own decisions. People are influenced by thousands of decisions they have never made. And so it is so difficult to say that this person is evil because of something they have done. Was John Wayne Gacy Jnr an evil person because he murdered all those young men? Possibly his decisions were linked to his alcoholic father, or a chemical imbalance in his brain.

This poem by John Donne is so great at understanding the connectedness of humankind. This is not to say we are not individuals with our own personality and 'soul', but rather to say that we are not alone.

No Man Is An Island 

by John Donne

No man is an island,
Entire of itself,
Every man is a piece of the continent,
A part of the main.
If a clod be washed away by the sea,
Europe is the less.
As well as if a promontory were.
As well as if a manor of thy friend's
Or of thine own were:
Any man's death diminishes me,
Because I am involved in mankind,
And therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls;
It tolls for thee.


This is also a great song that I really love and find speaks so very well about this topic. Don't be scared off by him singing about 'Allah'. He's just singing about God and using the Arabic word for God.