Doctrine of Creation

William Jennings says,

A Christian doctrine of creation should orientate us towards thinking about

• place
• habitation
• where we live and what we make.

Instead of us obsessing over questions of:

• origins
• the relationship of theology and science
• evolutionary theoreticals.

Thinking about these matters has drawn the doctrine of creation into a deep hole, out of which it has not emerged in the last forty years.

The church knows how to think about time, but it does not what to think about place?

I don’t just live in a house and I don’t just go to a church. I live in a place. We need to start thinking about what it means to engage with a place.

Place

Place is important, but...

If you sit in Starbucks or McDonalds, you meet a sample of people from the catchment the restaurant draws from. If you build them into a church, you still have a gathered church, just it is gathered from the same catchment has the restaurant.

To really do place, you need to live in a neighbourhood, and walk among and serve your neighbours. You need some other followers of Jesus living in the same place, so people in the immediate neighbourhood, can see you loving each other.

Working in the Dark

When Naaman was healed of leprosy by washing seven times in the River Jordan, he had a problem. He had switched his allegiance to God, but he would still have to take his master the King of Aram into a pagan temple of Rimmon. He took two mule loads of soil back to his home town (2 Kings 5:17). He would have spread it on the floor in the pagan temple where is master worshipped. It would appear like dust on the floor, so no one would realise it was there. By this symbolism, he created a space in the pagan world that belonged to God. When he went into the pagan temple as part of his work, he could worship the true God.

People at the bottom level in a business have very little authority. However, they should try to create an area that belongs to God. It might be limited to the space around their desk, or the counter where they serve. By quiet prayer, they can make this spot a place where the Holy Spirit is happy to be. Invite him to be there every day. This gives them freedom to walk with God. It also allows other people to come into contact with the Spirit. They should expect to see them touched.

Some people will not be able to control a space. They have authority over their words and their smiles. They should dedicate what they do control to God, each day.