Planet Earth - The End

I finished off the "Planet Earth" DVD's tonight. If you haven't seen this series, it is a MUST watch. Some of the most incredible scenery ever, so beautiful. I have to admit that I waited a while to watch the last 3 episodes, because I knew what was coming. They were all about how humans are impacting the world, and it didn't bring many warm fuzzies.

It is depressing to see what we have done to this world. God created this world and called it good. Then He gave us the job of caring for it, and we've screwed it up pretty bad. Just in the city of Indianapolis things are pretty crappy. We can't see the stars because of all the light pollution (this summer in Kentucky and Utah I finally saw the Milky Way for the first time). If we get very much rain in a small period of time, millions of gallons of raw sewage gets dumped in the White River. Every new subdivision is marked by a complete lack of trees. Walk along a street or highway and look at the trash that lines it. There's no where in the city that you can go for true peace and quiet (if you think it's here, you don't know what it is). But even when I go out into the wilderness I find how we have managed to screw things up. Red River Gorge is rather overused. As much as I love it, there's a lot of trash and you can see where humans have trampled over a lot of things. Carving their names in the rocks and trees. In Glacier we found trash along the trail, though not as much as we expected (which is sad that we expected any). In Utah in a canyon, mile and miles from any kind of terrain that a vehicle could make it through, we found large truck tires. It was ridiculous. Don't even get me started on Las Vegas, that is the antithesis of everything I find to be good in life.

But moving beyond the environment, look at what we are doing to people. When 6,000 people a day die in Africa due to simple things like clean drinking water or diseases that we treat with simple over-the-counter medicine from CVS. Or people in Indianapolis who struggle to make it by each day, without basic things that most of us take for granted. Let's face it, the human race has don't a pretty crappy job of taking care of the things God told us to take care of.

But I have to stop and look at what I'm doing to help make things better. Ouch. There's a few things I've done. I'm a member of American Whitewater, and I support missionaries to Africa who are helping with AIDS education and taking care of orphans. I've been making an effort to reuse grocery bags and recycle things. I've been involved in some inner city work. But to be honest with myself, I've been pretty lazy about everything. I'm a part of the problem, not a part of the solution. I've been really challenged to consider what I'm doing to make this world a better place, even if it's just a small piece. I'm not sure what all that involves, but I'll work on it. One interesting thought that occurred to me. If I'm looking at moving to Oregon, in making a job change am I willing to pass on a job opportunity simple because I object to what the job is supporting? I found a job posting for a company that does work with logging, with I really have a problem with (I've seen clear cut forests, it's horrible).

I'm just thinking, I don't have any answers to any of this. But I thought it was really interesting that as Planet Earth explored the issues of conservation that they presented a well balanced view of a lot of things. They presented the idea that hunting is part of conservation of endangered species. They presented the idea that an African family is not going to choose to save a tree at the cost of not feeding their child. That people have to be considered as well as the environment, though taking care of the environment is vital to taking care of the people. They presented the idea that those who believe that God created this world have a responsibility to care for it.

I look forward to the day when God wipes out everything we've done to screw this world up and makes everything new. I'm excited to see what this world looks like as God intended it to be. Until then, I'd like to enjoy what we have now because that's pretty cool too. I think it's worth caring for, the planet and the people.