A Beautiful Vase

Imagine someone gives you a beautiful vase. Someone you love and respect, who's helped and protected you through life. It's wonderfully decorated and filled with healing ointment. Your friend tells you to look after it carefully, and to use the contents for yourself and others. You're to pass it on to your children when you die. He promises that if used properly the contents will never run out.
What would you do? Perhaps you'd admire its beauty...or examine it carefully to work out what it's made of or how it was fashioned...or paint a picture of it?
You wouldn't leave it lying around on the floor where it might get broken or dusty...or put it on a precarious shelf where it might fall off… or throw stones at it...or let someone remove some of the material it’s made of. You wouldn't take bowlfuls of the ointment unnecessarily...or deny the ointment to someone else. Most of all you wouldn't forget who gave you the vase and why.
Unfortunately, we do these things to our environment, forgetting that our Lord created it, said that it was good, and told us to look after it.
Don't feel guilty! God isn't asking you to save the planet. He's asking you to live in a way that pleases Him.
Don't be downhearted! 'The earth is the Lord's'. It's His creation, and in His time He'll renew it.
Don't score points! Respecting God's creation is not a ladder of good works.
We are forgiven people, not under law but under grace. The Archbishops are encouraging us to use the #LiveLent booklet to explore a distinctively Christian approach to caring for God’s creation this Lent.
Andy & Di Sawyer
(This is a picture Di had a while ago)