Creation Care is the worshipful act of caring for the environment; it is not done in response to environmental degradation but in service to God. It is caring for the Earth, and all that is in it, because God gave it to us to care for; in giving us authority over the Earth and every ‘creeping thing’ within it, He also gave us a duty of care towards it. Creation Care is, therefore, the faithful outworking of that duty we have towards the Earth and all its inhabitants.  

In light of all that, I can imagine you have guessed where the idea of Creation Care stems from, right? Yep! It’s Genesis 1, specifically Genesis 1:26, 28, which says: 

Genesis 1:26 NKJV  

Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our likeness; let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.”   

Genesis 1:28 NKJV  

Then God blessed them, and God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply; fill the earth and subdue it; have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over every living thing that moves on the earth.”   

The words ‘dominion’ and ‘subdue’ in these verses may seem aggressive, almost as though we are actually meant to treat the Earth in a violent, exploitative manner, but that is not the case. The Hebrew word for dominion in both verses is râdâh (pronounced: raw-daw’), and it means to subjugate, rule, or reign over.  

If you look at the 25 verses râdâh appears in, you will see that it is most often translated as rule and is typically referring to a person ruling over a people, not as a malicious tyrant but as a servant. They serve God by caring for and serving the people God has given them, and the same is true for us – we serve God as we care for and serve the creation He has given us. 

Likewise, the word subdue is not giving us permission to plunder the Earth but instead conferring on us the necessary authority to care for it. The Hebrew word used in verse 28 is kâbash (pronounced kaw-bash’), and it means to bring into subjection. In the 15 verses it occurs, it is usually translated as it is in verse 28: subdue, which means bring under control.  

In using the word subdue God is not telling us to brutalise the land; He is telling us to bring it under our control or, in other words, to exercise our authority, to rule over it; and as we have already seen, we are not meant to rule over the Earth with greed and violence but in service with care. This is further evidenced in the additional meaning The Strong’s Concordance ascribes to the word. According to it, kâbash also means to ‘tread down; hence negatively to disregard; positively to {conquer} {subjugate}’.  

From this definition, we see that we are meant to walk in the authority we have over the Earth (‘positively to {conquer} {subjugate}’), but more than that, we are not meant to treat the Earth with indifference (‘hence negatively to disregard’). God calls us to an active relationship with the Earth in which we care for it in service to Him.  

God further proves this is what He wants for humanity in Genesis 2. When He places Adam in the Garden of Eden, the Bible says:  

Genesis 2:15 NKJV  

Then the Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to tend and keep it.  

The AMPC says that Adam was put in Eden ‘to tend and guard and keep it.’ The NIV says he was put in Eden to ‘to work it and take care of it’, and the YLT98 says God placed Adam in the garden ‘to serve it, and to keep it.’ Our relationship to the Earth is made clear here; we have authority over the Earth to tend to it, guard it, serve it, work it, care for it, and keep it.  

And so, we see that God’s heart is for us to care for creation so much so that He blessed us for that very task in Genesis 1. That blessing and our God-given authority have not gone anywhere; the responsibility that comes with our authority has not disappeared. It is still God’s desire that we walk in the authority He gave us and fulfill our responsibility of care to creation. How do I know this? Because God ‘is the same yesterday, today, and forever.’ (Heb 13:8 NKJV) and because His ‘words will by no means pass away’ (Matt 24:35). So, what He said at the beginning of time He still means today, we are still meant to guard, serve, work, care, and keep creation.       

Creation Care is not simply a nice thing to think about or a side quest to complete when we have the time; it is an essential part of our walk with the Lord. It is not something we do to fit in or stay on trend; it is an act of service and worship done in reverence of the Lord God that goes back to the very beginning of the Earth.  

Thank you so much for joining me on this journey of finding out what Creation Care is. In the next post, we will answer the question: What is a Creation Steward? See you there!