Recycling is Biblical (part 1) at Trying to follow

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Recycling is Biblical (part 1)

1 September 2006 6 Comments

Earlier this week I sent an email out to some friends informing them of the new recycling policies in Nashville.

At the end of the letter I went out on a limb and threw in a statement saying that it’s “Biblical” to recycle. Well, I think it took a few people back and rubbed them the wrong way or something. So, I’ve got to give some explanation.

I think this will only be two parts, but no guarantees.

First of all, with any issue we address as Christians, we need to stop beginning our thought process from a societal worldview. What I mean by that is that the society we live in views the world a certain way and when we look at the Bible and try and consider the most “Christian” thing to do, we must try our hardest to begin thinking about it from a clean slate rather then the already established worldview.
It’s interesting that when I say “recycling is Biblical” that the burden of proof is on me to prove that it is indeed supported by the Bible. If we are going to step back and then we need to consider how Biblical NOT recycling is.
I’ll write more in part 2 about why I think particularly Recycling is a good thing to do and try and support environmental stewardship as a Biblical step. However, for now I think we need to start seriously considering many of the actions in our lives.

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6816 CommentsRecycling+is+Biblical+%28part+1%292006-09-01+13%3A05%3A21Ariah »

Zach said:

Did you forget to finish this article? You build up to begin arguments, then you just had a couple confusing sentences that look more like an outline for an argument. Can you add some more meat to the end of this post?

# 1 September 2006 at 9:32 am

adria said:

Hey Ariah,

I’m very excited about these posts of yours. I’ve shared with you my recent, personal revelations about recycling. To be sure, for your own encouragement, you do not have to convince me of the biblical implications of recycling. I do think that you have an advantage by having a more Jewish view of the world and our role in it than others, who let’s say, aren’t Jewish. I say that not really knowing how much that worldview weighs on your decisions, because, unfortunately I don’t know your background as well as I would like (hmmm, we should hang out). Anyway, I know that people can benefit from your perspective on this issue, if they are willing to keep leaning and changing.

this long comment is now over.

# 1 September 2006 at 10:56 am

Ben said:

The concept of recycling is very biblical; in fact it’s at the heart of scripture. Think about it, God created the world and humanity, but things got messed up and instead of starting all over God decided to “recycle” the earth and mankind. That might sound like a stretch but it’s really not. Jesus came not to discard those who are messed up, but to make them new. The story of scripture teaches us that we must not be too quick to discard whether it is people, the earth, or even plastic bottles. Besides, God commands us to care for the earth and recycling is one of the best things we can do.

# 1 September 2006 at 1:22 pm

Recycling is Biblical (part 2) at Trying to follow said:

[...] This is a follow up to my intro in part 1 (which according to my friend Josh, sounded grouchy). [...]

# 6 September 2006 at 9:17 pm