Introduction to PEC's 2020 Lenten Devotional

God Provides Enough for All

Our family recently moved from the Louisville area to Henryville, Indiana, population 1905 humans, but teeming with wildlife. More tree and shrub species than we can catalog; owls, hawks, turkeys, woodpeckers, coyotes, fox, deer, monarchs, turtles, ladybugs, and the bobcat that appeared on our game cam the first night.

Living in such abundance, I find myself talking to creatures and even to trees, mostly expressing gratitude. I don’t expect them to respond, of course. So I am awed when one seems to accept my existence, when a hummingbird flies up to look me in the eye, or a nuthatch continues to feed nearby. 

If we think we live in a different world from other creatures, we’ve been conditioned to do so by centuries of human solipsism, trained to see nature as existing far away, irrelevant. But such distance is an illusion we’re waking from now, as we find creation reacting with violent force to our disrespect for its laws and norms. 

Human distance from nature is an illusion Scripture’s writers do not share. Scripture prompts gratitude for the abundance God offers through creation. Our first lesson in that abundance comes on the Bible’s first page: “See, I have given you every plant yielding seed that is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree with seed in its fruit; you shall have them for food. And to every beast of the earth, and to every bird of the air, and to everything that creeps on the earth, everything that has the breath of life, I have given every green plant for food” (Gen. 1:29-30). In short, there is enough for all. For all people across the world, and for all creatures who inhabit the world with us. Tragically, primarily because we who are rich take more than we need, this abundance is unequally distributed, so that it seems like fearsome scarcity.

Simplicity is key both to Lent and to environmental sustainability. Lenten tradition suggests a fast from some dimension of the overabundance endlessly surrounding the wealthy: from food, or from a destructive habit, recognizing our dependence on God for all we have and are. An ecological fast during Lent might involve dining closer to the ground—eating vegan or meatless, or reducing food waste. It might involve consumer goods—fasting from online shopping, or reducing single-use plastic. Or fasting from cars or planes, walking or staying put instead. Or from screen time, looking up to observe the vibrant world around us. Or from contributing to injustice, as Isaiah 58 suggests.

Whatever your Lenten practice is this year, the writers of these devotions join you in praying that in 2020 we may become channels of God’s peace for the earth and its inhabitants.

The Rev. Dr. Patricia K. Tull is A. B. Rhodes Professor Emerita of Hebrew Bible at Louisville Presbyterian Seminary and author of Inhabiting Eden: Christians, the Bible, and the Ecological Crisis and Isaiah 1-39. She and her spouse Don Summerfield have six children and four grandchildren, live in a zero-energy home, and enjoy growing much of their own food.