Yesterday I saw this comic, and somebody forwarded me this story, and it got me to thinking about “climate change” I put climate change in quotes because it used to be called global warming, until the globe actually cooled last year. Now it’s always called “climate change.”
I realize that this post is about two months too late. I missed all the hype surrounding the SBC statement by Jonathan Merritt. And I missed the big “We get it” statement by the ERLC.
But here are my thoughts anyway…
I have no idea whether humans are causing global warming or not. I will admit that it seems like climate change is real. I found An Inconvenient Truth to be rather convincing, but I cannot deny the stats from earlier that the world cooled last year. So, to clear this up, it does seem like something is going on, but I am not sure it is caused by humans and our activity on this planet. Now that I have established such a thoroughly fence-sitting position let me bottom line it for you.
For Christians, it doesn’t matter whether or not humans are causing global warming. It seems to me that the real issue is stewardship of the planet. We only have one planet to live on, at least until we figure out some new technology to put us on Mars. But I must say that the middle panel of the comic is correct. Stewardship of creation is a secondary issue. Just so that I am clear, there is only one great commission. There is only one duty that rises above all others for Christians. We are to spread the gospel, and preach to all the lost. That, however, is not an excuse to destroy what we have.
There are major problems on both sides of this issue. The people who say that this God’s world and He will take care of it are being irresponsible and simply unbiblical. God gave Adam the job of ruling over creation right in the beginning And the simple fact is that he expects the same of us. We are to take care of the world.
The other side describes it as a “planetary emergency,” and says “[global warming] threatens the future of human civilization.” So Gore believes that the end of the world as we know it will be because of global warming if something is not done to stop it. The problem with that is the hyperbole of it all. I’ll state this plainly. The main problem with the world is sin. It will be the cause of the end of civilization. No debate about that one. We doomed the world a long time ago. And there is no saving it. The greatest crisis ever to face mankind has already been settled. This world will end.
Let me wrap this all up. We must take care of the earth, just as we take care of our homes, our bodies, and our money, but climate change is not the greatest problem the world ever has faced, sin is.
And just in case you were wondering, I could sign the creation care document in good conscience.
being good to the planet is loving your neighbour… there is no duality of primary or secondary. we cannot love god with all our heart and be content with are behaviour towards his world. we cannot preach good news without showing good news and being good news. also, nothing has changed in relation to our responsibilities towards this world laid out by god in the beginning. i find this subject challenging, because we’re all caught up in doing bad to the creation… it’s almost impossible not to be. but i do think the bible is very clear about our duties… let us never forget, the good news is for all creation.
You want proof we are causing global warming?
check out this graph
http://www.pir.sa.gov.au/__data/assets/image/0020/51077/cc_figure_2.jpg
I like to go outside and just spray hairspray straight up until the can runs out.
In reply to Burton’s graph … I was curious how they measured temperature 1000 years ago so I looked up the history of the thermometer:
The first thermometers were called thermoscopes and while several inventors invented a version of the thermoscope at the same time, Italian inventor Santorio Santorio was the first inventor to put a numerical scale on the instrument. Galileo Galilei invented a rudimentary water thermometer in 1593 which, for the first time, allowed temperature variations to be measured. In 1714, Gabriel Fahrenheit invented the first mercury thermometer, the modern thermometer.
I didn’t research enough to see how long ago they started measuring CO2. I will research the NOAA website for historical climatological data and repost if I find anything interesting.
Looks like 1850 was the earliest CO2 measurements.
http://www.applet-magic.com/CO2history.htm
However the NOAA website also has a graph back to the year 800 so I am just ignorant as to how the data was obtained way back then.
http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/climate/globalwarming.html
I’m pretty sure they measure that temp by measurements done with ice core samples somehow. A lot of that ice has been there for thousands of years, and I think they know stuff based on that really deep ice
+1 what Jeremy said.
They use ice core samples, they can track everything from temperatures to how much methane, carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide, helium, etc was present in the atmosphere.
There was a program on the discovery channel a few weeks ago that showed some interesting graphs. The lady scientist made a program that used things like volcanic activity, solar flares, etc to project where our global temperature “should” be…. Even considering the warming and cooling cycles, we are way past where we “should” be.