Particularly in the last 30 years, environmental concerns have been at the forefront of Western society. Everything from the rate at which we consume the world's natural resources to alternative fuel sources, from "save the whales" to "earth-friendly," from landfills to recycling, from the ozone layer to global warming: each issue represents an effort to maintain and sustain our natural habitat.
The Bible says a lot about the natural world. First of all, God created the world and everything in it. Creation is God's means of judging and saving the people; it is also God's means of showing God's power in the world. People were put on the earth for a purpose: to care for God's creation. So, though human beings certainly have been blessed with the intelligence and the power to use creation to our own ends, according to the Bible our purpose is to serve the land and all that is in it.
Science has shown that we are not doing a very good job of this. Overpopulation and industrialization have impacted our environment in alarming, sometimes irreversible ways. Some have even predicted that at the rate we are consuming natural resources, there won't be any left for future generations.
What do you think? What is it that we truly need for survival and in what ways do we take advantage of the gift of creation? What can we do better?
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i believe that we need the industries for the jobs that help our generation today. These industries wouldn't be able to run with out power and machines to i think that gas is something we could live with out but it would make our lives alot harder. We do however take advantage of the land we are giving and plants and trees that we grow to live off of. but something that alot of people could do better is recycle. It is one of the bigs problems that we have in the world today
i feel that God has given us everything on earth that we need to survive. if you look back through history people have always been able to survive this is because god made this world with everything in it we need to survive. yes we take advantage of God's creation but we have gotten lazy, which is where all of these industries have came from. we are human so of course we can always do better, their is always room for us to improve because we are not perfect..... Chris Daniels
I believe that overpopulation and industrialization have definitely impacted our environment in both positive and negative ways. However for the most part it is what makes us wealthy with more job opportunities. I don't think we will ever run out of resources. However, we do take advantage of creation in terms of nature and keeping it clean and pure. Ways we can help with this aspect is recycling and reducing the amount of loitering which i believe has both stirred away from our lifestyles
What we need for survival, is to use the human ingenuity and spirit God has given us to fix what we have damaged and create alternative ways to continue our lifestyle. For instance God created the sun, which is almost an unlimited source of energy, if we could harness this effectively and efficiently, we would eliminate our need for fossil fuels, a main contributor to global warming.
Plus we can use solar energy until the sun explodes or burns the earth and kills us all anyway... yeah that sux
God created humans to take care of the earth. I think we have done a good job of so far. All these people are getting over concernd about global warming. Take the fact that i dont know really what it is like in a big overpopulated city, since i am froma small town in Iowa. We try to keep are town clean and recycle every thing we can. One more thing if God created the earth, it be almost inpossible for humans to destroy it, if God wants it gone he will be the one to do it.
I think that we do take advantage of almost everything. The United States is especially bad at this. People got along just fine back in the days of our grandparents. The problem is we want more. Also, the more we have the more money we have or can make. Nobody wants to downsize or give anything up. Basically, all we need for survival is food, water, clothing, and shelter. We don't need fancy mansions and 70+ articles of clothing to choose from to wear. You can obviously tell we take advantage of things because we are overweight, overdressed, live in huge houses, and drive fancy cars. Plus a lot of people own more than one car and/or house. We do not need all that. We need to figure out what we need to survive and cut back on everything else. The furure generations are going to be the ones who have to live with our mistakes so we need to stop and consider them for a change.
I think that we do take advantage of almost everything. The United States is especially bad at this. People got along just fine back in the days of our grandparents. The problem is we want more. Also, the more we have the more money we have or can make. Nobody wants to downsize or give anything up. Basically, all we need for survival is food, water, clothing, and shelter. We don't need fancy mansions and 70+ articles of clothing to choose from to wear. You can obviously tell we take advantage of things because we are overweight, overdressed, live in huge houses, and drive fancy cars. Plus a lot of people own more than one car and/or house. We do not need all that. We need to figure out what we need to survive and cut back on everything else. The furure generations are going to be the ones who have to live with our mistakes so we need to stop and consider them for a change.
I think that we are carelessly using up natural resources. It is scary to think that our future generations may be jeopardized by the actions we have carelessly made. We should do more to prolong the resources we have now. We need to have fresh air, trees, wildlife etc. Everything is inter-related, sacrificing one means sacrificing another. We should make a consious effort to recycle and reuse. We should educate our younger generations, and implement change now. Instead of using the technology we have to figure out ways to produce more, we should be trying to figure out ways to help save our environment.
Obviously we can do better. It's human nature to adapt to our environment and take advantage to better satisfy our needs and wants, and that's never going to change. However, with the right combination of leaders and activists I think things can change, but it needs to be soon. From everything I here we're using and abusing our environment at an alarming rate, and although you can't believe everything you hear, I'd rather be safe than sorry and not wait to improve our situation until it's too late.
It seems so easy for people to take what God has given us for granted. Not only do we take advantage of the gift of creation, but we abuse it. In my opinion, the first step of doing a better job of taking care of what God has given us is simply putting garbage where it belongs. People are destroying the beauty of our planet, because they are too lazy to use a garbage can. Recycling would help as well. Leaving things the way God made them instead of tearing them down for our own personal gain would also be a positive step. I think that people have become far to selfish in many ways and our planet is suffering because of it.
I believe by consuming natural resources today we jeopardize our children’s forthcoming. I think the many ways we are forfeiting god’s creation of the world in the chapter Genius is the spilling of oil in the sea, the use of oil in cars automobiles, and finally the industrialization of society. The fact is we need these things to subsist, the only hope mankind has is to use our minds and construct better solutions for the planet. The countdown has begun, let's bring it to a standstill it before it reaches zero.
-James Postels
God created man so that he can keep and work on the land He created. God gave man the power to dominate all creatures on earth.however man in the attempt to obey God's commandment, started to create things to help him fullfil his work which unfortunately come along with more and more trouble. there is something in our lives (humans) that makes me think and sometimes frightens me. the fact that with almost every invention brought on this earth, there are more and more problems affecting the earth which come with those inventions , speaking of the mass production in industries which help pollute the earth and lead to many matters among which the depletion of the ozone layer and many other things that we may observ today. the only solution will be to stop producing goods and that is impossible because no one would like to go back to the primitif life.
Throughout the ages, I think a shift is apparent from reliance on God, to reliance on self. This shift was especially facilitated by the emergence of technology. However, the more man relies on self, I think the less he is aware of what is going on around him, thinking he is in control of everything regardless. Many groups have been raising awareness about the condition of our fragile earth, now that a degree of awareness has been established, the next step is action. And it's going to take a lot of action to reverse the effects of our reckless treatment of the earth. Water, air, and food are the absolute necessities of life on this planet, but even these necessities may soon be endangered. If one chooses not to take action in preserving the planet for himself, I can only hope he will do it for the sake of his children and grandchildren.
I think we take things for granted and we are very selfish now a days. We think we can do whatever we want and when we want. For example pollution is high in America. Some people will drive 2 blocks to go somewhere on a nice day when they could just walk. Things like that just add up later and create more damage to our earth.
When God created the earth, he new everything that was going to happen to it, so im sure he is well aware of what was going to happen. I do believe that we could be taking care of the earth better. I do think we take advantage alot of what we have. To help people need to stop littering, they could recycle, help clean up around thier cities, just do whatever they can to help. Because things arent going to be as good as they once were if we keep going at this rate.
I know that we are not taking the best care of the earth. Although I do believe with the way technology is going we will be just fine. I don’t think God would have given us the brain power to invent the technology, industry, and economy we have if he didn’t want us to use it. Yes I do think everyone including myself needs to be more conscious of the environment, and yes I believe we are using up resources very fast, but if there does come a time that we don’t have any for future generations I honestly think there will be new technology so that it won’t even affect them. Look at what is already going on. People are using corn for fuel. So there is a strong possibility that we won’t need gas as a resource in future generations. We do need to take care of the earth, don’t get me wrong. I am just saying that I think things will work out, I don’t believe that the world is going to end because of the overpopulation and industrialization.
We live in a world of excess. Everyone is lazy and we use a lot of energy we don't need to. People drive less than two blocks, even on the best of days. We crank the heat up everywhere (guilty), lights, water, everything. The earth *was* a fantastic gift, but as far taking care of it goes, we have done a poor job at best. A lot of it is overrated, such as global warming (we are still coming out of an ice age after all), and the hole in the ozone has always been there, and it is shrinking over Antarctica last I knew. Pollution, overpopulation, and misuse of resources are our real problems. We have but one Earth and we must share it with 6 billion others. But no one really seems to care and it is depressing. Our resources will eventually run out (albeit not in our lifetime), so we need to be considering other alternatives to all of our "excesses" but we don't. Oh well, I guess we screwed this one up....
I think that we humans take the world for granted. I know of people who do not beleive in this Global Warming. but you can see the effects of it. We need god for survival because he is the one who created the earth and all her food/resources. God created us and we have destroyed what god gave us.
I believe we as Americans take seem to take the world for granted. People are constantly just litering or taking out a forest somewhere to put in a town or just the simple things like using to much electricity or water. It's like this because we have become a custom to always having these things at are finger tips and never having to worry about not having any of it. It in turn has caused us to become really lazy and we need to start respecting what we have and realizing that if we keep this up that one day it will run out. We need to start caring more for what we have and doing simple things like recycling and conserving water and electricity. Basically just using what we need. This way we can keep the earth the way it supposed to be.
I think that God had given us enough to survive. However, I think we have abused a lot of our priveliges of our inteligence. We have made what God gave us a disaster, and used our powers to become more wealthy. If you take a look at the statistics a person will find that the earth has become more of an industry and business making then it has for people to live in it. There are buildings we do not need and businesses that we do not need. I guess though some of the new technologies have really helped civilization and poverty; however, we need to start taking more care of the environment
Reproduction in large numbers is one the world's biggest problems. Even though some people refuse to accept this as a solution, at least half the people on this planet need to die before we will have ample resources. Genetic engineering of crops and livestock have made small improvements in how much can be distributed worldwide, but not even close to what needs to happen in order to make a large difference. As far as pollution goes, we have dug ourselves a hole that I fear even the Prius can't get us out of.
Creation is something God cherished a lot, because it was the first thing He had created. As mentioned in one of the comments earlier, people take the things of the earth for granted. The environmental concerns in Africa are great, but in most cases, they don't really care about what they do to the environment. I can see that here in America, things are taken a lot more seriously about the environment, and especially on how there are natural reserves for the environment.
Well this is definitely a really good question but I honestly don't know how to really answer it. I think we are constantly taking advantage of the earth, thats just a habit that humans seem to do automatically. We don't really think about how a little pollution adds up and how it can seriously harm the world. I think we need to stop being such an indifferent and ignorant country and start caring about these issues. Measures have been taken to help with some of these different issues but so many people just don't care that these attempts fall short. The world is a beautiful place that is one of a kind and we definitely need to start listening to all those who are trying to make a difference and follow their examples.
I believe that we do take advantage of the earth in a negative way. Rainforests are disappearing, there are new species of animals being added to the endangered species list all the time, global warming is occuring, etc. etc. We need to start conserving our resources, and we need to develop new renewable resources to replace the nonrenewable resources we are sucking up from the earth.
It is definitely scary how fast our earth is going downhill. I do not think we are doing that great of a job with preserving our earth. In the United States we package absolutely everything when sometimes it is not necessary. We drive big cars that need lots of gas-we use lots of coal, etc., and other natural resources. We throw away a lot and recycling is getting better but is not great! Even water consumption & use is very high. It is scary to think of what could happen to future generations. We can do a lot better. I am thankful to those such as Al Gore who have done a good job of presenting the need on what needs to be done to help out our planet! We can do much better-it's just a matter of time and money.
I think that we are in a big world of hurt when it comes to global warming, natural resources and the environment. People just use, use, use the land and natural resources that God gave us, without thinking about the consequences of how much and exactly what they are using. As a direct result of that they are slowly killing off the world and I think that the process has been sped up a lot. There are many people that say that it's natural things that are causing global warming and other things like that, but God is the one who created those things. So I think that God is sort of punishing us for not taking care of the land he gave us to live on and to take care for him. I don't know that we can really do anything to get people to change what they are doing because a lot of them just don't care they want whatever is convienent for them and they aren't thinking about the long term affects.
I feel that God set us up for life with the world he put us on. It is what we do with what were given that will decide how long our resources are good for. With the rapid growth of industrilization and the constant garbage we are putting into the air our beautiful earth is being destroyed. Yes it is true that God put us here to preserve the world he created, but there is little that can be done with overpopulation and industrilization. It is what is keeping our world growing and changing. We just happen to be hurting the earth in the process. The only choice we would have is to kill some of the people or shut down the plants which would take jobs away and lead to greater incline in unemployment. Some options we could do is recycle and use gases in our vehicles that will not pollute the air. God has control over everything we do. It will be his choice when the world ends, so maybe things like global warming and overpopulation is just a test from God to see what will do. However, it still is our job to preserve what he has given to us the best way we can. We need things on this earth for survival like the trees, water, land, etc, but by using them in ways that only hurt the environment is taking advantage of what God has given to us!
God made the earth and everything on it for humans. God expects us to do whatever we need in order to survive. Because of overpopulation, it might be harder for future generations to survive without natural resources. Technology is getting so great that we probably won't run out of, or even need natural resources.
I believe that we should continue to try and save our environment. However, I believe that the earth, and all of the people in it will be gone before the world quote on quote "ends". Think about it if you read the Bible, it tells us how the world is going to end, so why believe all of this garbage how we are all going to die off and the human race is over. My answer is continue to try and save the whales, but realize that world will not end by the human race dieing off.
I definitely think that there is a lot more that we can do for the environment. I don't really think that we respect everything that God has given us and we do abuse many of the natural things we have been given. Also I think that with technology there will be many advancements and substitutes for the things that we use now. But for some of the natural resources there no substitutions. I think there are many little things that Americans as a whole could be doing, but I think we don't take the time or the money to do it.
God created us to take of his creation of the earth, and i believe we are not doing a good job of it at all. all the indusrties we have are dumping deadly chemicals into oceans and rivers and killing things that live in them. i also believe that we need these industries but we need to find ways from them dumping this kinda stuff into our environment. something we could do better today is recycle this is something very easy to do and we need to take advantage of it.
I believe that we as people arent really taking care of the earth. As far as population and industrial things go i think that its nothing we really can do about that. As time goes on and technology gets greater, some of those things are neccessary for us these days. I believe that if it came down to surviving just off earth alone with no technology or machines, it would be hard now since every generation we depend more and more on machinary. To better the earth we can cut down on pollution (which is hard to do) and just better ourselves as far as not littering.
i think that human beings are doing a terrible job of taking care of God's creation. God gave us Earth to take care of, and all we care about is getting somewhere faster. We have gotten a lot better though by developing new sources of gas, recycling, and planting new trees. I think there is still room for improvement though. Hopefully in the near future cars could run on water or something. I dont think we are far away from something like that.
We can all talk about the problems that we as humans are causing the world, but what about acting on that? We're the next generation. We need to lay off the technology a little go outside more. Look around see what the enviornment is like. We're going to be a generation of amazing technological advancements and have many great people emerge, but will any of these advancements better the earth? I'm sure a few will, but it is a lot easier to use the enviornment to our betterment rather than better the enviornment.
I think that we need to stop pollution in our country. Easier said then done I know but if one starts, that's one less to contribute to it. We take advantage of this world because we think it will always stay the same and nothing will change. Eventually smog will continue accross the nation and effect the whole U.S. as it is now in big cities.
Coming from Africa, pollution from industralization is not something that concerns me much because that is the least of our worries. However, overpopulation is something that concerns me because it is making the poverty situation even worse. I dont mean sound ignorant but i cant worry about animals and trees when my people are starving.
I do think we have taken advantage of what we have been given. I don't think it is bad that we have made the advances in technology that we have, but I think when we notice a problem with what we have done we should find a better alternative...ASAP. I also think sometimes we allow too much politics into the environmental issues. For example, it's kind of funny (ironic) how we haven't TRULY put a large effort into finding a replacement/alternative to gas for our cars and etc and that President Bush owns some oil companies. Not saying President Bush is a bad guy, but to me it's a little fishy. So bottom line, I think we should try to find alternatives to things we know are hurting our environment...otherwise no one but us will truly pay for it in the end.
The earth is important to everyone and God made the world for us to live on it. It is our fault if we destory our planet. We just need to help out as much as someone can clean up the earth. pick up after ourselves.
I thnk we were put on earth to care for God's creation. i think its our job to keep it clean as possible and i feel as if we're not doing that. And yes i do feel that we do take advantage of what is given to us! For example trees, trees help us breathe, and people continue to cut them down for resourses, and sometimes just to build a house, or a mall of some sort. I think overpopulation is a problem, but theirs not too much you can do about that. Look at the birthrate, it continues to go up. I think what we can do better is to start recycling more. I think that will help a lot.
In my opinion it is our duty to keep what we were given in a condition that will last forever, but as we all ready know it is almost impossible. We need to understand ways to reuse things and become more aware of the energy the wind, the water, and the sun provides for us. Oil consumption needs to be better regulated so that we can develpo new energy methods, while still burning fossil fuels. With the develpment of new engines, greenhouse gases are being reduced in todays new cars.
we take a lot of things for granted nowa days. we don't serve the land either, at least not as well as God would have wanted us to. We use up so much oil and other resouces it's not even funny. i think that if we don't become more aware of how much we are hurting the earth it'll get destroyed. People won't care about the earth unless it will affect them, which someday it probably will.
I believe that the world is not taking very good care of what God has given us. If you gave a friend a puppy, and they abused it you probably would hate them forever. Same difference. I think we need to do a better job of taking care of the enviroment.
I feel that we have not been good care takers of the Earth that God created for us to take care of. I think a lot of people are selfish and a lot of them don’t care about taking care of the environment, but they care more about making money instead. For example, the owners of big industries that are manufacturing goods while releasing thousands upon thousands damaging chemicals into the air. I think technology has had a lot to do with us not taking good care of the Earth because of the different industries, cars we drive, etc. But on the other hand, technology advances are helping us work better to improve the way we treat the environment, such as solar and hydro energy and hybrid cars to name a few. God gave us the ability to improve the way we have been mistreating His creation through knowledge and discovery.
I think that one of the major problems that we have is that humans have historically viewed themselves as being the most important thing in the world. People used to believe that the sun revolved around the Earth. Most Christians believe that God created us in his image and made the world for us. At every point in time there has been a species more advanced than any other on the planet, right now we are the most advanced and many people can't wrap their minds around the possibility that we are nothing more than just the most advanced species on Earth at this time. Earth existed long before we did and is it possible that it wasn't created just for us? Is it possible since there are so many things that exist beyond our reach that we will never know about that maybe everything wasn't created for us? I think we should take better care of the environment because it is essential for our survival and it would be wrong to ruin it and leave our consequences to the generations to come.
I do believe that we are not doing a very good job at taking care of the enviroment. We need mostly every big to little thing that God created to survive, and the way that we are abusing the enviroment we are taking major advantage of it and not really noticing the beauty about it. We stop tearing down the forest and polluting, but thats easier said than done.
i think that with the more people that come into the world the less that we will have and the natural resources will be taken for granted until there is a real issue with how less of the resources we have! We do need most of the resources to survive but other things that we use the natrual resources for are not really needed but the world that we live in today makes it a belief that we are in need of applainces and different items for entertainment which burn up our natural resources. The only thing we can do better is apperciate the stuff we have and try to realize that soon enough this will be an important issue later and we need to take care of now before it turns into that.
The United States of America has been doing a good job of trying to get into the flow of using alternative energy. Like wind turbines, solar power, and in the popular science magizine even says that scientists are working on ways to harness the wave power, for electrical energy. If it will ever be possible for us to put someone on another planet, not counting the Moon, it would open up so many doors for us. We can continue to do what we are doing toward saving the enviornment, by cleaning up the areas that we have destroyed.
I was surprised when I came to the Unites States, because people don’t separate burnable trashes, non-burnable trashes, bottles and cans. Many Japanese don’t have a specific religion or don’t believe in the God though, most people worship nature of the God. We don’t try to waste foods, water etc, and it is kind of morals in Japan. When I was a elementary student, I had many opportunities to learn about an environment and the present condition of the earth. I think that these opportunities are really needed as the condition of the earth is getting worth in recent years.
We aren’t taking care of the environment in many different ways-pollution, overpopulation, the extinction of animals. People are supposed to be the smartest of all creatures and yet we are the ones destroying the environment. I think there are many things that can be done to prevent overpopulation, animal extinctions, pollution, resource depletion, and all the other problems in the environment; like recycling, using resource only when they are needed, finding alternatives for fuel made from oil. But I don’t think we will ever totally get rid of these problems. Eventually, I’m sure humans are going to go extinct. I just think we are speeding up the process with all these environmental problems we are causing. I tend to think everything happens for a reason so maybe this is happening for a reason but don’t understand why yet.
We as human beings take advantage of this world, or its resources and its land, we move other species away to make room for ours, even if that means killing some of them off! We pollute the air, dirty the water, and soil the land. We believe just because we have the ability to think and make desicions, that we are the ultimate species. I think that if this was the god of the old testament we would have all been dead by now. We ruined his creation!
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