It's been a good while since I last deposited a word or two on this page. Since my last post I have come to learn more about how the Lord is calling us to serve Him. 

We moved back to Pilot Mountain this past February following a period of much struggle and searching for direction in my calling and career track. It was in Northern NJ that I found solar energy and fell in love with the idea of clean energy. The thought that my four boys could live in a world where they are not "called" up (drafted) to fight in wars dictated by our nation's energy policy motivated me to get out and tell the story of clean energy to bunches and bunches of people.

In an effort to drain out as much of the polarizing political debate on climate change, and with a determination to wedge in a biblical perspective, I attempt to share some thoughts on how I and we should prepare our hearts and minds on this critical issue.

I care not whether the promoters of a worldwide carbon tax are searching for a yet another grab of control of the world's population, or if the data used to support such a wrest for control is accurate. The current state of the polar ice caps are not my immediate concern.

At the heart of this debate is what I will term "a godly environmental worldview". The industrial revolution has brought us more people, more production of goods made from fossil fuels, and a whole lot more new toxins pumped into the air, and more diesel exhaust pumped into our oceans by large cargo ships, as well as countless numbers of holes in the earth's crust.

Before we step into the argument about whether or not hydro-fracking is an environmentally safe method to extract shale gas, we have to ask the question, "is there a better way to harvest the power and energy to spin a motor"? Can we move ourselves and our stuff around the globe at the current pace, can we honestly increase capacity required for the betterment of mankind by continuing the same intense level of drilling for oil and natural gas?

Dan 12:4 “But you, Daniel, shut up the words, and seal the book until the time of the end; many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall increase.”

The words in this verse are like a capstone on world events leading up to the ultimate battle between Christ and Satan. Running "to and fro" is what makes our world go around. Technology has a fundamental purpose, and this purpose has at its core a focus to increase movement of information and people plus incredible access to information. So modern technology is about running to and fro, if not physically, than through communication lines (now a cloud) connected to our handheld devices or a computer.


Adding further background from the angle of my biased perspective is the fact I was raised in the rolling hills of southeastern PA on a dairy farm. It was here that I developed a love for the land. I naturally came to see firsthand how the Lord has mysteriously made the soil, water, and the sun produce food and thus has made a beautiful way for us to sustain our life on this planet, even though part of the curse of man's sin was the curse of making that food by the sweat of our brow.

My exposure to the farm and produce has permanently imbued my perspective on how I look at the environment. It was hard to watch my dad sell off all his cattle and equipment in 1986. Little did I know that my father's struggle to make it in farming would make a deep sub conscience impression on me. That impression is simply expressed as my natural sense that everything in life is temporary, nothing lasts forever. The winners and the losers change places throughout history. But in the end we could all be losers if we chase the wrong things with the wrong motives.

So how should we look at or address the idea of renewable energy and clean energy?

To start off, I am involved in the clean energy business, this by choice, but also a byproduct of a time of great soul searching from 2009-2011 to take care of my family. Through this experience I intensely sought the Lord to inquire how I could take care of my family in a field that would help us to do the things that would best support ourselves and His Kingdom.

Before I ever took up a book on clean energy or a class to learn about this technology I had good work experience earlier in my life where I designed clean air solutions for the fire service. My task was to remove all the diesel exhaust in the firehouse from the time that the engine started to the point where it left the station, also upon return the fire engine continued to emit diesel exhaust as it backed into its parked position inside the firehouse. The sense of satisfaction I received after I installed one of our clean air systems was very gratifying. When I drove away in my red Ford F350 I knew in my heart I had done good for the men and women living inside the walls of that firehouse.

After I sold and eventually saw the value of an installed solar system, I felt the same sense of satisfaction. As a matter of reflection, if any of you are out there doing work that does not satisfy you I would challenge you to consider looking into work that fits your God-given purpose.

From this vantage point, climate change is not the issue we are called to deal with simply because most climate change scientists come at the argument from an evolutionary point of view. Stating tacitly that we are the sole protectors of our planet and the our solar system. A completely preposterous idea from the standpoint of our basic puniness as compared to all the forces that can so easily damage our planet and our way of life.

My obvious assumption is that God the Creator made all things including you and me, and with His last and most important creative act he made us to know the earth and commissioned us to be good stewards of the earth. In an awesome and overwhelming Divine edict we were and are declared to be His vice regents of our planet.

You have made him to have dominion over the works of Your hands; You have put all things under his feet, Ps 8:6

So here we see clearly from this text that we have been granted the right to do with the earth as we deem right. We harvested God's trees to make heat, light, build our homes, make furniture, and for cooking. So in order to use a tree for these helpful things we have to first cut the tree down to the ground thus we expose God's little creatures to harm. Considering the fact that the birds and the insects that called the tree home have to now find another place to live. Sad, but somehow God takes cares of these concerns for them and he has for us.

Consider the ravens, for they neither sow nor reap, which have neither storehouse nor barn; and God feeds them. Of how much more value are you than the birds? Lk. 12:24 

But still we play an important role in insuring that the ecosystem is healthy, and that forest we decided was a good place to harvest some wood. Because this very forest will continue to yield the renewable wood products we delight to use for countless applications that makes our daily life more enjoyable and easy. But we should and we must think about the next generation of trees that forest will or will not produce based on how we manage the piece of God's land. .

This point and example of how mankind has used the earth for the pursuit of his own happiness carries me forward to the point we have to face today as it pertains to our energy policy. Clean air and clean water would quite naturally be a positive responsibility as "vice regents", since all of mankind to consider even if to satisfy our natural inclination for legitimate self preservation. A good neighbor cares not only about the welfare of the forest as a steward but he also cares about the next generation of humans and animals and birds that will occupy any piece of His land, so all who may need to access the same resources in the pursuit of being fruitful and multiplying and to be a keeper of the land He gave us to tend. 

As stewards of God's earth we must think in terms of managing the works of His hands, technically we don't own any piece of land or that grows on that piece of land, God does. So caring for the fish who swim in our creeks and rivers, the birds who fly over our heads, and the crops that grow on our little piece of God's earth are clearly our responsibility to maintain.

To think that when we stand before the Lord one day in judgment and give an account of what we did with His earth and thought should grip our conscience. To know in our hearts that all of us will have to deal with the reality that we will have to confess how we managed His earth and how we treated His earth. This idea might come upon you as a harsh and stark reality for those christians who don't carefully consider how we manage the earth's resources today.

In the parable of the talents, Our Lord reveals that we are given things by Him out of His Goodness and we are responsible to make positive use of that which He has put under our control. The earth has been given to us as a gift, our title as "vice-regent" of the earth realm is directly connected to our very existence as human beings, so the obvious result of these realities would con-notate that we are responsible for all the decisions we make as a people regarding our natural resources.

The sad reality is that the folks who care about wildlife and how we manage the earth's resources most of the time do not have a belief that the Bible is God's Word to mankind, and yet they care about the earth more than many of us.  

Capitalism without a referee (government regulations) will run a muck, the creation has and will continue to be tortured by our sinful desire to have more and more, to control markets etc, We need God Himself to intervene to save us from ourselves. God seems to raise up a group that saves the whales and the bald eagle and every other endangered species. But my hope is that God's people will be on the front-lines preserving His earth in the days to come.  

Some might argue that the earth will burn up at some point in the future, but should that be our main concern today? Just as in taking care of the poor, widows, and orphans, we have a stewardship to care for those who have no helper. The earth cries out for good men to do good things to help keep things working in their proper order.

In a final word on this topic, much more could be said, looking specifically at the growth of the hydro-fracking industry and when we arm ourselves with the facts on the impact of hydro-fracking on the local ecology, we have to consider all the factors involved with the entire process from start to finish. While the natural gas industry creates jobs and wealth it most assuredly impacts the surface and the depths of the earth. 

Industry experts who were on the forefront of developing this technology know intuitively, and they know through personal experience hat the hydro-fracking process does have a negative impact on the ecological systems where the drilling takes place.

I encourage all those who have concerns about the point made here to go to this link, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nWf1nhWrrTE, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FpMal8_jawk  

In the first video the speaker who happens to be an expert on hydro-fracking calls all church going people to consider the real impact of their decisions to sell off the mineral rights of their land on their neighbor's property. A very sobering and good question to consider.

May the Lord continue to guide us to make fully informed decisions about the impact of our current energy policy as it relates to what the Bible informs us is clearly our responsibility to perform as His vice-regents of planet earth.

The Bible has something to say about all of life, especially things pertaining to life and godliness, the Bible has much to reveal to us about our responsibility to His earth and to our neighbors. Establishing the reality that the Word is God main goal is to preserve our life here and now and also assists us in enjoying the pleasure of maintaining a godly position on climate change.