We interrupt our regularly scheduled commentary to bring you a couple of event announcements…

If you are in the Twin Cities area this weekend, I hope you will join me for one or the other of two events:

Care of Creation 5th Anniversary Celebration:  It was in April 2005 that Care of Creation Inc. was founded as the first evangelical environmental missions organization.  Five years later we’re still here!  And according to one friend who moves international mission circles a lot, “Everywhere I go, people have heard of Care of Creation.”   Join us tomorrow: Friday, March 19, 7 pm at Bethlehem Baptist Church’s North Campus building (5151 Program Ave, Mounds View, MN 55112) for a dessert reception and to rejoice with us as we review the last five years and look forward to the next five and fifty!  We will also be blessing Craig and Tracy Sorley and their children as they prepare to return to Kenya in the next couple of weeks.   No RSVP necessary – just come and bring your friends!  But if you are a blog-reader or FB or Twitter friend be sure and introduce yourself – and if you can’t be with us for geographical reasons, maybe you can pray with us for a short time during that time slot – and if you do, use the comments to let us know.

“Why the Environment is Important to Christians”: I will be giving the message at The Gathering, an alternative worship experience at Wooddale Church this Sunday at 6 pm in the Great Room.  Would love to have you join me – and again, if you find your way there because of this post, please let me know!

And coming soon…

April 11, 10:30 am: Ambassador’s Class at Blackhawk Church in Madison WI.

April 16-17 (Friday evening & Saturday morning): The full Our Father’s World Seminar in Madison WI.  Register here. ($25 regular; $15 student)

If you live in the northeastern US, the title “weird weather” will not be a surprise.  Or if you lived in the cold south this past winter.  (See “Snow in 50 States – What’s going on?“).  Or if you lived in the UK, Europe, Australia…

This is a summary of current (ie. happening right now) weird weather around the world posted by Brad Johnson at Wonkroom blog yesterday:

NORTH AMERICA Weeks after some of the strongest snowstorms ever to hit the East Coast, another powerful winter storm drenches the Northeast, kills eight people, and knocks out power for hundreds of thousands. Record warmth in North Dakota and Minnesota threatens another year of catastrophic flooding.

SOUTH AMERICA Tropical Storm 90Q, also known as Anita, the “second known tropical cyclone to form in the cooler South Atlantic Ocean,” is circling off the Argentina coast. The first known South Atlantic tropical cyclone, Catarina, was in 2004. Read more »

“Old Literature” is an occasional feature that highlights long-forgotten books, articles, speeches or poems that still speak to us today.  As it happens, there’s some new material that also deserves our attention.  Today, Tending to Eden by Scott Sabin, Director of Plant with Purpose (formerly Floresta).

Scott Sabin and I met about 7 years ago at a conference in Kenya.  He tells about that conference in his new book,Tending to Eden that was just released two weeks ago:

Edith and I took several pastors to a conference on creation care in Kenya.  I was one of the presenters, and in the course of my presentation I showed a slide of the devasted forests around Mt Kilimanjaro National Park.  Pastor Lyamuya approached me later and, with an embarassed smile, explained how convicting it was to see the photo from his own community.  “God entrusted it to us to take care of, and we aren’t doing our job.” Read more »

Today, a guest post from “The Youngest” (my children began a number of years ago identifying themselves by their birth-order… no, I don’t know why!) who is a senior Environmental Ed major at University of Minnesota.  Who knew how amazing the life of an inch long caterpillar could be?  We’re about to find out…

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It is my pleasure to announce the newest addition to my household: Habakkuk, the caterpillar. Yes, indeed I did just say that a caterpillar has taken up residence in my house.
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Regular readers are aware of my habit of collecting interesting conversations – usually on airplanes – and using these to draw out observations and occasionally conclusions about the state of the creation care effort as it relates to ordinary people.

Keeping in mind that we’re dealing with anecdotes, not data, there are still useful things that can be learned from talking with ordinary people. This month’s candidates are a business college Dean and an automotive company executive, and I want to say at the start that I plunged in hoping to learn from them. As far as I was concerned, they were experts. Read more »

The Philippines recently experienced a major typhoon and massive flooding of the capital city, Manila.  Here’s a first hand report from Melba Padilla Maggay, who is the Director of the Institute for the Study of Asian and Church Culture (ISACC) the organization that will be hosting my visit to Manila at the beginning of November.  I’m posting this with her permission, and asking that you please both read it prayerfully and, particularly if you have connections to Filipinos, that you distribute it so others will understand what has happened.  The recovery will take a long time – keep these sisters and brothers in your prayers.

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