And God saw everything that He had made and, behold, it was very good. And the evening and the morning were the sixth day. (Genesis 1:31)
If we are to accomplish God’s purposes, we must be aware of them. Nowadays, a lot of Christians simply associate stewardship with financial contributions to the Church, NGO and business. Even those who regard stewardship as making prudent use of one’s resources, like time, skill, and money, are still lacking in the fundamentals. The concept of “whole-life stewardship” that the Scriptures teach us has been forgotten. We can only identify our true purpose and answer the biblical challenge to bring about thriving in whatever we do, particularly our job, by adopting a more comprehensive biblical view of stewardship.
Life Stewardship
God owns everything according to the basic tenets of biblical stewardship as we are frequently informed. All we are doing on His behalf is serving as managers or administrators. While this is undoubtedly the case, it nonetheless restricts the biblical understanding of stewardship and its potential to promote successful development.
The definition of stewardship is the administration of another party’s resources to further the goals of the owner. The final sentence, “to further or satisfy the owner’s desired outcomes,” should be noted. To accomplish God’s purposes, we must be aware of them. We need to return to the Garden of Eden to understand what those goals are.
From The Beginning
The creation account is split into two parts by Moses in the opening chapter of Genesis. God formed the world and the skies in the beginning as we can see at the starting point of creation. The abyss was covered in darkness, the waters were surrounded by the Spirit of God, and the land was void and unformed (Genesis 1:1–2).
The Scripture says; “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters” (Genesis 1:1-2).
God creates and fills what He has made during the second phase, which spans the six days of creation. God creates the earth and the heavens on days one through three. He then populates the earth and the heavens on days four through six. Finally, on day seven, God takes a break from creating the world. In the book of Genesis, we learn that at the end of the sixth day of God’s work of creation, He saw all that He had made, and it was very good. God examines His workmanship at the end of each of the first five days and declares it to be good.
It is excellent that God gloriously summoned this world into existence. It functions well both as a whole, as an integrated system, and as each of its component elements. In fact, the scripture tells us that God thought it was quite wonderful in this integrated cosmic sense. The earliest indication of God’s original plan for creation may be found here. God made the world in order to be exalted by it. For this reason, God calls it “very good”. God created everything, including man, the masterpiece of creation, for His glory, just as a brilliant picture reflects the glory of the master artist.
Does this indicate that God created us and the rest of creation so that He might become more glorious in Himself? No. Rather, God created the world and everything in it to reveal His glory, so that creation would recognise and adore Him (Psalm 8).
According to Psalm 8:1, man’s primary purpose is to glorify God and enjoy Him eternally. But to really enjoy is to exalt or glorify Him. God is urging us to appreciate Him by inviting us to glorify (exalt) Him.
Conclusion
We must fulfill the basic purpose of the owner, which is to exalt Him, in order to effectively manage everything that God has given us. We do this, among other things, by learning to appreciate God’s creation for what it is. That same goodness is best expressed by the Old Testament notion of shalom, which is essential to comprehending whole-life stewardship. Our God made this world alongside all that exists in it to reveal His splendor so that creation would acknowledge and glorify Him.
The Psalms declare, O’ LORD, our Lord, how excellent is your name in all the earth! Who have set your glory above the heavens! (Psalm 8:1)