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Morning Meditation
September 8, 2025
Scripture: Genesis 1:9-13, 20-23
And God said, “Let the water under the sky be gathered to one place, and let dry ground appear.” And it was so. God called the dry ground “land,” and the gathered waters he called “seas.” And God saw that it was good.
Then God said, “Let the land produce vegetation: seed-bearing plants and trees on the land that bear fruit with seed in it, according to their various kinds.” And it was so. The land produced vegetation: plants bearing seed according to their kinds and trees bearing fruit with seed in it according to their kinds. And God saw that it was good. And there was evening, and there was morning—the third day….
And God said, “Let the water teem with living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth across the vault of the sky.” So God created the great creatures of the sea and every living thing with which the water teems and that moves about in it, according to their kinds, and every winged bird according to its kind. And God saw that it was good. God blessed them and said, “Be fruitful and increase in number and fill the water in the seas, and let the birds increase on the earth.” And there was evening, and there was morning—the fifth day.
Meditation by Glenn Beamer
With several millennia of accumulated knowledge about Earth’s origins and evolution, many people perceive the above Genesis passages as quaint, outdated, or romantic. I don’t think God intended us to read these passages as a replication of him sitting at some celestial workbench methodically creating oceans and mountains, and then just two days later adding fish and foul to the mix as he perfected our planet.
Whatever its limits as a historiography, Genesis does a remarkably reliable job of reflecting the sequence of Earth’s evolution. The passage provides an impressive scope of the time and interactions that transpired over 4.5 billion years to give us the world we live in. Importantly, Genesis author did not have God’s creation start with us. Genesis is God’s first commendation to respect the earth and to understand our roles as stewards of God’s creation.
When I was in high school, we had a biology teacher, Mr. Kunkle who created the first environmental science course in Bethlehem, took his classes to Hawk Mountain during the seasonal migrations, and restored a natural ecosystem on three unused acres that lay behind the school. What really set Mr. Kunkle apart was that he was from Palmerton, 30 miles north of Bethlehem, and he was committed to Palmerton.
Until the 1980s, Palmerton’s largest employer & tenant was New Jersey Zinc. The zinc mine and smelting plant dominated the town and could be seen traveling on Route 248. What made Palmerton distinctive was that its economic sustenance had the negative side effect of spewing red dust in the air, on cars, houses, and just about any surface. Analysis confirmed at least four other major metal contaminants in Palmerton’s air.
The zinc plant closed in 1981, and the community was left economically adrift and environmentally scarred with 2000 acres of decaying buildings and contaminated land, and a heavily polluted 2.5-mile-long zone of mountainsides, creeks, and rivers that no longer supported natural life. Along with a group of residents, Mr. Kunkle created a vision to reclaim the land and to restore it such that it could reflect conscientious stewardship and transform itself to be environmentally and economically sustainable.
With Mr. Kunkle’s leadership, the group spent a decade acquiring more than 1000 acres of land, having the federal government designate the many of those acres a Superfund site, and patiently restoring the natural ecosystems. Forty years after he began this mission, Mr. Kunkle is the Executive Director Emeritus of the Lehigh Nature Gap. The gap provides educational programs for children and adults, summer camps, and a host of other community programs, least surprising among them – hawk watches. The center has mitigated environmental damage, restored habitat, and built hiking and bike trails.
When I was in school, my family regularly canoed at Beltsville, north of Palmerton, and I remember feeling sad that folks lived in what I then saw as a cruddy place. When the lads and I drive through Palmerton today on our way to Blue Mountain or Jim Thorpe, I’m proud that I knew and learned from Mr. Kunkle – he has genuinely been God’s steward in Carbon County. I tell Charlie and Conor about him and his work.
The contrast between the billions of years of evolution depicted in 30 verses of Genesis and the forty years of Palmerton’s natural resurrection is striking. But the work of the Lehigh Gap Nature Center is but on of millions of efforts to steward God’s creation no matter the challenges.
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