Evangelical ethics of caring for creation rests on the foundations of several key biblical teachings:

• Honoring God as Creator by respecting His handiwork;
• Obeying God’s command to humanity’s first parents to care for the earth and its creatures;
• Following God’s call to love our neighbors, especially those who are poor and less powerful;
• Furthering Christ’s work of reconciling all things to God.

Statements by evangelical leaders and writings by evangelical scholars have drawn out the ethical implications of these and other teachings for a biblically-based ethic of stewardship.

Biblical Foundations
God is the Creator

The cosmos, in all its beauty, wildness, and life-giving bounty, is the work of our personal and loving Creator. Our creating God is prior to and other than creation, yet intimately involved with it, upholding each thing in its freedom, and all things in relationships of intricate complexity.

God is transcendent, while lovingly sustaining each creature; and immanent, while wholly other than creation and not to be confused with it. God the Creator is relational in very nature, revealed as three persons in One. Likewise, the creation which God intended is a symphony of individual creatures in harmonious relationship. The Creator's concern is for all creatures.

Creation is Good

God declares all creation "good" (Gen. 1:31); promises care in a covenant with all creatures (Gen. 9:9-17); delights in creatures which have no human apparent usefulness (Job 39-41); and wills, in Christ, "to reconcile all things to himself" (Col.1:20). (An Evangelical Declaration on the Care of Creation.)

It is not quite right to say that human beings were the climax of God’s creation in Genesis 1-2. The real zenith comes with God’s own Sabbath rest as God entered into the enjoyment of God’s “very good” creation. It is important to note that the creation is not solely for human benefit. The Old Testament gives it value in relation to God directly, to glorify and to bring delight to God. Creation is good and beautiful independent of our presence within it and our ability to observe it. . . . [The] goodness of creation is not mererly a human reflective response to a pleasant view on a sunny day, but the seal of divine approval on the whole universe. (Christopher Wright, “Creation — Distinct & Dependent” in Let the Earth Be Glad: An Evangelical Kit for Caring for Creation, Evangelical Environmental Network.)