Sustainable

Sustainable, a word reclamation

The word reclamation here is “Sustainable.” Like many popular words, you can hear this word sprinkled around the meeting table, rolling off silk ties swung around starched shirts. The project needs to be sustainable. Is it sustainable? How do we make it sustainable?

Buzz words generate excitement, but users of them don’t always have a crisp understanding of what they mean. Take the word sustainable. It may sound wise to talk about sustainability. It may be convenient to label a new idea unsustainable if we don’t like it. But let’s think through this idea of sustainability and what it means.

The American Heritage Dictionary defines sustain as:

sus·tain
tr.v. sus·tained, sus·tain·ing, sus·tains
1. To keep in existence; maintain.
2. To supply with necessities or nourishment; provide for.
3. To support from below; keep from falling or sinking; prop.
4. To support the spirits, vitality, or resolution of; encourage.
5. To bear up under; withstand: can't sustain the blistering heat.
6. To experience or suffer: sustained a fatal injury.
7. To affirm the validity of: The judge has sustained the prosecutor's objection.
8. To prove or corroborate; confirm.
9. To keep up (a joke or assumed role, for example) competently. [Middle English sustenen, from Old French sustenir, from Latin sustinēre : sub-, from below; see sub- + tenēre, to hold; see ten- in Indo-European roots.] sus·tain'a·bil'i·ty n., sus·tain'a·ble adj., sus·tain'er n., sus·tain'ment n.

Most of the time when we use the word sustainable, we actually mean self-sustainable, our goal being to make sure there is a plan for X Project to continue on long term without the support or intervention of the creator. We use it to answer in the affirmative the question, “When I am gone, will this continue on?” But the word in itself means to maintain, nourish, and support something. Wanting something to be self-sustainable is wanting it to maintain, nourish and support itself. I wonder, how many things in our world can nourish themselves? We live in families and communities because we need each other. Sustaining something is part of our nature. So why is independence the measure of success? I wonder if it would be better to think in terms of healthy interdependence rather than independence.

But there is wisdom in planning for the future. The desire to have something go on beyond our direct influence is good and healthy when it is within Gods will and direction. But if we determine our success solely by how long something survives, it may be echoing our desire for legacy and the ability to live on despite our finiteness. These desires cannot be met in our work, but only through the infinite God who supplies our legacy through our obedience to Him. When we find these personal needs met, we are freed to see clearly enough to let go of projects that may have outlived their usefulness.

The common sentiment when we talk about sustainability is to ask, “Can man sustain whatever project we are talking about?” And “Can we train, organize, and manage the endeavor in order to turn over responsibility to someone who can sustain it after we are no longer working on it?” The reality is, nothing is sustainable outside of God. Man is finite and anything that begins and ends with man is temporal. It may be helpful to talk in terms of degrees of sustainability asking, “How finite is my project?” or “How long of an existence would be considered success in this endeavor?”

To look to sustainability as the ultimate measure of success for something is probably not wisdom. If we did, we may forgo efforts that God would have us try. To feed a hungry person is not sustainable, but it does show God’s love. Jesus encouraged us to help the poor, and to build our legacy in Heaven (Luke 12:33). Helping the widow and the fatherless does not restore their family, but it does bring our Lord glory when it’s in obedience to Him. We need to be careful not to put aside projects God would have us do because we don’t see them as sustainable.

Many times a buzzword pops up to answer a void that exists. Perhaps we didn’t think enough about sustainability in the past and now in the excitement of a new and helpful concept, we have swung to use it too heavily when measuring success and judging effectiveness. We need to find a balance between sustainable and self-sustainable, and evaluate the motives behind our value for sustainability by looking to God for His direction in all our endeavors.

Verses to Ponder
Isaiah 44:6 (New International Version)
6 "This is what the LORD says— Israel's King and Redeemer, the LORD Almighty: I am the first and I am the last; apart from me there is no God.

Psalm 55:22 (New International Version)
22 Cast your cares on the LORD and he will sustain you; he will never let the righteous fall.

Psalm 146:9 (New International Version)
9 The LORD watches over the alien and sustains the fatherless and the widow, but he frustrates the ways of the wicked.

John 12:8 (New International Version)
8You will always have the poor among you, but you will not always have me."

James 1:27 (New International Version)
27Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.

Nehemiah 13:14
14 Remember me for this, O my God, and do not blot out what I have so faithfully done for the house of my God and its services.

Psalm 103:14 (New International Version)
14 for he knows how we are formed, he remembers that we are dust.

Psalm 112:6 (New International Version)
6 Surely he will never be shaken; a righteous man will be remembered forever.

Ecclesiastes 1:11 (New International Version)
11 There is no remembrance of men of old, and even those who are yet to come will not be remembered by those who follow.

Mark 14:7 (New International Version)
7The poor you will always have with you, and you can help them any time you want. But you will not always have me.

Luke 12:33 (New International Version)
33Sell your possessions and give to the poor. Provide purses for yourselves that will not wear out, a treasure in heaven that will not be exhausted, where no thief comes near and no moth destroys.

Sources
Biblegateway.com
Dictionary.com
Etymonline.com

American Heritage Dictionary - Cite This Source - Share This
sus·tain (sə-stān') Pronunciation Key tr.v. sus·tained, sus·tain·ing, sus·tains
10. To keep in existence; maintain.
11. To supply with necessities or nourishment; provide for.
12. To support from below; keep from falling or sinking; prop.
13. To support the spirits, vitality, or resolution of; encourage.
14. To bear up under; withstand: can't sustain the blistering heat.
15. To experience or suffer: sustained a fatal injury.
16. To affirm the validity of: The judge has sustained the prosecutor's objection.
17. To prove or corroborate; confirm.
18. To keep up (a joke or assumed role, for example) competently. [Middle English sustenen, from Old French sustenir, from Latin sustinēre : sub-, from below; see sub- + tenēre, to hold; see ten- in Indo-European roots.] sus·tain'a·bil'i·ty n., sus·tain'a·ble adj., sus·tain'er n., sus·tain'ment n.
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The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth EditionCopyright © 2006 by Houghton Mifflin Company.Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.

Etymology, http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=sustain
sustain
c.1290, from O.Fr. sustenir "hold up, endure," from L. sustinere "hold up, support, endure," from sub "up from below" + tenere "to hold" (see tenet). Sustainable growth is recorded from 1965.