The teaching that God created the earth and all things that are upon it gives to man a special task in the presence of suffering and pain. These were not found on the earth as God first made it. They came as a result of man’s fall. Man’s challenge then is to help reverse these consequences in every way he can. As God’s steward he must heal rather than hurt, build rather than destroy, love rather than hate all nature and its creatures. “How,” asked the Prophet Joseph Smith, “will the serpent ever lose its venom, while the servants of God possess the same disposition, and continue to make war upon it?” Nature is under man’s dominion but not for sport. The Father marks every sparrow’s fall, and man must pay for every act of cruelty.
The Lord’s Question: Thoughts on the Life of Response by Dennis Rasmussen. Brigham Young University Press. April 1985. Chapter Two, “Do Not I Fill Heaven and Earth?” p.18
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