“When Jesus had spoken these words, He went out with His disciples over the Brook Kidron, where there was a garden, which He and His disciples entered.“—John 18:1
Human history began in a garden, a place rich and full of life and all that God intended for us.
Then Adam and Eve committed the first sin. The first Adam disobeyed God and was banished from the garden, bringing the curse of death upon humanity. The “last Adam,” Jesus (1 Corinthians 15:45), obeyed by entering a garden and surrendering to God’s will, restoring life to humanity. That garden is on the Mt. of Olives, where Jesus often went to pray, rest, and meditate (Luke 22:39).
Our souls long to return to the Garden where God created us. He gave us a love for His creation and a desire to be restored by its beauty.
The song complains, they paved paradise and put up a parking lot,1 and we respond with a token of greenery. Anything growing and alive that helps meet a deep need to live among the plants, vines, flowers, and seeds that push their way through the earth in the cycle of rebirth.
We need the whisper of wind in the trees and the softness of grass underfoot. Even in the most arid locations, we water and work to plant gardens of all sizes and forms, from parks in the heart of a city to window boxes perched on skyscrapers, to postage stamp gardens, vegetable patches, and suburban lawns.
We toil to regain paradise. Even if we don’t plant, tendrils of green will force their way through the cement cracks, determined to remind us.
The actual meaning of paradise is “enclosed garden,” and we desperately want to somehow, in some way to return to the garden.
Jesus gave His life so that we can once again walk in the cool of the evening with our Creator, as Adam and Eve once did. So we can return to the garden, at peace, and be restored to fellowship with our Creator, who loves us.
1.Joni Mitchell, Big Yellow Taxi, © Siquomb Publishing Company, 1970
Bible Gateway
Bible Gateway passage: Zephaniah 1:7 – New King James Version
Be silent in the presence of the Lord God; For the day of the Lord is at hand, For the Lord has prepared a sacrifice; He has invited His guests.
