EDENIFICATION

 

GOD AND GARDENS

I love beautiful gardens. Although I appreciate walking through a temperate rain forest and admiring the natural flora, I especially appreciate a well-planted and maintained garden. And it seems that so does God. Throughout the Scriptures, garden language is used to describe God’s presence and blessing. This is powerfully seen in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. And even after mankind fell from innocence and was expelled from God’s garden paradise, Eden, God’s original “Creation Mandate” still summoned mankind to Edenify the earth. Ultimately, in the new heaven/earth God’s dwelling place with mankind is described as being in a garden (Rev. 22:1-5). In fact, it seems that God went to great lengths to ensure that the earth could indeed be Edenified. Because, after God had created the universe, and He focused on our extraordinary planet, He designed our planet to have the unique qualities making lush gardens possible:

* a finely-tuned gaseous atmosphere;
* a perfectly tuned gravitational rate (9m/sec);
* a biosphere that ensures symbiotic replenishing;
* a water to land ratio which distinguished saltwater from fresh-water;
* water in three states (including icy snow-capped mountains located strategically around our planet near the equator ensuring a continuous supply of melting-ice fresh water);
* tectonic plates which help to distribute nutrients ;
* microbial life;
* sea life;
* volcanic and earthquake activity distributing minerals into the food chain and precious metals nearer to earth’s surface;

He then reserved a special mountain-top field where He planted a garden. It was a life-giving garden with  many fruit trees, a stream of mountain fresh water flowing through it (that would eventually flow down the Edenic Mountain and become four rivers – Gen. 2:10).  

And the LORD God planted a garden in Eden, in the east,
and there He put the man whom He had formed.
Genesis 2:8

Into this divinely planted garden the Lord brought the man. This was a garden that God loved. He charged ’Adam — His image-bearer —  with the privilege of tending it, for it was a mystical garden. It had at least two supernatural trees and welcomed many supernatural heavenly beings, including the Lord Himself, as regular visitors. It seems that God was showing ’Adam that this is what He wanted him to do to the rest of the planet – to Edenify it.

¶ The LORD God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to work it and keep it.
Genesis 2:15

 

GOD CREATED MAN TO BE A GARDENER

Not only was the Lord a regular visitor to the garden He had planted (as intimated in Genesis 3:8), but even after mankind were expelled from Eden’s divine garden, gardens (and mountain-top gardens in particular) became associated with man meeting and walking with God. Even after Eden it seems that God loved to be associated with gardens and His blessing upon a land is frequently described in horticultural terms.

For the LORD comforts Zion;
He comforts all her waste places
and makes her wilderness like Eden,
her desert like the garden of the LORD;
joy and gladness will be found in her,
thanksgiving and the voice of song.
Isaiah 51:3

JESUS, MOUNTAINS & GARDENS

Perhaps this is no more apparent than in the life of the incarnated Christ. He often met with His Father in a garden at the top of the Mount of Olives called Gethsemane – and especially as He approached His cross (Luke 22:40-46).

¶ Then Jesus went with them to a place called Gethsemane, and He said to his disciples,
“Sit here, while I go over there and pray.”
Matthew 26:36

And it was not without significance that when the body of Christ was buried it was buried in a garden tomb.

Now in the place where He was crucified there was a garden,
and in the garden a new tomb in which no one had yet been laid.
John 19:41

 

BUT WILDERNESS

If gardens are symbolic of God’s presence and blessing, wilderness, barrenness, deserts are symbolic of the devil and his presence. 

¶ Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.
Matthew 4:1

But the goat on which the lot fell for Azazel (the devil) shall be presented alive before the LORD to make atonement over it, that it may be sent away into the wilderness to Azazel (the devil).
Leviticus 16:10

EDENIFICATION

But God’s original “Creation Mandate” for mankind was to take dominion over creation (Gen. 1:28-30). God introduced mankind to what this looked by bringing him into the garden He had planted on Mount Eden. It was a holy garden. In one sense Eden was a temple because a temple is where God dwells, and God and man can meet. This is actually an apt description of Eden. But if this is the case, then it might reveal that God not only wanted ’Adam to make the earth like Eden – a lush, fruitful, garden paradise – but also where people anywhere on earth could meet with God. Therefore, Edenifying, is not just about planting and maintaining (a) beautiful garden/s, it’s also about introducing people to God, so that they too can be reconciled to God and meet regularly with Him wherever they are. This is why I hope that our world increasingly experiences Edenification. And I hope that both aspects of this Edenification might be evident around our church grounds, our church’s 300 or so ambassadors, and especially from our pulpit for generations to come.

He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. To the one who conquers I will grant to eat of the tree of life, which is in the paradise of God.’
Revelation 2:7

 

Your pastor,

Andrew

Let me know what you think below in the comment section and feel free to share this someone who might benefit from this Pastor’s Desk.

BRUISED REEDS BEWILDERED

The prophets foretold of the Messiah being both powerful and yet gentle. He would vanquish his enemies, yet gather his people as a shepherd gathers lambs. He would punish rebellious nations with a rod of iron (Psalm 2:9) yet be attentive to the distressed and destitute (Psalm 22:5). He would treat the broken with dignity and respect, yet mete out justice to those responsible for their plight (Isa. 42:3). We are presented with a powerful portrait of the strength and compassion of the Messiah in the prophetic psalms and poems of the prophets while being told that despite this, He would be misunderstood, slandered, and maligned.

a bruised reed he will not break,
and a faintly burning wick he will not quench;
he will faithfully bring forth justice.
Isaiah 42:3

He was despised and rejected by men,
a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief;
and as one from whom men hide their faces
he was despised, and we esteemed him not.
Isaiah 53:3

Despite Christ showing unequalled compassion for people, unprecedented care for those close to Him (including His mother and brothers and sisters, and His disciples), His need to, at times, be alone was misunderstood by these people in particular. As unimaginable as it may seem, His mother and siblings at times felt neglected by Him –

¶ And His mother and His brothers came, and standing outside they sent to Him and called Him. And a crowd was sitting around Him, and they said to Him, “Your mother and your brothers are outside, seeking you.” And He answered them, “Who are my mother and my brothers?”
Mark 3:31-33

His disciples experienced times when they felt He didn’t care for them – 

But He was in the stern, asleep on the cushion. And they woke Him and said to Him, “Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?”
Mark 4:38

And one can only wonder how the portico full of ill people felt when He walked over some of them and past others of them to restore a man who had been lame for 38 years while seemingly ignoring their plight!

In these lay a multitude of invalids—blind, lame, and paralyzed. One man was there who had been an invalid for thirty-eight years. When Jesus saw him lying there and knew that he had already been there a long time, He said to him, “Do you want to be healed?”  The sick man answered Him, “Sir, I have no one to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up, and while I am going another steps down before me.”  Jesus said to him, “Get up, take up your bed, and walk. And at once the man was healed, and he took up his bed and walked. ¶ Now that day was the Sabbath.”
John 5:3-9

WHEN ALONE DOESN’T MEAN BY MYSELF

But Jesus often withdrew to the wilderness for prayer.
Luke 5:16

Jesus often withdrew from people. The One who loved people the most needed to have times of space and distance from them.  Pastors, the most visible representatives of Christ, in days gone by, were almost universally trained that the best day to take off in a week was Monday. Unless someone has ever experienced what it is like to be needed and wanted by so many people so intensely over the course of a day, it is difficult for them to imagine how wearing this can. I imagine that it is also difficult for people to understand that even the most caring people need quiet time alone to recharge and restore – physically, emotionally, and spiritually. Christ’s disciples certainly found it difficult. Mary and Martha found it difficult. Christ’s mother and siblings also had reason to struggle with it. Seasoned pastors turned professors of theology and ministry would instruct their protégés that an intense day of ministry, where preaching just one sermon is equivalent to the expenditure of emotional and even physical energy of labouring 8 hours (let alone preaching twicea Sunday), leading a training meeting, being available for counselling and comfort, showing hospitality over lunch in between services, takes a toll on a pastor. Monday, they would counsel, is the day you need to withdraw and restore. All of these regular Sunday activities for a pastor would only be a fraction of the drain that Christ must have felt nearly every day of His incarnate ministry. Little wonder then, that Immanuel needed to often withdraw from people to be of most value to people. And while it appeared He was alone we know that He was never by Himself. 

For those of us called to care and shepherd others where we are continually attempting to repair bruised reeds and not snuff out struggling candles, we run the certain risk of being misunderstood when these precious lambs confuse our absence for indifference or our silence for rejection. Christ ran that risk and was the subject of such misunderstanding. They challenge for Christian carers, especially those called to shepherd, is to recognise that our needed times of isolation and quiet are not times by ourself but with the Enthroned Father who has no need to slumber or sleep (Psalm 121:4) who gives restoration and strength to all those who wait on Him (Isa. 40:31).

Pastor Andrew