After Creating An Earth, God Planted A Garden--And Assigned Us To Cultivate And Care For It

After having become overgrown with wire grass from
years of neglect, my hope is to restore this plot behind
our  unit in VMRC's Park Village to full productivity.

After the grand "hymn of creation" in the first chapter of the Bible, we are told that God planted a special garden for humans to till and care for. Thus humanity's first God-given responsibility was to be good gardeners and careful caretakers of God's creation.

In spite of growing up learning the carpenter trade, Jesus makes multiple references to plants and trees, to tares and soils and seeds, and describes himself as the true vine and his Father as a gardener. One of Jesus’s favorite places to pray was in a garden called Gethsemane; he was buried in a garden near where he was crucified; he was even mistaken for a gardener by Mary 

Magdalene after his resurrection. 

Here we are two months later, already blessed with  some
beans and tomatoes. Check here for another update later.

In the Revelation we are told that in the new heaven and the new earth there will life giving trees bearing abundant fruit every month of every season, and on each side of the water of life flowing in a fully restored and forever Eden, rather than in a gold-paved metropolis.

Gardening is in our divine DNA, and we are never closer to our creator than when we are tilling the soil, planting seeds, irrigating and caring for earth's life-giving vegetation, and harvesting and enjoying its abundance. 

The soil in which growth occurs is made up of dead and decaying vegetation and other kinds of former life, but is also teeming with microorganisms, worms and tiny insects that are continuously at work tilling and fertilizing the earth and drawing on its resources. 

When we plant seeds in this mixture of death and life a kind of resurrection miracle occurs. Seeds themselves experience a form of dying and new birth, sending down roots for nourishment and emerging as life-giving wonders that are then prepared to die--to give up their life--so that we and other creatures may live.

In similar ways, loving and caring for each other and for the earth is our first and most urgent responsibility. 

Here are stanzas 1 and 4 of hymn #788 in Voices Together, the words of Mary Louise Bringle:

The garden needs our tending now--

the water, soil and air.

The very rocks and stones cry out 

for stewardship and care.

Creation groans, awaiting still 

the consummation of God's will.

While people die in poverty, 

some lives are thick with waste.

The prophets warn us, "Simplify!" 

Their challenge must be faced.

Creation groans, awaiting still 

a church responsive to God's will.

Refrain: Earth shall be green and new, 

Eden restored, Terra viridissima. * 

* Latin for greenest earth, inspired by a phrase from Hildegard of Bingen's Viridissima Virga

Here's an updated photo showing what the good Lord and a great growing season can do on a plot of ground that had become overgrown with wire grass and which was suffering from years of neglect (7/29/22 photo):

Abundant green beans and tomatoes to enjoy--and share with some of our VMRC neighbors. We also had lots of sweet corn we grew in a neighbor's unused plot and were able to relish and share. Delicious!