Community Garden Day // John 20:15

Happy Community Garden Day! It’s the time when tradition tells us it’s prudent to plant in our gardens for the summer. I love the idea of the community garden. I once served a church with a great property where the daily children’s program planted and maintained a community garden. It was a great project for them and a gift to the community. Thinking about this on the day after Easter, I’m struck by a reference we read in John 20:15 where Mary mistook Jesus for the gardener. Jesus asked Mary who she was looking for, before he called her name and she realized it was Him! That nugget that John gave us where Mary mistook Him for a gardener has captured my attention for many years! Could it be that Jesus was doing gardening things? Was He pulling weeds or planting seeds? Is this a gift from the Lord where we are to realize that Jesus’ Resurrection could now repair the damage caused by Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden? It seems to me there might just be some hope in what the Lord was doing just as soon as He walked out of the tomb. He wasted no time, and I think we are to look at life the same. So, on this Easter Monday and Community Garden Day, may we join the Lord in the work we all have to do to tend the soil and repair the damage done in the world by sin. Forgiveness. Reconciliation. Love. All of it helps to restore what was broken as we await Jesus’ triumphant return!