Last week I began a series of sermons looking at various aspects of God and work. We spoke of God’s work as a creator - and especially focused on the second account of creation in Genesis where God is described as taking the ground and fashioning humankind and the animals out of it.

In that same passage there is another image of God at work - listen for it:

Now I know that amongst the congregation in this church there are many who are keen gardeners. I know there are some who think that spending five hours straight out in the garden is absolute heaven. I know that there are a team who turn up faithfully every Friday to work on the gardens around this church. I know many of you spend much time, energy, thought and money on keeping your gardens looking lovely. I know that our family had two weeks holiday at the beginning of this year, in the middle of the summer drought, and the person who offered to care for our garden - I won’t name him but he lives in our suburb - had worked a miracle in those two weeks. We thought we’d come back to the wrong house with its lovely green lawn and neat edges. And those of you who know me know that I am not a gardener. I barely even know where we keep compost in our garden, let alone what one does with it. But some of you know also that I do love the end result of gardening - especially the beauty, freshness, colour, and scent of flowers. I also love the fact that people who have gardens are able to grow food in them. When we lived at the farm for a couple of years we inherited some fruit trees, and we grew some vegetables since we had plenty of room and only cows for neighbours who didn’t notice how infrequently we weeded the vege patch! It was just lovely to be able to pick fruit and vegetables for that night’s dinner straight out of the garden. And to be able to preserve a year’s supply of apples or nectarines and make enough bottles of jams and relishes to give away the spares to our city friends and family.

So I may not have the greenest of thumbs myself but I understand the importance of the work of gardening. And I might get interested in it one day. I can begin to understand when people say to me how much they enjoy feeling soil on their hands, how satisfying it is to watch the garden that they’ve planned and worked at begin to bloom, how being in touch with creation is for them a means of connecting with the creator. And when I need time on my own, or time to reflect, or time to pray, you would probably find me in a garden.

When David and I first arrived in Switzerland, we were quite intrigued at seeing people at work in tiny fenced plots of land grouped together on the side of the road. It didn’t take us long to realise that these were the substitute gardens for those who lived in apartments - they might not have had any land to use around their home but they could hire these allotments and grow their vegetables and flowers after all. There was usually a lttle shed there, and often on weekends we’d see whole families spending the day there, using the shed to make cups of tea as well as for storing the hoes and trowels. So gardens are not just an optional extra - people seem to need gardens for their own well-being.

Isn’t it interesting, then, that the garden God planted was both beautiful and useful. It was pleasant to the sight as well as good for food. It’s also interesting to see that in this story the garden was planted after the human was created. The intention was to make a home for Adam to live in, and a means for his sustenance.

For some people life is very transient. Why bother planting a garden when you might not be in the place long enough to see it come to fruition? But paradoxically, that might be the very reason that it is so important for so many. It is after all a way of “putting down roots.” I read an article in one of the weekend newspaper magazines where the writer talked about planting asparagus. For her it is a sign of stability and hope, because an asparagus takes at least two, sometimes three years to mature but will keep bearing fruit for over twenty years. She ended the article like this: "I plan to be here to harvest this crop in three years but who knows what might happen between now and then. These days, few people have roots deep enough to give them assurances about who they will be and what they will be doing from year to year" (Margaret Simons, Weekend Australian, 4-5 July).

But God the gardener isn’t transient. God is interested in place. In the specific. In making a home for his people. So he planted a garden for Adam. And God was present in that garden - later we are told that Adam and Eve “heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden at the time of the evening breeze.”

God came to another homeless people and led them to a place of their own - a land, he told them, which was “a good land, a land with flowing streams, with streams and underground waters welling up in valleys and hills, a land of wheat and barley, of vines and fig trees and pomegranates, a land of olive trees and honey, a land where you may eat bread without scarcity, where you will lack nothing.” (Deut 8:7-9) And when that same people were in exile hundreds of years later, God encouraged them through the prophet Jeremiah to make a place for themselves there - "Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, to all the exiles whom I have sent into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon: Build houses and live in them; plant gardens and eat what they produce.”

God is interested in place but God is also interested in the work of gardening. The descriptions of God the gardener are quite specific: in Genesis God plants the garden and makes trees grow. In the earlier creation account we are told God made “plants yielding seed of every kind, and trees of every kind bearing fruit with the seed in it.” (Gen 1:12) This is a gardener who is interested in life and not profit. Compare God’s work here with technology that has enabled seed companies to produce plants which do not seed. Human beings are in danger of becoming dependent on these companies rather than the plants themselves for our survival. But in Genesis we see a God who created life which was guaranteed to survive and reproduce and continue as a source of nourishment for the rest of creation.

The passage in Ezekiel that was read earlier is an image of God restoring Israel after the exile. And what a marvellous image! God the gardener takes a tender and vulnerable shoot from the top of a mighty ceder, plants it and protects it until it grows into a great and noble tree which is able to provide shelter and sustenance for other creatures. The might of this tree will be a witness to the skill of the gardener. Ezekiel was prophesying the restoration of the Israelite nation, but we reading this with the eyes of a Christian faith might well see in it a prophecy of the tender shoot coming forth from the family tree of Israel - a foretelling of the vulnerability of a baby who grew to be the greatest man who ever lived.

Paul also describes God’s work in gardening terms. In Romans 11 he speaks of the Gentile Christians as “wild olive shoots” grafted on to the olive tree which was Israel. Some commentators have suggested that Paul himself didn’t know what he was talking about - the usual procedure would be to graft cultivated shoots onto the original stock to ensure a healthy growth. But isn’t this the very point Paul is making? It was God’s work, and God’s creative power at work, that enabled such a miracle.

God is at work as a gardener. But we were given that responsibility too. Adam was told to till and keep the garden and to eat of the fruit of the trees. There is a mutual dependency between the human and the garden. The garden provides for us, but it is our responsibility to look after it. In fact the word translated as “to till” is the same word meaning “to serve”. We serve the earth when we care for it. And at the same time we serve the creator who planted the garden in the first place.

I spoke with the children about St Francis of Assisi earlier. He is remembered most particularly for his attitude of respect for the natural world. In his famous canticle he personifies the aspects of nature: brother sun, sister moon, brother fire, sister water, and mother earth. The prevailing attitudes of his time viewed the earth as merely for the use of humanity. But Francis saw the created world as having an integrity of its own, as well as reflecting the glory of its maker. We are told that he insisted sweet smelling flowers be grown in grounds of the monastery and brought inside as a constant reminder of the sweetness of the Lord. His respect for plants and animals was an extension of his love and worship of God who created all things.

And indeed this is how it was intended for Adam. But as we read on through Genesis and see that Adam was expelled from the garden, we realise that human beings did not fulfil their responsibilities well. The story of the Fall invites us to examine what our relationship is with God, with our world, and with each other.

We find the new Adam working in the garden too. In the garden of Gethsemene, as his life’s work comes to a climax, we see Jesus drawing on the serenity of his surroundings as he wrestles with God’s will for his life. And then in another garden, not far from Golgotha itself, we encounter him again.

Because it was to this garden early on the Sunday morning that Mary Magdalene came. And someone who she supposes to be the gardener asks “Why are you weeping? Whom are you looking for?” Even in her inability to recognise Jesus her answer suggests that she thinks this person must be able to help her in her grief. She doesn’t even need to name the one she is looking for. “Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you’ve laid him.” And then the stranger who she supposes to be the gardener says her name: “Mary.”

Had she not recognised him because she was too overcome with grief to pay attention? Were tears closing her eyes? Or had she failed to recognise all along who he really was? After all, the sort of Lord and teacher that Jesus was wasn’t the sort of Lord the Jews were expecting. One who welcomed sinners. One who touched lepers and saw worth in demoniacs. One who ate with tax collectors. One who equated children with God’s kingdom. One who passively accepted arrest and torture and death, even though everyone knew he had done nothing wrong. One who acted like a servant. One who could be mistaken for a common worker. A groundsman in a graveyard. A gardener.

And when her eyes were opened, when she saw that this one who she had supposed to be the gardener was indeed her Lord, it became her task to tell. “Go to my brothers and tell them”. Tell not only that he is risen, but that his life of service has been affirmed by God. Tell them that humankind’s original responsibility: to serve God, the earth, and each other, tell them that this is still their task. But tell them that the Lord will be with them.

When we come to this Easter text again and consider it together with the story of the garden in Genesis, we can no longer think of it as a story of mistaken identity. Mary through her tear blurred vision caught a glimpse of the original gardener. The one who planted a pleasant garden, created a place for humankind to be at home, and walked in the beautiful evening breeze. The one whose justice meant expulsion from the garden, but whose compassion made way for a return to that created state.

God's work of creation and God's work of salvation take place in a garden. God wants us to find our place, to grow, to be nourished, and to find our way back to the original garden. The work of the gardener is to bring healthy life. And God is calling each of us by name to tell this good news. Let us be faithful to that call.