Once there was a garden where prayer flowed like streams of fresh water, where thanksgiving sprang up like grass and where worship rose like the morning sunshine. In that garden of Eden, the progenitors of human race Adam and Eve flourished. Here friendship with the loving Creator our heavenly Father was the most natural outflow, as they basked in loving conversation with God and one another and took care of the garden. That relationship was designed by our Creator God for us as well. In that intimate fellowship, all provisions were available for our fulfilment and joy; but we let it go.
We let go of God’s love when we declared our independence and self-sufficiency and tragically walked into the darkness of ignorance. Now we move through our lives without even realizing that the most essential part of who we are is missing. We have lost the way. Something is missing. We experience an aching emptiness at the center of ourselves we can’t quite express. As we try to pull together the many loose ends of our lives that should provide meaning, we so often come up empty.
We find ourselves longing for a deeper sense of connectedness with our Creator Living God; a deeper sense of union. How can we reclaim the sweet intimacy of the Garden of Eden, the place where the first man and woman walked with God in the cool of the day without shame and with total abandon? How can we move into that place again? That is the reason why Jesus came into this world. That is why we celebrate Palm Sunday, the triumphant entry of Jesus into Jerusalem, as the King of Peace.
We thank Jesus for calling us out of our weariness into His rest, out of our need into His abundance, out of our loneliness into His friendship. Let us walk with Jesus once again in the Garden.