Gethsemane

Monday 25th

Gethsemane

“Now the Lord God had planted a garden in the east, in Eden; and there he put the man he had formed. The Lord God made all kinds of trees grow out of the ground – trees that were pleasing to the eye and good for food. In the middle of the garden were the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. A river watering the garden flowed from Eden.”

Genesis 2:8-10a

‘When he had finished praying, Jesus left with his disciples and crossed the Kidron Valley. On the other side there was a garden, and he and his disciples went into it.’

John 18:1

There were two gardens. Two gardens in this long tread of time. And God walked in them both. So did frail humanity, humanity forged in the image of God forgetting themselves and forsaking God. This is the story of the first garden, but only part of the story of the second.

‘They went to a place called Gethsemane, and Jesus said to his disciples, “Sit here while I pray.” Mark 14:32

When God had said “Let us make humankind in our image” (Genesis 1:26) He was silently saying, “I choose you to exist as I exist… I choose for you a loving heart, a responsible character, a propensity for truth and a volitional existence”. He was saying “I love you. I choose you”.

And every day that Adam and Eve walked past the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, and chose to keep on walking, they were soundlessly speaking, silently saying to God, “I love you, I trust you, I choose you; I choose to trust your heart. I trust that your gifts are good, your words are true and the boundaries you set are good. I choose to stay. With you.”

Because love never was just a sentimental feeling. Deep love is always a choice. A choice that costs. A choice that chooses another over every other inclination, every feeling, every leaning away within. Love stays.

But they didn’t stay. They left Him. Alone. On that aching day in the garden long ago, when the first humans reached for the fruit of the tree that mixes good and evil together, they weren’t just reaching, they were speaking, they were silently saying… “God is a liar, God’s heart can’t be trusted, God isn’t good”. They were saying… “my will not yours be done on this earth beneath our feet”, they were saying “I choose… not you” to God, “I choose the absence of you, I choose the loss of you, I choose my own way and my own will and mine, mine, mine. I choose not to love you anymore. I choose to leave.”

The first human beings chose their will over God’s, their way over God’s way, the mixed presence of good and evil over the loving presence of a good God. And in dethroning God from their hearts every form of darkness rushed into the void, darkness leading to every form of sin, every form of death.

The seeds of all our destruction took root there in the first garden, when humanity said “not your will but mine be done” and led through swirling millennia of violence, sadness, sin and death to here, the second garden. Here where the new Adam, the son of David, the Son of Man kneels and faces the very same choice once more, the choice we fail in every moment with every breath to make: the choice to resist, the choice to obey, the choice to love, the choice to choose God.

The choice to stay. With Him…

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