Outside the Garden

A couple of weekends ago I spent a day on a silent retreat.  It’s the first time I’ve done something like this with a group.  It was an interesting experience sharing a meal with seven other women without anyone speaking.

We came into the garden to meet with God.

There was a cold wind blowing, grey clouds churned overhead.  I found myself a spot huddled under a bush, slightly sheltered from the wind.

The leaves were mostly gone from the trees, which stood starkly against the grey sky.  The lawns were neatly mown, the shrubbery trimmed and shaped.  The garden had been planned and cared for.

Human nature prefers gardens.  Generally, we’re more comfortable when life is planned and orderly.  We were designed this way by our creator.  The last of his creatures, once we were formed we were placed in a garden He had planted for us, and given instructions to tame and tend the earth.

Outside the garden is wilderness, and although we like to look at the wilderness, we’re not as comfortable living out there in chaos.

Yet the same God we meet in the garden is also present in the wilderness.  Before that first garden, when the earth was formless and empty, the Spirit of God hovered over the waters, filling the chaos that was the pre-creation emptiness.

The Spirit of God also fills the times of chaos in our lives, even when we find it hard to meet with him there.

The earth is the Lord’s, and everything in it,
the world, and all who live in it;
for he founded it on the seas
and established it on the waters.
(Psalm 24:1-2)

(P.S. This post is dedicated to Sonia H.  Get well soon, Sonia.)