Graves Into Gardens
Grim. Cold. Haunting. Dark. Eerie. Ominous. On the surface, there’s something unsettling about graveyards, especially at night time. Stone markers memorialize the names of those once living while the soil beneath cradles the bodies of the dead. Like a funeral procession of cars passing through busy streets, graves command the attention of passersby—reminders of lives lost and the inevitability of death. Yes, ON THE SURFACE, graves are somber sites… spaces where the living go to remember and mourn. But BENEATH THE SURFACE, there is deeper Mystery and Meaning at work.
After Jesus’ death on the cross, Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus took his body and prepared it for burial. They embalmed Jesus’ body with a mixture of myrrh and aloes, wrapped him in linen, and laid him in a tomb just outside of town. The large stone that covered the entrance to the tomb sealed the deal, making the Messiah’s death feel final. Grim. Cold. Haunting. Dark. Eerie. Ominous. Creation without Christ? Jesus wasn’t the only one to die that day; with him died the hopes of a people in need of a Savior. In the few days following Jesus’ crucifixion, the cross and grave were little more than painful reminders of death’s sting. But, an easy-to-miss detail in the Gospel According to John gives us reason to hope again…
“There was a garden at the place where Jesus was crucified” (John 19:41). Of course there was! Think about the poetic significance of a garden being the setting of Jesus’ crucifixion. Something gardens appreciate that we often forget is the seasonality of created things. After a season of life and growth, plants die and return to the soil. It’s then common for gardens to lie fallow for a season. But this period of dormancy is necessary to prepare the soil to be fertile so it can yield good fruit again. Agrarian theologian and lifelong gardener Wendell Berry puts it this way:
The most exemplary nature is that of the topsoil. It is very Christ-like in its passivity and beneficence, and in the penetrating energy that issues out of its peaceableness. It increases by experience, by the passage of seasons over it, growth rising out of it and returning to it, not by ambition or aggressiveness. It is enriched by all things that die and enter into it. It keeps the past, not as history or as memory, but as richness, new possibility. Its fertility is always building up out of death into promise. Death is the bridge or the tunnel by which its past enters its future. (“A Native Hill” in The Long-Legged House, 1969, 204)
Even as Jesus was breathing his final breaths, the creation around him was undermining the power of death. It turns out the Lord of Life is also the Sovereign of Soil, God of both graves and gardens.
Remember back to Ash Wednesday when we received the mark of the cross in dust on our bodies with the words, “From soil you have come and to soil you will return.” As final as death might seem, soil isn’t merely the resting place of the dead; it is the breeding grounds for new life and the place where creation awaits resurrection. Starting with Christ, God is in the business of bringing dead things back to life—of turning barrenness into flourishing—and soil is the site of God’s restoration work.
One of our favorite Easter traditions is the Flowering of the Cross. For centuries, churches around the world have participated in the Christian folk ceremony, turning a barren cross into a beautifully adorned symbol of resurrected life. Easter morning, worshippers come to church with flowers in hand, affixing them to the cross to represent the transition from Good Friday to Easter, from sorrow over Christ’s death to joyful celebration of his resurrection into new life. Covered with fresh, living flowers, the cross serves not only as an emblem of Jesus’ resurrection, but also of the ongoing beauty of the garden God is planting and tending all around us. It’s only by the power and blood of Jesus Christ that something as haunting as the cross can be turned into a symbol of grace and life. The flowering of the cross enacts the truth that, through Christ, graves are turning into gardens.
Flower the Cross
This Easter we invite you to be part of the Flowering of the Cross. As you prepare for Easter worship, purchase or pick fresh flowers and greenery from your garden or yard and bring them to church. When you arrive for either of our services, place your flowers on the cross that will be located in The Gathering (entrance area to the sanctuary). Together we’ll transform the barren cross into an Easter symbol.
Three days after Jesus’ death and burial, he rose from the grave and walked through the garden while “Mary stood weeping outside the tomb. As she wept, she bent over to look into the tomb; and she saw two angels in white, sitting where the body of Jesus had been lying, one at the head and the other at the feet. They said to her, ‘Woman, why are you weeping?’ She said to them, ‘They have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have laid him.’ When she had said this, she turned around and saw Jesus standing there, but she did not know that it was Jesus. Jesus said to her, ‘Woman, why are you weeping? Whom are you looking for?’ Supposing him to be the gardener, she said to him, ‘Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him away. Jesus said to her, ‘Mary!’ She turned and said to him in Hebrew, ‘Rabbouni!’ (which means Teacher).”
Mary may have mistaken the resurrected Jesus for the gardener, but it’s actually a fitting characterization. Our resurrected Savior is in the business of tending, nurturing, and restoring all of creation. God is the best and essential Gardener of the world and is still in the business of bringing dead things back to life. If we’ll trust God even with the seemingly dead areas of our lives–if we believe in the power of resurrection–then what was once barren and dead will come to life again. Through Christ, all that is grim and cold, haunting, eerie, and dark is being transformed into something vibrant, warm, abundant, nourishing, and flourishing with life. Through Christ, graves are transforming into gardens!
