the gardener and the spade

 

Everything that exists is a creature of God. And because creation is so interconnected and interdependent, everything is caught up, to a greater or lesser extent, in the estrangement from God that resulted from the independence rebellion of a third of the angels.

Death is one of the creatures of God. As the hymn All Creatures Of Our God And King puts it:

And thou, most kind and gentle death,
waiting to hush our latest breath,
O praise him, alleluia!
Thou leadest home the child of God,
and Christ our lord the way has trod:
O praise him, O praise him,
alleluia, alleluia, alleluia!

Death, too, has been caught up in the estrangement; and death, too, is caught up in the reconciliation of all things in Christ.

Paul, writing to the church in Corinth, states that those whom Moses led out of bondage in Egypt two thousand years before the time of Jesus nonetheless participated in his life-giving life. Even though they made choices that led to their death, to a gracious limit on the effect of estrangement, death is not the end. As Paul writes to the church in Rome, he is utterly convinced that nothing in all creation, including death, is able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. A great many Christians today do not share his confidence, but there we are.

Likewise, we who, from a chronological perspective are separated from Jesus by two thousand years in the other direction, are drawn to him, to the reconciliation of all things in him, which is won on the cross.

On one occasion, Jesus was asked about the deaths of some Galileans at the hand of Pilate. They died, Jesus responds, because of the estrangement between Jew and Gentile. And those who died when a tower collapsed on them died because of the estrangement between neighbours that allows one to put profit before the common good. Yet death is not the final horizon.

In response, Jesus told a parable about a fig tree that had failed to produce figs for the past three years and was threatened with being cut down. In the Bible, trees represent people. The fig tree stands for Israel, and beyond that the human condition, and under all of that the life of the human god Jesus. For three years, it has not produced figs. At this stage, Jesus has been going from place to place healing the sick, driving out demons, and teaching both the crowds and his disciples. Yet the restoration of Israel has not come about, as far as his critics can see. He has had his opportunity. Let him now be removed. But Jesus gently but firmly insists that his time has not yet come. Will not yet come for another year. For now, he continues with the unglamorous, painstaking, slow work of digging in fertiliser.

A year from then, Jesus would be hoisted up on an execution scaffold. Yet this was not the end, for he would transform the cross into the tree of life, the fruit-bearing tree. Here we see the true cry of humanity, ‘Father forgive,’ and the true response of God in giving the Son the gift he asks for, the life-giving Spirit. Here we see the Son glorify the Father through the Spirit, in loving humanity even to the extent in sharing in their death and returning the Spirit to the Father. And here we see the Father glorify the Son through the Spirit, rewarding his faithfulness with the life of the Spirit returned to him.

And all creation, whether it lies on the chronological horizon before or after this event, is being drawn to the cross, where all things are reconciled in Jesus, never to be estranged again.

This is a slow and hidden work, that takes as long as it takes. It takes in your history and mine, the healing of every wound you have suffered and every wound you have inflicted. To the naked eye, the fig tree of your life, or mine, may look barren, nothing to see here. And yet, the gardener has not given up. Still, he digs around us, gets deep into our roots. For those with eyes to see, it is possible to watch him at work, healing those parts of us that, chronologically speaking, are no longer present, our childhood, our past.

He will not lay down his tools until all creation is restored. All creation.