Hi Friends,

Is there ever more hopeful a day than Resurrection Sunday? We worship Jesus Christ, Lord of Glory, the One who eviscerated the power of death and walked out of a sealed tomb. Graves opened up, Satan crushed at last under His heel.

This Man, this triumph, forever altered the history of the entire planet. And yet, He is not first recognized as king. He is not seen as judge, not as victor.

He is seen as a gardener.

Mary Magdalene, having arrived to an empty tomb and alerted Peter and John, now comes back to the tomb weeping. Cut through with grief, she wants only to find the body of Jesus. She speaks with angels and even turns her back on them. She must find Him.

And when she does see Him standing before her, she sees a gardener.

The first appearance of the Resurrected Savior is of infinite importance, meant to draw our hearts to understand more of who God is. He does nothing unthinkingly, nothing without meaning. Every word and act of God is woven over centuries into the tapestry of the story He is writing.

But, to see Him—especially now—and mistake Him as a gardener?

And yet, in the words of Bishop Hall, “Devout Mary, thou art not much mistaken. As it was the trade of the first Adam to dress the Garden of Eden, so it is the trade of the last Adam to tend the Garden of His Church”.

Christ, the last Adam, a gardener. Enduring whip and cross, now exalted and enthroned forever, all to restore what He has wanted with every fiber of His being all along.

“Father, I desire that they… may be with me where I am” (John 17:24). With Him. Walking side by side in the cool of the day, as it was in Eden in the beginning.

He finds us, like He finds Mary, not as one face in the sea of a crowd. Not hurried on His way to a more worthy mission. He comes in close—one-on-one—to a grieving woman. He comes in close to you and to me.

He gets His hands in the dirt, tending every seed and making all things beautiful in time.

Our resurrected king with the heart of a gardener—How we love You.

–Anna