Gardens are mentioned throughout Scripture, including four very special gardens that are each a place of peace, although three are also places of sadness. The good news is that peace and joy win out in the stories of all these gardens!
The first garden is where the story begins: The Garden of Eden.
And the Lord God planted a garden eastward in Eden;
and there He put the man whom He had formed.
And out of the ground made the Lord God to grow every tree
that is pleasant to the sight, and good for food;
the tree of life also in the midst of the garden, and the tree of
knowledge of good and evil. (Genesis 2:8-9)
This garden was where Adam and Eve met and walked with God, where God instructed Adam to
dress and keep it. How peaceful and beautiful it must have been until the day of
Adam and Eve’s fall by the serpent’s deception. They were sent out of the
garden so they could not eat of the Tree of Life and live forever in their fallen state.
Fortunately for them and for us, our omniscient God knew this would happen and had a plan of
salvation ready—see Genesis 3:15, the Bible’s first prediction of a Savior. Satan would “bruise
his heel” (wound the coming Messiah by His death on the cross), but our Savior would
crush (destroy) Satan’s head by rising on the third day to break the power of death and sin. Our
adversary is a defeated foe whose doom is sure.
The second garden was a bittersweet refuge: The Garden of Gethsemane.
It was a peaceful place where Jesus could withdraw from the crowds to pray with His disciples (John 18:2). But it became a place of great sorrow through betrayal by one of His disciples on the night before His crucifixion.
The third garden was a location of horror and hope: The Garden of Golgotha.
It was a garden of tombs in the place where Jesus was crucified and buried (John 19:41), transformed into a garden of victory by His resurrection.
The fourth garden is a place of eternal life: The Heavenly Garden.
Here, Eden is restored, and we return to the Tree of Life and its healing properties:
And he shewed me a pure river of water of life, clear as crystal,
proceeding out of the throne of God and of the Lamb.
In the midst of the street of it, and on either side of the river,
was there the tree of life, which bare twelve marnner of fruits,
and yielded her fruit every month: and the leaves of the tree
were for the healing of the nations.” (Revelation 22:1-2).
In the first garden, we lost a close, intimate relationship with God. Spiritual death and
mortality followed. In the second garden there is displayed both peace with God and the corruption of man. In the third garden, the glorious hope of resurrection life overcomes the horror of death. The final garden is a place of ultimate victory and eternal bliss.
Hallelujah to the Lamb that was slain! (1 Peter 1:18-20; Revelation 5:6-14).