Grounded in a Garden

 All our sermons through Lent begin with this quote from sculptor and environmentalist Anthony Goldsworthy. We often forget that we are nature. Nature is not something separate from us. So when we say that we have lost our connection to nature, we have lost our connection to ourselves.

 

I recall two books that I had on my bookshelf growing up. One was a little book called, A Children’s Garden of Verses. It had only a few verses from Robert Louis Stevenson’s book of the same name. The little book was like a garden of pretty flowers; the flowers were rhymes, poems, and prayers, all suitable for grounding young children. The second book was Beatrice Potter’s, The Tale of Peter Rabbit. Peter Rabbit was always in the expertly tended and meticulous garden of Mr. MacGregor, where he -Peter Rabbit- would rummage through and help himself to whatever he wanted to eat, leaving behind holes and pieces of plants. Mr. MacGregor and Peter Rabbit had very different understandings of garden. Each understanding came from their nature. Human nature is quite different from rabbit nature.

 

On Ash Wednesday we began the season of Lent, reflecting on nature – nature as in creation, human nature, and God’s nature. We thought about Ash Wednesday as turning over a sod – turning over hearts and wills to open ourselves to becoming rich soil, grounded, and eventually blooming in the glory of Easter. In a recent exploration of the Genesis text, Professor Valerie Bridgeman from Methodist Theological School in Ohio focused on ‘nature.’ She wrote, As a Lenten text, it does seem that we are being asked to ‘reflect on the nature and limitations of humanity, including the consequences of our actions and inactions and our responsibility in and for this world.’ –Working Preacher.com

Let us consider an interpretation of the Genesis story that follows a garden path less travelled. Human beings are placed in a garden. The vegetation is abundant. There are creatures of every kind. The soil is naturally perfect for hosting and supporting the life in its care; some have called the Garden of Eden, paradise.

But, if we think of human nature --- from a human perspective is the garden paradise?

Today’s story begins with Adam being placed in the garden and commanded to till it and keep it. That is a lot of responsibility; to arrive in a new surrounding, as a new creature, and figure it out.

We are told that Serpent starts a conversation. Serpent is said to have tempted humanity, causing humanity to sin. Serpent through the centuries has received a bad rap, and has been painted as the Devil, evil – non-of-which comes from the story itself. This passage has theologically been termed ‘the Fall’ and the moment of ‘Original Sin.’

Taking a fresh look at the garden passage, could it be that the story is about nature, human nature, and God’s nature? God’s nature created humankind as a creature with freedom of heart and will, with the ability to choose their relationships, with nature, other humans, and God. This story is a conversation of living within this freedom, and it means discerning boundaries. Being in relationship requires boundaries: who to listen to or not listen to; what to eat, not eat; what or how to take or not take; what to till and tend and what to leave alone. To cope with freedom human nature developed an internal process to help discern who to be, how to be, and what to be. The process is an on-going internal conversation -some might call this the conscience. Internal conversation is a consideration of all the choices human’s have to make and all the boundary decisions to be made. In this story, is Serpent the internal conversation partner of human nature? Neither good nor evil – just a conversation partner, to reflect on the options. God said don’t eat the fruit.  But why not, go ahead and eat the fruit. Where the conversation goes between Serpent and human determines how a particular human will act in the same situation. Genesis continues the story we heard this morning, with the story of God walking in the garden. God’s nature of being present and relational to have conversation with God’s creatures. God’s voice in addition to an inner Serpent fertilizes an idea of a relational garden that is abundant and flourishing the world over.

 

One of my all-time favourite paintings is the Tangled Garden -by J.E.MacDonald, an artist of the Group of Seven. The Tangled Garden - in the background there is a small portion of a wood-sided house overlaid with a gnarly apple tree. In the middle is a patch of abundant brightly flowering plants. The foreground has large sunflowers whose season is done; their heads are bent, leaves are turning brown. The garden is full and overgrown. It appears that as the seasons turned it has been left to its own nature. Boundaries - human-made edges and planting groups- have disappeared. Everything is tangled together – blossom and decay, life and death, buds and harvest, plants and weeds. I find the Tangled Garden and its nature beautiful. My nature sits well with this nature. In it I see God’s nature.

 

Mr. MacGregor would not like the Tangled Garden. Mr. MacGregor gardened by bringing his sense of order to the plot of ground. He dug the soil. He tended his plants. Protected the garden with a boundary fence and gate. Traps were set to rid the garden of rodents and pests. Gardening as a verb was hard and time-consuming work. Every plant had its place in the eyes of Mr. MacGregor and weeds were immediately hoed and removed. Order. Productivity. A garden was to be tamed, commanded, and controlled.

 

Peter Rabbit, on the other hand, experienced garden as a bountiful space, full of food and fun. He enjoyed the garden. Gardens were places of adventure and play. Yes, gardens were beautiful but also dangerous, due to Mr. MacGregor’s human nature, but being in the garden was worth the risk! Peter Rabbit got into quite a lot of trouble. He lost his coat which Mr. MacGregor turned into a scarecrow, and almost his life, ending up in Mr. MacGregor’s stew. Peter Rabbit no matter how much his mom and cousins told him to avoid the garden, he did not show any restraint.

 

God tells human beings that they may eat of every tree but of the tree of knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall die. This is a conversation about boundaries and consequences. Just because something is good for food does not mean we should eat. Just because a flower is beautiful does not mean we should take it out of the garden to place it inside and ‘own’ it. Just because a tree is good for wood, does not mean we need to cut it down. I am currently reading a book with writings about birds from the 1800s where because there were so many birds, humans decided to kill thousands at a time for sport – simply because they could.

 

Today we visit a garden. The garden is the original grounding spot for humanity. It is the place where human nature began to discern what it means to be human and in relationship with nature, other humans, themself, and God. We learn that gardening is not as easy as saying till and tend. There is a lot of discernment required and that discernment comes through internal conversation. Human nature doesn’t always choose wisely. We learn that God’s nature is to come to the garden and be present; to walk among creation and grow relationship with humankind, if humankind chooses to come out from hiding and walk through the garden too. Enjoying the garden, with respect, entering into relationship with it, not rummaging or ruining but caring and keeping.

 

The garden image challenges us this morning. How do we garden? How are we grounded in the garden? Lent gives us time to consider nature, human nature in the eyes of Mr. MacGregor or J.E.MacDonald, experienced via Peter Rabbit’s nature. This week consider experiencing garden in an alternative way to your usual nature. Discern boundaries. Think on consequences. Grow relationships.

Grounded with Ash. The Petrichor of Ash Wed.

 

2026 Lent sermons will all begin with this quote from sculptor and environmentalist Anthony Goldsworthy.

We often forget that we are nature. Nature is not something separate from us. So when we say that we have lost our connection to nature, we have lost our connection to ourselves.

 

Ash Wednesday liturgy draws attention to our nature and God’s nature via nature.

An invitation is offered this evening to receive ashes in the form of a cross on your forehead. The ashes are burnt palm fronds from a past Palm Sunday. The palms and the ash are nature, as in creation.

We are marked with a cross as we hear, “You are dust and to dust you shall return.” In this marking we are confronted with God’s nature - a God who out of great love dies on a cross so that humans might grasp the unending lengths that God will go to love, and to continue in pursuit of relationship with humanity.

We come face to face with our human nature – in the bodily reality of death and decay, dust to dust. We too confess that human nature holds a sinful rebellion, an inability to fully and unconditionally love, that separates us from God, our neighbours, and creation.

 

Ash Wednesday liturgy is like a turning over of sods. It is like a farmer plowing untilled land to make a field to farm on. In the turning over of the sod, roots, rocks, worms, insects, and soil are exposed. There is ground – earth- ready for intentional tending and working: the rocks are removed; roots are loosened and withered; sunshine and rain naturally soak in; and there is hoeing and weeding and the adding of mulch. Before seeding the ground will be plowed again. The field will be prepared with furrows ready to receive seeds.

Lent works the sods – the ground- that we turn over on Ash Wednesday.

 

Lent is about Grounding. Through the hearing of scripture, singing minor-toned hymns, reflection, disciplines, and practices we tend and work the ground within. We pick out rocks – the items no longer serving us; we loosen that which binds our spirits, soak in that which gives us hope and the capacity for compassion; we hoe and weed our opinions, understandings, and morals. Lent -especially in Northern climates- is the time we start to long for spring, for soil, for blooming Easter.  To get to blooming – first the sod is turned and the ground is tended and worked with care – this journey reconnects us to nature: our nature, human nature, God’s nature.

 

Sunday texts in Lent will journey across and through various soils. We visit a garden, walk a caravan route, find ourselves in the wilderness, stand in a grassy field, and end in a dry river valley. Each soil story contains wisdom to help us ground ourselves, reconnecting to nature – creation, our nature, human nature, God’s nature. You are invited to work with ancient farming techniques (all found on the table at the back of the sanctuary): finger labyrinths, an everyday prayer, and devotional booklets. Come Holy Week we seed the soil with sandpaper, nails, and colour swatches.

 

It is hard to be grounded in today’s world. There is so much that disturbs and poisons the soil: climate crisis, wars and rumours of war, economic tariffs/trade disputes, instability in pubic and government systems and institutions, the rise of AI, inundation of electromagnetic waves … you know what untethers you, what untethers human nature. We are like dust in the wind.

 

To be Grounded.

There is a recurring experience for me – where every time it happens – I am 100% completely grounded. The event connects me to nature, Mother Earth. The moment calms everything in my own nature – my whole system resets and rejuvenates. The experience breathes God’s breath and that which seemed lost is resurrected.

This grounding moment happens when gentle rain falls on dry soil, causing geosmin – the compound created by dying bacteria, mixing with plant oil – to spring into the air. That earthy smell when the rain first hits the ground is called petrichor.

Petrichor is an instantaneous grounding moment for me.

 

And it is not just me. The human nose is sensitive to geosmin. Scientists speculate that the earthy odour and taste is a nod to the past, when the scent of rain was important for survival. It is in our nature to respond to petrichor. And it is not our nature alone, the nature of camels in the desert is to rely on the smell of petrichor to find oasis --- life-giving water.

 

Refreshed earth. Released tension. Rehydrated. Nourished. Grounded.

The rituals of Ash Wednesday and Holy Week act in a similar way. They reach that which has been buried, grown over, malnourished, or is blowing in the wind, and instantaneously ground the moment.

 

Grounded with ash is the petrichor moment of this evening.

It is a moment of grace-filled energy that springs up around us as we accept our human nature – that we are dust – that we are poor farmers who require help. In admitting we are ungrounded, in turning over the sod within us, God’s nature rains and warms the soil. Reconnecting, refreshing, and in days to come resurrecting in us that which is dry, disturbed, and disconnected.

 

Tonight, we turn over the sod.

That is all that is being asked.

We expose our human nature. Trusting the response of God’s nature.

 

 

Salt and Light

 

The metaphors of salt and light in the Bible call Christians to actively influence the world positively. As salt, they are to preserve goodness and enhance the quality of life around them. As light, they are to provide guidance and be visible examples of righteousness. This is from biblestudytools.com

 

The scripture text presents us with two short and to the point transition statements.

Both are easily remembered and easily repeated. You are the salt of the earth. You are the light of the world.

The statements are boldly made without interpretation or explanation.

These two statements are the connective tissue between the Beatitudes, Blessed are, and Jesus’ teachings on the Law, You have heard it said.

 

These two statements continue from the last Beatitude, “Blessed are you when people revile you and persecute you.” The YOU is plural. It is not about a single person but rather a corporate you. This kindom work, that Jesus’ is and will be teaching about, cannot be done alone; it is relational work therefore it must be done together. In like manner, YOU are the salt of the earth, you are the light of the world, the YOU is plural. You as the body of Christ. One grain of salt or one charged electron goes untasted, unseen. It takes many grains and many electrons to be tasted salt and visible light. Within the language the two statements are not just of the earth, of the world, but, FOR the earth, FOR the world, not for yourselves – light is put on a hill so that it is visible. Matthew’s Gospel is preparing listens for the grande finale of the Great commission at end of the Gospel – go make disciples of all nations, baptizing them, teaching them.

 

Praise the Lord for two clear statements!  -object lessons in a sense –

(sigh) only to be followed by a complicated section that begins, Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law…

Some scholars deem this section the most difficult in the whole Gospel. It is peculiar to Matthew’s Gospel. It is full of ambiguous terms with tension between clauses and other passages. Editor’s hands have been at work to make sense of what Matthew was trying to articulate. There are no satisfying explanations.

What the ambiguity does do, however, is spark our curiosity to try and figure it out. One item we find is an important note about the context of 1^st century Judaism.  Jews of Jesus’ time highly regarded scripture; scripture was holy-inspired with God as the ultimate author. Rabbis and teachers, whether Pharisee, Sadducee, Essene, or other group revered and used Hebrew scripture. They were united in this. Where they did not agree was in the interpretation and application of the scripture. We see this lived out in confrontations between Jesus and other scripture reading groups, most often the Pharisees. We see interpretation at work in Matthew’s Gospel as he freely altered some of the quotes he used from scripture.

 

The rest of Matthew chapter 5, that following what we have read this morning, is Jesus’ interpretation and teaching of the Law. Jesus is teacher and the disciples are the class. At times there are others who listen in, auditing the class so to speak. I kind of picture chapter 5 like teaching confirmation class. After church this morning, the confirmation class meets. The class will focus on learning about the Commandments as printed in Luther’s Small Catechism, so including Luther’s interpretations and applications for each Commandment. Part of the class we will concentrate on applying the 5^th Commandment, you shall not kill. Using a spectrum each student is invited to decide where they stand on various applications of the law. Is it okay to kill a mosquito? Is polluting the environment breaking the commandment? Does it break the commandment to euthanize a sick dog? To shoot animals for sport? In times of war, can you kill another human being? What about abortion, MAID? As the exercise continues, each described situation becomes more difficult to discern how to interpret and apply the law.

 

There is nothing easy about Jesus’ discourse on the Law.

But before we get there, we are gifted with two clear bold statements. Statements that can be repeated when we get confounded and confused, when conversations get convoluted or commandeered. Matthew gifts us with two statements that centre our minds and call our hearts back to the core. You are the salt of the earth. You are the light of the world.

 

(Hold up a saltshaker and a light bulb)

 

Salt and light – an object lesson.

 

Of all the objects Jesus’ could have used, he chose salt and light.

How many of you have salt at home? How many of you have lightbulbs or candles at home? At the church we have shakers full of salt and we have lots of light sources.

There are few places where humans are that you won’t find both salt and light. Both are in your home, in the home of your neighbour, in the home of your enemy, in refugee camps, in shelters, in camp sites, in war trenches, in bunkers, in prison, in hospitals, in asylums, in zoos, in conservatories, on airplanes, on space expeditions, on death row. There is a universality of salt and light. Both affect the human condition.

 

One thing I learn from the abundance of salt and light, is that salt and light are already present. When we go into the world - salt and light are already there before we get there. God is already there, as is kindom in various stages of wholeness. When we go, we enhance the quality of both salt and light already present.

 

I think Jesus chose that which is simple and common because the very presence of salt and light acts as a mnemonic device, continually centring our minds and calling our hearts to the two statements. You are the salt of the earth. You are the light of the world. The statements are in our face, as the continual reminder that we are a community – a plural YOU- who lives in relationship and together applies the law and how it is that we approach and live every moment of life.

 

This week every time you turn on a light switch, light a candle, obey a traffic light, use the flashlight on your phone… Be reminded that You are the light of the world. Every time you put salt on your food, eat a salty potato chip, use Epsom salts for sore muscles, or put salt down after shovelling… Be reminded that, You are the salt of the earth. Centred and called YOU are a connected to a community. You are a community, flavouring and illuminating the world – many grains, many electrons together enhancing the wholeness of God’s kindom.

 

The metaphors of salt and light in the Bible call Christians to actively influence the world positively. As salt, they are to preserve goodness and enhance the quality of life around them. As light, they are to provide guidance and be visible examples of righteousness.