Getting Back to the Garden

In 1969, singer/songwriter Joni Mitchell wrote a song called Woodstock. It reached the top of the charts in 1970, when it was performed by Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young. It was a celebration of the famous music festival in the state of New York that captured the imagination of a whole generation. 

The lyrics to the chorus go like this: We are stardust / We are golden / And we've got to get ourselves / Back to the garden. I believe these lyrics point to a truth that is deep within every human heart: We all long to get back to the garden. We all long for something that seems just beyond our reach. I believe this is why writers from different cultures throughout the earth, almost universally describe life as a journey: A restless attempt to satisfy the longing in our souls. Books like Exodus, Homer’s Iliad, Bunyan’s Pilgrim's Progress, and Mark Twain’s Huck Finn, all describe life as a journey or personal pilgrimage. Life is viewed as a quest, from beginning to end. 

Getting back to the garden seems to be the deepest longing in the human heart. As we’ll see in today’s message, there’s a good reason why: The Garden of Eden is a picture of the depth of God’s love for His people. It reminds us that He knows our deepest desires and promises to satisfy them for us, in Christ! 

In His Service,

Pastor Steve