God's Garden

It’s been a very sad day for us today, because while watching our church service online we heard about the sudden death of a friend. He had been a member of our church family for many years, but we had known him for some time before that because he was head of physics and computing at our sons’ school and taught all three of our boys. He was a kind, gentle and deeply spiritual man and my husband and I are both in shock and have spent the day in a bit of a daze, desperately sad for his wife and son. (Their other son was tragically killed in a car accident twenty years ago.)

This afternoon while I was walking round the garden to try and find some solace for my sadness, I took this photo of the newly-planted urn in the centre of the rose bed. 


God’s Garden

THE Lord God planted a garden
In the first white days of the world,
And He set there an angel warden
In a garment of light enfurled.

So near to the peace of Heaven,
That the hawk might nest with the wren,
For there in the cool of the even
God walked with the first of men.

And I dream that these garden-closes
With their shade and their sun-flecked sod
And their lilies and bowers of roses,
Were laid by the hand of God.

The kiss of the sun for pardon,
The song of the birds for mirth, –
One is nearer God's heart in a garden
Than anywhere else on earth.

For He broke it for us in a garden
Under the olive-trees
Where the angel of strength was the warden
And the soul of the world found ease.

Dorothy Frances Gurney