History teaches us about two gardens with two different scenes, and yet they really are one and the same. The continuation of an encounter between God and man, long ago. Of course, Satan manages to place himself within both gardens with the goal of destruction, but he only finds temporary success (so he believes) in both. Because of the curse of death that entered the first garden through the first Adam, we find ourselves witnessing the payment for that penalty in another garden through the second Adam and the mystery of two gardens unfolds.

Do you know what is so profound about the correlation between the two gardens? In the Garden of Eden there were droplets of blood from an animal shed to cover Adam and Eve in their sins. But this covering was merely temporary, until the answer to the curse in the future garden arrived. Luke chooses to point out to us, that in this Garden, among the Mount of Olives, Jesus the Lamb was in such agony, that His sweat became like great drops of blood falling down to the ground. It’s almost as if this historian added this specific detail, because He knew to look even further back in history about the One He was proclaiming. But it wasn’t just for the symbolism of the blood that would be poured out as our covering. Place close attention to the PLACE that Jesus begins His suffering and prays for the Father’s will to be accomplished.

Then Jesus came with them to a place called Gethsemane. Matthew 26:36

In Hebrew, the name Gethsemane means Oil Press. The One among the olive trees that are often pressed and crushed, is Himself undergoing the crushing process. A crushing so great on His body, so that the anointing oil of His life, His Spirit, can be poured out to cover all of those who will receive His sacrifice. This is the very “crushing” Isaiah speaks of in regards to the Messiah, when he says in chapter 53:5,10-

But He was pierced for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was on Him, and by His wounds we are healed.

Yet it was the LORD’S will to crush Him and cause Him to suffer, and though the LORD makes His life an offering for sin, He will see His offspring and prolong His days, and the will of the LORD will prosper in His hand.

Isaiah the prophet, reveals to us the very nature and sufferings that the Messiah would endure. In fact, the very word Messiah means Anointed One. The oil from the Olive trees is often synonymous with the anointing of God’s spirit and will, as we see in Leviticus 8:10-12.

Then Moses took the anointing oil and anointed the tabernacle and everything in it, and so consecrated them. He sprinkled some of the oil on the altar seven times, anointing the altar and all its utensils and the basin with its stand, to consecrate them.  He poured some of the anointing oil on Aaron’s head and anointed him to consecrate him.

How beautifully prophetic it is, that just a few verses earlier in Matthew 26:6, we find the women with the alabaster box anointing the Anointed One with costly oil. Symbolizing that He was the tabernacle of Gods presence dwelling with us. He was the High Priest that that God had consecrated to offer Himself to the grave, so that He could destroy our greatest enemy. Preparing His body for what was so costly for Him to pour out, but so freely for us to receive. As we remember Gethsemane this Passover/Easter season and what it offered us there, let us not forget the fulfillment to God’s promise that it brought us, because of what we brought forth in that first garden.