Eating the tree of life, that is, enjoying Christ as our life supply, should be the primary matter in the church life. The content of the church life depends upon the enjoyment of Christ. The more we enjoy Him, the richer the content will be. (Life-study of Revelation, msg. 10)
The New Jerusalem as the consummation of God’s work throughout the ages can be our enjoyment and experience today in our Christian life. Today we can enthrone the Lord in the center of our being and thus experience the throne of God and of the Lamb in the center of New Jerusalem.
When the Lord is enthroned in our being, when He is the Head and we check with Him about everything, there is a flow of water of life that proceeds out from His throne – we experience the river of water of life. In our Christian life and church life today we can experience the river of water of life which proceeds out from the throne of God and of the Lamb and flows out through the gates to reach everyone.
Whenever we open to the Lord, call on His name, and speak to Him, He as the Spirit flows in our being and becomes the many rivers of water of life gushing out from our innermost being as love, peace, joy, sanctification, goodness, forbearance, long-suffering, and many other fruits of the Spirit.
As we drink the water of life flowing from the enthroned Christ in the center of our being, we are being inwardly supplied with the tree of life.
On both sides of the river of life flowing from the throne there is the tree of life producing twelve fruits, yielding its fruit each month; and the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations (see Rev. 22:2).
In and as the New Jerusalem for eternity God’s original purpose will be accomplished: we will drink the water of life and eat the tree of life (see Gen. 1-2, Rev. 21-22). Today the Lord wants to recover us from merely understanding and comprehending what the divine truths in the Holy Word are – to eating Christ as the tree of life!
The primary matter in our Christian life and church life should not be working for the Lord, reading the Bible, or meeting with the saints; as good as these practices are, we need to focus primarily on eating Christ as the tree of life, that is, enjoying Christ in His word as our life supply.
May the Lord make us those who give themselves to just eat Him to be supplied with Him as life and live the Christian life and church life by the Christ we eat (see John 6:57).
The Enjoyment of Christ as the Tree of Life is the Believers’ Common Portion
God’s original intention (Gen. 2:9), as seen in what He told Adam to do after He created him in Gen. 1-2, is for man to eat the tree of life and have God’s life, living forever in a constant fellowship with God for the fulfillment of God’s purpose.
However, due to the fall of man, the way to the tree of life was closed and guarded by God’s righteousness, holiness, and glory (see Gen. 3:22-24). Through Christ’s redemption, the way to the tree of life was opened again (Heb. 10:19-20); He fulfilled the righteous, holy, and glorious requirements of God and opened a new and living way to the tree of life through His blood.
Today all men can come to the tree of life and enjoy Christ as their common portion. Christ Himself is life – He is the bread of life (John 6:35), He is life itself (John 11:25), and He is the vine tree (John 15:1); Christ is the reality of the tree of life. Today we can come to God in spirit and wash our robes by applying the blood of Christ in order to have right and eat of the tree of life (Rev. 22:14).
The Greek word for “tree” in Rev. 2:7 (eating the tree of life as the reward to the overcomers) is the same one as in 1 Pet. 2:24, which means “wood”. The tree of life signifies the crucified and resurrected Christ who is our common portion today in the church life.
When we enjoy the Lord in His word, eating Him as the tree of life, we are taking in the crucified and resurrected Christ, and all the germs and negative things in our being are killed.
When we pray over God’s word and take in the words in the Bible by means of all prayers and petition (Eph. 6:17), the death of Christ is applied to our temper, disposition, offenses, self, and natural man, and our inner man is strengthened with the supply of life in God’s word.
Christ as the tree of life is our common allotted portion in the light (Col. 1:12), and He is so available and ready to be enjoyed by us! In the New Jerusalem the tree of life grows alongside the river of water of life on both its sides – the tree of life is a vine, spreading, growing, bringing forth fruit, and being so easy to be partaken of!
There is abundance of fruits in the tree of life: 12 fruits, each month bearing fruit. We simply need to eat Christ in His word and we will experience a foretaste of the tree of life in the New Jerusalem!
Eating the Tree of Life Should the Primary Matter in the Church Life
The primary matter in the church life is not taking care of outward activities, meetings, or even the home meetings, church meetings, etc. Rather, the primary matter in the church life today should be eating Christ as the tree of life, that is, enjoying Christ as our life supply.
Whether the church life is rich and sweet depends on how much we have enjoyed Christ. We need to love the Lord and enjoy Him, and the church life will be full of the enjoyment of Christ – so rich! We don’t need more “teachings” in the church life; religion teaches, but Christ feeds!
We need more feeding on Christ, more enjoyment of the tree of life, more taking in of Christ as the life-supply. In order for us to grow in life and develop in our spiritual function we need to eat the Lord as the bread of life in our spirit (John 6:57).
The mental apprehension of the things in the Bible and the understanding of the doctrines in the Scriptures can take us only so far; what we really need in order to grow in life is to eat Christ as the tree of life.
God didn’t give Adam a lot of teachings after He created him, and the Lord Jesus didn’t come to be a “good Teacher”; rather, what God cares for and what Christ was concerned with in His ministry was that man would take God in as life in the form of food.
For our proper growth in the Christian life what we need is NOT merely the mental apprehension of teachings but the eating of the Lord as the tree of life, the bread of life, in our spirit. The words in the Bible should be our spiritual food to nourish us, and we should live by every word that proceeds out through the mouth of God (Matt. 4:4; Heb. 5:12-14).
We need to be recovered to eating the Lord, and eating Christ as the tree of life should be the primary matter in our Christian life and church life.
The overcomers in Ephesus are promised to eat of the tree of life (see Rev. 2); the overcomers in Pergamos will eat of the hidden manna (Rev. 2:17), and the overcomers in Laodicea will dine with the Lord (Rev. 3:20). Eating Christ as the tree of life, the hidden manna, and the feast is both our portion today and our reward in the millennium.
The Lord desires to recover our eating Christ as the tree of life, the hidden manna, and the rich feast. Eating Jesus is the way!
Lord Jesus, recover us from anything else to eating Christ as the tree of life. May we be those who pay attention more to being inwardly supplied by Your living word than to anything else. Thank You for opening the way to the tree of life; now we can wash our robes and have right to the tree of life! Lord, we love You! We want to enjoy You and eat You as the tree of life, taking You in as our life supply. Give us a foretaste of the ever-fresh and ever-green tree of life in the New Jerusalem today as we come to Your word in a prayerful way!
References and Hymns on this Topic
- Inspiration: the Word of God, my Christian experience, bro. Ed Marks’ sharing in the message for this week, and portions from, Life-Study of Revelation (msg. 10), as quoted in, the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, Aspects of the Christian Life and Church Life Seen in the New Jerusalem, week 1 / msg 1, The Throne of God and of the Lamb, the River of Water of Life, and the Tree of Life.
- On this topic via the New Jerusalem blog, The Tree of Life in the Garden and in the City, and, Christ as the Reality of the Tree of Life Supplies Life for our Living.
- Hymns on this topic:
# I freely eat this living tree, / For eating is the way / To put God’s life inside of me, / To live by Him today. (Hymns #1143)
# We have found the way to live by Christ— / Pray His Word and call His name! / This—the eating, drinking—has sufficed / And its worth we now proclaim. (Hymns #1153)
# How may we express such oneness, / be divine and shining too? / Hallelujah, eating Jesus is the way! / He’s the tree of life, the manna, / and the feast that’s ever new— / Hallelujah, we may eat Him every day! (Hymns #1226)
# Blessed are those who wash their robes / That they might have right to the tree of life. (new song on Rev. 3:20)
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