![Jesus said to him, I am the way and the reality and the life John 14:6 ...I have come that they may have life and may have [it] abundantly. John 10:10b](https://i0.wp.com/www.agodman.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/09/Jesus-said-to-him-I-am-the-way-and-the-reality-and-the-life-1024x576.jpg?resize=800%2C450&ssl=1 "Jesus said to him, I am the way and the reality and the life John 14:6 ...I have come that they may have life and may have [it] abundantly. John 10:10b")
Our great God gives us freedom of choice: we can either partake of the tree of life or of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil; when we take Christ as the tree of life, we enjoy Him and are constituted with Him, and we accomplish His eternal intention. Amen!
This week we come to a new Holy Word for Morning Revival based on the 2022 Memorial Weekend Conference; the general title is, Taking the Way of Enjoying Christ as the Tree of Life.
This first week we are enjoying the matter of, Taking the Way of Enjoying Christ as the Tree of Life for the Accomplishing of God’s Eternal Economy.
We may have heard of Christ being the tree of life and we may enjoy Him as life here and there, but we need to have a deeper appreciation of our need to depend on Him as life and to partake of Him as the tree of life.
The tree of life typifies Christ who imparts life to man to please and satisfy man; He imparts Himself into us as our life to please us and satisfy us.
This is why, after creating man, God put man in a garden; He didn’t put man in a factory or field to work for God but in a garden, and the garden’s name was Eden, that is, pleasure.
God wants man to be pleased; He wants man to enjoy God as life. God wants to please man and make man happy, and the way He does it is by presenting Himself to man in the form of the tree of life.
When we partake of God as life, when we enjoy Christ as the tree of life, we are pleased, satisfied, and happy.
The only thing that makes us happy as men created in the image of God and according to His likeness is taking in Christ as the tree of life.
We need to give ourselves to just enjoy God as life; we need to spend our days in the enjoyment of Christ as life.
It would be a great shame for us merely to know that Christ is our life and that God wants to be life to us, but not to enjoy Him as our life.
May we consecrate ourselves to Him to partake of Him as life, to take Christ as the tree of life into us.
We may be in a good mood or in a bad mood; we may be in a pleasant situation or in suffering; no matter what is happening outwardly and how much suffering we experience inwardly, we need to learn to enjoy God as life.
We all have to admit that we are so short of life; we may have a lot of knowledge and even the Bible may be quite familiar to us, but how much of God as life has been constituted into our being?
We need to repent for our shortage of life; we need to confess our lack of growth in life and make a thorough repentance before Him concerning our lack of life.
May we return to the enjoyment of Christ as the tree of life and partake of Him again and again as our life so that we may have life and live because of Him.
We have the Freedom of Choice to Choose the Tree of Life or the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil
In Genesis 2, right after man was created by God in His image and according to His likeness, we see that man was put in front of two trees: the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil (vv. 7-9).
After God created man in His image, He planted a garden called Eden, and there He put the man He created.
Eden means pleasure; God wants man to partake of God as life and be filled with satisfaction, pleasure, and happiness.
Later in Psa. 36 we are told that God causes us to drink of the river of His pleasures.
We may not want to drink, but the Lord will help us and even cause us to drink of Him as the water of life.
The two trees show that in this universe there are two wills, two sources, and two possibilities for man to choose with his free will (see Deut. 30:19-20).
Our God is great; though He wanted man to partake of God as life and enjoy Him as the tree of life, He did not force man to do it.
God could have coerced man to eat of the tree of life, or He could have put the tree of life inside man by default.
But God is great; He doesn’t force man to do anything – He gives man the freedom of choice.
We human beings have the freedom of choice to choose the tree of life or the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
We human beings are small compared to God; we may want to do something or we may want others to do something, so we would even force others to do what we want them to do, or we may try to convince them that we are right, so that they agree with us and take our choice.
But God is great; He wants man to eat the tree of life, but He did not force man to do it. Neither did He put the tree of life into man; rather he gave man free will.
Hallelujah, we have the freedom of choice, and we can choose to partake of God as our life.
If God had not given us a choice, He would have forced man to take the tree of life.
But God is too great to do such a thing! He is a great God, and He is honorable and attractive.
He simply presents Himself as life to man. And there is a choice: we can either partake of the tree of life, which is clearly a type of God as our life, or we can partake of the other tree, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
Moses was one with God when he put two choices in front of the children of Israel – he set before them life and death, blessing and curse, and he encouraged them to choose life so that they and their children may live.
If we choose life, if we choose God as life, we and our children will live; if we choose the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, death will come in.
We need to listen to the Lord, choose Him, and choose life; when we choose the Lord, we choose life, and when we love the Lord, we receive Him as life.
When we tell the Lord Jesus that we love Him, we choose Him as the tree of life, and He as life is dispensed into us to make us living.
Some may say that God compels us or constrains us with His love, and that is true; on one hand, He gives us freedom of choice, but on the other hand, He loves us so much that He draws us with His love.
When we see the Lord’s love and mercy, we are conquered and subdued, and we simply respond by loving Him back.
God became a man to embrace us and love us, and we sinners cling to Him and love Him back. He became like us to make us like Him, and He expressed and manifested His love toward us – now we just love Him!
God became man to embrace us, the sinners, so that we might cling to Him to become God in life, in nature, but not in the Godhead.
May we choose life by clinging to our dear Lord Jesus, loving Him, listening to Him, and holding fast to Him!
Lord Jesus, we choose You as life! We reject the tree of the knowledge of good and evil and we choose the tree of life! Hallelujah, our great God gave us freedom of choice; we have a free will to choose God! Amen, Lord, we exercise our free will to love You and partake of You as the tree of life. Thank You for coming to us, even for becoming the same as us, so that we may cling to You, hold fast to You, love You, and cling to You. We just love You, dear Lord Jesus! We choose life by loving You, listening to Your voice, and by coming to You again and again! We do not want to remain in death or be filled with death by the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Remind us, again and again, to choose life so that both we and the ones around us may live!
The Tree of Life Signifies Christ as Life to man in the form of Food for man to Enjoy Him and become His Expression
What does the tree of life signify? The tree of life is a symbol of God as life, the proper source (see Psa. 36:9; John 1:4; 10:10b; 11:25; 14:6; 1 John 5:12; Col. 3:4).
The tree of life signifies Christ as life to man in the form of food for man to enjoy Him and be constituted with Him for His glory.
Throughout the Bible we see that God presents Himself to man as life in the form of food so that, by man partaking of God as life, man would become His corporate expression, thus accomplishing God’s original intention according to His eternal economy (Gen. 1:26; Isa. 43:7; Gen. 2:9; Rev. 2:7; 22:14; John 1:4; 14:6a; 10:10b; 6:35, 57, 63; Rev. 21:10-11; cf. 4:3).
God wants man not only to be saved in life from all the negative things that usurp man but also to partake of God and be constituted with God so that man would reign in life over all things through Christ (Rom. 5:10, 17).
So He came to the earth and said, I am life (John 14:6), and I am the vine tree (John 15:5); He is the tree of life.
In Him was life, and He came that we may have life and have it abundantly (John 1:4; 10:10).
The words that He speaks to us are spirit and are life (6:63) and if we partake of Him as life, we shall live because of Him (6:57).
The issue of our enjoyment and experience of Christ as life is the city of life, the New Jerusalem.
God created us and formed us for His glory, and we will become the glorious city shining Him out for eternity. Hallelujah!
The tree of life, the tree of God, the God-tree, is the center of the universe; God as life wants to be enjoyed by man!
The Old Testament begins with the tree of life (Gen. 2:9) and the New Testament ends with the tree of life (Rev. 22:2, 14); the thought of God being man’s life runs through the entire divine revelation.
We may think that, because we have sinned and our robes are stained, we cannot partake of God as life; but we can wash our robes and eat the tree of life.
God’s placing man in front of the tree of life indicates that God wanted man to receive Him as life by eating Him organically and assimilating Him metabolically so that God might become the very constituent of man’s being (John 6:57; 63; Jer. 15:16; Matt. 4:4).
It is crucial to know and realize that man has a choice: he can choose God as life or he can choose the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, which is death.
When we find God’s words and eat them, when we make new discoveries of God in His word, His joy becomes the gladness of our heart! Hallelujah!
May we choose God as life and may we daily choose to partake of God as life, for He is the tree of life for our enjoyment and experience today.
The tree of life is the tree of God, even the God-tree; when we partake of God as life by enjoying Him in His word, we receive the divine life, we grow in life, and His life constitutes us.
But if we do not actively choose the tree of life, if we don’t choose to set our mind on our spirit (Rom. 8:6), death is there, and death spreads in our being.
If we don’t join ourselves to the proper persons who choose life and are on the line of life, we may remain in death and confusion.
From Genesis to Revelation we see that God wants man to partake of Him as life.
For this, God Himself became a man; He was embodied in the Lord Jesus Christ to impart life, give life, and become a life-giving Spirit.
Now, after the Lord passed through death and resurrection, He is a life-dispensing, life-imparting Spirit.
On one hand, He is the universally great vine tree spreading all over the earth; on the other hand, He is the life-giving Spirit imparting Himself as life into all those who receive Him.
The tree of life in Gen. 2 is a symbol of God as the source of life, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil is a symbol of the other source in the universe, Satan as death.
May we be those who choose to partake of Christ as the tree of life so that we may be constituted with Him as life and become part of His glorious expression on the earth. Amen!
The more we choose God and partake of Christ as the tree of life, the more we eat the Lord as the tree of life, the more we are organically constituted with Him, we assimilate Him metabolically, and He becomes the very constituent of our being.
This makes us part of His corporate expression, His glorious expression in the universe.
Thank You, dear Lord Jesus, for coming to us in the form of food so that we may partake of You as the tree of life. Hallelujah, Christ comes to us as food so that we may enjoy Him and be constituted with Him for His glory! Amen, Lord, we choose to partake of You as life. We come to You in spirit and in Your word, and we choose to partake of Christ as the tree of life so that we may be constituted with God’s life and become part of God’s expression! Hallelujah, we can become part of the corporate expression of God, the glorious expression of the Triune God, for the accomplishing of God’s original intention according to His eternal economy! Amen, Lord, we open to You right now to receive You as our life by eating You organically and assimilating You metabolically. Become the very constituent of our being until we are filled with you to corporately express You!
References and Hymns on this Topic
- Sources of inspiration: the Word of God, my enjoyment in the ministry, a sharing by brother Ed Marks in the message, and portions from, Life-study of Genesis (pp. 159-162), by Witness Lee, as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, Taking the Way of Enjoying Christ as the Tree of Life (2022 Memorial Day Weekend Conference), week 1, entitled, Taking the Way of Enjoying Christ as the Tree of Life for the Accomplishing of God’s Eternal Economy.
- Hymns on this topic:
– There are two lines to live by in our living today— / One the life line to bring us into Christ all the way. / But the other is knowledge which will make us die; / We must be very careful on which line we abide. / Oh, we’ll stay on God’s life line, never turning aside. / We don’t care for vain knowledge, which will cause us to die. / Lord, we’ll touch You by calling on Your name each day; / Living in Your appearing, in Your presence we’ll stay. (Hymns #1194)
– We are washing all our robes the tree of life to eat; / “O Lord, Amen, Hallelujah!”—Jesus is so sweet! / We our spirits exercise, and thus experience Christ. / What a Christ have we! (Hymns #1151)
– Dear Lord, Thou art the Tree of Life, / The very life supply; / Thy fruits, replete with life divine, / Our hunger satisfy. / Thou art the true and heav’nly Vine, / Our very source of life; / By Thee we live, in Thee abide, / And rest from all our strife. (Hymns #198)
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The tree of life was a symbol, signifying God as the proper source (cf Psa. 36:9; John 1:4; 10:10b; 11:25; 14:6; 1 John 5:12; Col. 3:4). If we only read Genesis 2, we will be unable to understand the meaning of the tree of life. However, the Gospel of John reveals the life denoted by the tree of life in a concrete way John 1:4 says, “In Him was life,” and John 15:5 tells us that the Lord Jesus is a vine tree. If we put these two verses together, we will realize that Christ is the tree of life. Jesus, the embodiment of God, is the tree of life. Therefore, the tree of life in Genesis 2 is a symbol of God as the source of life. Besides this source, there is another tree, another source in the universe—death. However, this tree is not called the tree of death; it is called the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. There is such a tree in this universe. These two trees oppose one another, the tree of life denoting God as the source of life, and the tree of knowledge signifying Satan as the source of death. As God is the source of life, Satan is the source of death. Therefore, in Genesis 2 we find two sources signified by two trees. Life-study of Genesis, pp. 160-162, by Witness Lee
We have a choice today: we can choose Christ as the tree of life, or we can choose the tree of knowledge of good and evil.
Hallelujah, God is embodied in Christ to be our life, and we can exercise our spirit to partake of Him as life!
Our God will never force us to follow Him. Every day, we must choose Jesus as our God of life. We can express God only by having Jesus as the God of life.
The Scriptures begin with the tree of life, and end with the tree of life. So, the thought of God being our life runs through the entire Bible.
Praise the Lord that He has planted Himself as life in our spirit, and we are now free to turn to the God of life as our source and our nourishment every moment of every day.
Amen! As Moses told the people in Deut 30, “I set before you life & death, blessing & cursing. Choose life…”
What a blessing and a mercy to know that God has given us the freedom of choice according to His original intention in placing man before the Tree of Life to take Him – Christ as the embodiment of God – in the form of food!
The enjoyment of this One should be the primary matter in our church life because it brings us back to God’s original intention with Himself as our source for the corporate expression of the Triune God!
just like Adam our God who is so great has given us a free will to choose him as the tree of life and the source of life or the tree of knowledge of good and evil which is the source of death may we be those who choose to eat and enjoy the Lord as the tree of life, and may we choose life today!
Amen Lord for the tree of life! Thank You for unveiling us to see our need of the tree of life a symbol of God as the source of life.
We want to exercise our free will to choose and enjoy You as the source of live and live because of You for the fulfillment of God eternal purpose!
May we receive the abundance of grace today to reign in life through the One, Jesus Christ!
Oh Lord thank you for reminding us again, we want live according to the tree of life not the tree of knowledge!
Amen brother, the Lord will not force us to partake of Him, neither did He put the tree of life in us when we were created! He desires us to choose Him,
Even though God is omnipotent to do whatever He wants to do, He never forced us to choose what He wants. He gave us free will to choose either death or life.
God’s purpose and intention with man as unveiled in the first chapter of Genesis are for man to express God and for man to represent God. The way accomplish God’s purpose is unveiled in chapter 2 , the Tree of Life which signifies Christ as the embodiment of the Triune God as Life to man in the form of food/ Tree to please and satisfy man. Hallelujah!!!
But there is the need for us to exercise our will to choose. To choose Christ over satan, to choose life over death, to choose blessing and not curse.
God’s placing man in front of the Tree of Life shows that God wants man to receive Him as his life to become the constituent of man’s being. Amen.
Amen! Fill us with Your love Lord Jesus. Dispense Yourself into us, fill us with Your attributes, transform us into Your image! Thank you dear brother.
Amen Lord, keep us enjoying you as the tree of life.
Amen. I was touched that in Genesis God is represented by the tree of life, the tree of life being the reality of the Triune God and the tree of knowledge representing Satan.
Satan is always frustrating Gods move , distracting the believers …Matthew 16 Peter thought he was saying something good to the Lord, but the Lord rebuked him calling Him Satan get behind me!
Saints! The lord is not merely interested in what we are doing but in whether we are in our soul or in our spirit.
May we open up to the Lord as the reality of the tree of life that we take him as our life! Our food ! Our drink ! Our air !
The tree of life in reality is our supply for our enjoyment of Christ , the all inclusive Christ!
Finally in the end of revelations the ultimate consummation of the tree of knowledge is the lake of fire. And the ultimate consummation of the tree of life is the city of water the New Jerusalem!!
Amen. Psalm 36: 8 They feast on the abundance of your house; you give them drink from your river of delights.