Christ as the Tree of Life is Planted in us and God is Rebuilding us with Himself

When we believers in Christ were regenerated, Christ planted Himself into us as the tree of life, and now we are branches of Christ, firmly grafted into Him; however, because we still live in the line of the tree of the knowledge, God is stripping and consuming us to rebuild us with Himself so that we may be God-men seeking God and living Christ.

Lord Jesus, thank You for planting Yourself into us as the tree of life. Hallelujah, Christ is the tree of life in our spirit, and we are joined to the Lord as one spirit! Amen, Lord, grow in us today. Grow in us and live in us. We choose to live in the line of life. We choose to eat You as the tree of life. Have Your way in our being, Lord, through Your work of stripping and consuming, that we may be torn down and rebuilt with God to be God-men on the line of life. Amen!

This week we have been prayerfully considering the book of Job to see the topic of Job and the two trees. In the divine revelation, there are two trees as two sources issuing in two ways, two principles, and two consummations.

One tree is the tree of life, which is God Himself in Christ coming to us in the form of food for us to partake of Him and live because of Him to fulfil God’s purpose.

Eating the tree of life issues in us living in the line of life, for we take the tree of life as our source, and we do all things in the principle of life.

If we eat the tree of life and remain on the line of life, we will consummate in the city of water of life, the New Jerusalem, to eat the tree of life for eternity! Amen!

However, eating the tree of the knowledge of good and evil issues in being on the line of death, which means that we live according to the principle of death and the result is the lake of fire.

There are two sources issuing in two lines with two principles of living and two consummations, and in the book of Job we see how both Job and his friends were on the line of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

Their logic was according to the wrong tree; they were halted in the knowledge of right and wrong, not knowing God’s economy.

We need to see a vision of the tree of life, God in Christ as food, and we need to eat the tree of life and depend on God as life in our daily life.

For eternity, the tree of life will be our portion; however, today we need to eat the Lord as the tree of life and live because of HIm in our daily living.

Christ Planted Himself into us as the Tree of Life at the Time and now He Grows in us

We were born of our physical parents, and we lived on the line of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. When we were regenerated, Christ planted Himself into us as the tree of life (see John 1:12-13; 3:3, 5-6, 15; 11:25; 15:1, 5).

When we were regenerated, we received a new life; this new life is Christ Himself. When we repented and believed into the Lord, we were given the authority to be children of God, those who are born of God.

We have His life and nature. Through regeneration we are born not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man but of God. This is how we enter into the kingdom of God.

We were part of the kingdom of Satan, but we are now part of the kingdom of God.

Nicodemus asked the Lord Jesus how he could enter into the kingdom of God, and the Lord said that unless one is born anew, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God.

Thank the Lord that we were born anew, and Christ planted Himself as the tree of life into us!

However, in our practical living, we may not be in the line of the tree of life but in the line of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil (Prov. 16:25; 21:2).

We do what seems to be right in our own eyes, but the end of doing this is the ways of death. Oh Lord!

We may choose to do the good, we may reject evil, but when we do what we think is good, the result is death, for this is the way of death.

Yes, we are regenerated, but what about our daily living? Do we choose to live on the line of life today? Do we partake of the tree of life and live according to the principle of life today?

We need to be transformed by the renewing of our mind. We need to be renewed in our mind to think the way the Lord thinks and choose the tree of life.

We need to seek the Lord. Like Adam in the garden of Eden, we today have a choice: we can choose to eat of the tree of life or we can partake of the many fruits of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

God wants us to eat the tree of life. Christ planted Himself as the tree of life into our spirit at the time of our regeneration, and now we need to turn to Him, enjoy Him, partake of the tree of life, and live by the tree of life.

If we eat Christ as life, if we partake of Christ as the tree of life in our daily life, the divine life in our spirit will grow and spread into our mind to make it the mind of Christ, and it will occupy and possess our emotions and will.

The sad situation with us, however, is that too many times we still eat the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. We not only eat of this tree; this tree is growing in us.

The more we advance in human life, the more we grow humanly and learn things, the more the tree of the knowledge of good and evil grows in us.

There are two trees growing in us in parallel, depending on how much we eat of them.

If we eat of the tree of life, if we pray-read the Word of God and call on the name of the Lord, the tree of life grows in us, and we become men of life.

But if we focus on ethics, morality, doing good, not doing wrong things but doing the right things, and knowledge of good and evil, the tree of knowledge grows in us. Oh Lord.

We may be good Christians, moral Christians, even kind and gentle Christians, but we are the embodiment of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, and we live in the way of death to spread death. This is very practical.

We need to turn to our spirit. We need to realise that, as Paul said in Galatians 2:20, we were crucified with Christ and it is no longer we who live but Christ who lives in us.

We need to pray-read this verse and allow the Lord to live in us. In our speaking with our spouse in married life, we need to let Christ speak and live in us.

We shouldn’t try to improve ourselves or stop before speaking to consider what we’re saying; we simply need to turn to the Lord and let Him speak in us.

If we still try to say the right thing, not to offend others, and do the things that are good, we fertilise the tree of the knowledge to make it grow and lead us to death.

But if we turn to Christ in our spirit, the tree of life grows and is manifested in us.

We may have a problem with our spouse; instead of saying anything or expressing our anger, we should simply pray-read the Lord’s word and care for Christ living in us.

This should be our way in our daily living; we have Christ planted in us as the tree of life, and now we need to live by this tree!

Lord Jesus, thank You for planting Yourself as the tree of life in our spirit at the time of our regeneration! Hallelujah, the tree of life is in us, in our spirit, and we can turn to our spirit to enjoy life and be filled with life! Amen, Lord, we turn. We turn from any knowledge, good, and evil, and we simply choose life. We come back to the tree of life. Amen, Lord, remind us to turn from trying to be moral, ethical, and good, to being in our spirit! Hallelujah, we are crucified with Christ, and now Christ lives in us! Amen, Lord, it is no longer we who live but Christ who lives in us! Live in us today, dear Lord. Live in us a life that expresses God. We stop our being. We stop our trying. We simply turn to our spirit. We want to be in the realm of our spirit, where life is. Amen, Lord, we want to live one spirit with You today! We don’t just want to deal with our temper, stop our anger, or not say any lies or offenses; we want to be in our spirit! Hallelujah, the tree of life is in our spirit! Amen!

God’s Intention is to Tear us Down and Rebuild us with Himself as our Life and Nature for us to be One with Him to Live Christ

In the book of Job we see how this dear one, Job, pursued something in the realm of ethics; we believers in Christ need to pursue something in the realm of God (1 Cor. 15:28; Eph. 3:16-21).

We should not pursue human perfection or uprightness, neither should we merely fear God and stay away from evil. This is not good enough.

What God wants is not a good man who pursues good and rejects evil; He wants a God-man who lives Christ.

In our daily living, we should not be in the realm of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil but in the realm of the life-giving Spirit (1 Cor. 15:45; Rom. 8:2).

Christ as the tree of life has been planted in our spirit, and now the Spirit of life frees us in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and of death.

However, many times we still try to improve ourselves, we try to do the good, and we want to be ethical and moral.

Because of this, God has to come in and do in us what He has done with Job: He is tearing us down and rebuilding us with Himself as our life and nature so that we may be persons absolutely one with Him (2 Cor. 1:9; 4:14).

May the Lord shine on us to show us that He desires not a moral man, an ethical man, or an upright and perfect man; He wants to gain persons on the line of life, those who are absolutely one with God.

God’s purpose in His creation of man is to obtain a corporate man for His expression and representation.

God’s purpose in dealing with man is to obtain an open vessel to dispense Himself into man and make man the same as He is in life and nature.

The whole Bible speaks about this, for this is God’s eternal economy.

For God to gain a God-man, for Him to gain a vessel for Him to dispense Himself into man and obtain a corporate expression of Himself in man, He needs to first tear down and consume us and then rebuild us with Himself.

He is stripping and consuming us not because He wants to punish us or because we have done something wrong; He is doing this to rebuild us with Himself.

God’s stripping and His consuming are to tear us down. We are still fallen and natural men, and as such, we still live in our natural man and are still fallen. So God needs to tear down the natural man and rebuild us with Himself.

God doesn’t want to repair the old man or somehow make it whole by improving it or perfecting it.

He wants to tear down and strip us so that He may rebuild us with Himself as our life and nature so that we may be persons who are absolutely one with Him.

God uses Satan as an ugly tool to tear us down and strip us, even to consume us.

He used Satan as an ugly tool to tear down and consume Job so that Job would be open to the Lord and, when he sees God, he would simply allow God to infuse him and he would gain God.

God uses Satan with his stripping and consuming to tear us down so that God may have a base and a way to rebuild us with God Himself for us to be God-men.

Job did not understand this, and many Christians do not understand what is the purpose of the suffering with the stripping and consuming.

The answer is God’s economy. The answer to God’s stripping and consuming us is that God wants to dispense Himself in His Divine Trinity int he Father, in the Son, and in the Spirit into us.

He went through a process to become a man, live a perfect human life, die on the cross, resurrect, ascend, and be outpoured as the Spirit into us, His chosen and redeemed people.

Now He is taking us through a process to make us the same as God in life and nature but not in the Godhead so that we may be His duplication and reproduction as a corporate God-man to express God and represent God.

The issue of the divine dispensing is the church as the Body of Christ, the new man, and the organism of the Triune God, and it consummates in the New Jerusalem as the enlarged and increased incarnation of God consummated in full! Hallelujah!

Lord Jesus, unveil us to see why do we go through sufferings. May we realise that God is using Satan as an ugly tool to strip us and consume us so that we may be vessels open to the Lord for His divine dispensing. Amen, Lord, we open to You. Grant us to open to You a little more today. Dispense Yourself into us more. Gain an opening in us. Have Your way in our being. We just open, Lord, and we allow You to work Yourself into us. You see how natural we are and how much we lack God. You see how much we still live according to the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Bring us fully in the line of the tree of life. Lord Jesus, we give ourselves to You! We do not want to be more upright or moral; we just want to gain more of God! We don’t seek more human perfection; we want to let You work Yourself into us! Oh Lord Jesus, dispense Yourself into us and make us the same as You are in life, nature, expression, and function, but not in the Godhead! Amen!

References and Hymns on this Topic

• Inspiration for this article/sharing comes from the Word of God, the enjoyment in the ministry, a sharing by the brothers on this topic, and portions from, Life-study of Job, msgs. 13, 16, and 36-38, by Witness Lee, as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, Noah, Daniel, and Job – Patterns of Living an Overcoming Life on the Line of Life to Fulfill the Economy of God (2026 International Chinese-Speaking Conference), week 4, Job and the Two Trees – day 6.
• Hymns on this topic:
  – A flowing river and a tree, / Eden’s outstanding features are, / Man to supply with food and drink / That he may live fore’er. / God is in Christ to be my supply, / God as the Spirit nourisheth me; / If upon Christ in spirit I feed, / Filled with His life I’ll be. (Hymns #509 stanza 1 and chorus)
  – Oh, what a life! Oh, what a peace! / The Christ who’s all within me lives. / With Him I have been crucified; / This glorious fact to me He gives. / Now it’s no longer I that live, / But Christ the Lord within me lives. / Now it’s no longer I that live, / But Christ the Lord within me lives. (Hymns #499 stanza 1)
  – The Lord Himself is food to me, / He is my life supply; / He will my pure enjoyment be, / None else can satisfy. / 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 stanzas 3-4)