Jesus Christ: The Tree of Life - 5

Have you ever wondered what it was that Adam and Eve saw when they went to the center of the Garden of Eden and the Tree of Life and the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil stood side by side? The contrast is extraordinary.

Remember one thing concerning Adam and Eve at this portion of their lives: they saw things as they were, so when they viewed these two trees that didn't have an origin on Earth, they saw them in a unique way, and how they saw them, especially with Eve, was a huge factor in the fateful decision to eat of the wrong tree.

It's tempting to really get into the depths of what really happened at that time, but the simplicity of it is enough, because in the end, that was one of the key elements of what was going on.

Paul mentions that in the time of the temptation of Eve, she was deceived concerning maintaining the simplicity of devotion to Christ. That was the major issue concerning the two trees. One offered simplicity, devotion and dependence on the life of Christ, and fellowship with Him, while the other offered independence from God, and a different type of knowledge, wisdom and food.

This is the center of the powerful story of Martha and Mary, where Martha attempted to influence Jesus to get Mary away from being centered on Him, where Jesus responded it was really the only thing that mattered, and He wasn't going to take that away from her.

Satan offered Eve the opportunity to be like God, without the help and dependence upon God; without the need to internalize and fellowship with Him within, which is part of what it meant to eat the fruit of the tree. To eat it meant to internalize the relationship we were offered with Christ.

The other major element was that the Tree of Life, or Christ, wasn't an attractive tree, whereas the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil was, as represented by Satan, who was a beautiful being at one time.

While spiritually Christ as the Tree of Life was attractive from the point of view of God, to natural man he wasn't, as the cross was at the center of the Tree, and built into it. This is something many Christians to this day resist. It's one of the major reasons much of the inner fellowship with Christ isn't pursued, because it means dying to self, and the application of the work of the cross within. Not many are willing to go that route anymore.

So when Satan started getting Eve's eyes fixated on the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, the idea was to get her to completely forget about the Tree of Life, which he succeeded at doing. History has unveiled the results of that mistake.

When Adam and Eve viewed the two trees, the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil was far more attractive and conducive to humanity than the counterintuitive Tree of Life. Even in their sinless state, immediately before partaking of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, the desire for an easier way to live was pursued by the old man; the first Adam.

What's interesting, taking into account that Eve was deceived but Adam wasn't, is that even though Adam wasn't deceived, he preferred to internalize a life form contrary to who God was. It looked wiser and easier, but in the end it was devastating and resulted in life being even harder.

To this day the major job our spiritual enemy continues to do is keep our eyes off of the simplicity of devotion to Christ, and eat of a tree that complicates and distracts us from that simple fellowship with Him, which is how Jesus describes of eternal life is, which was embedded in Him, the Tree of Life.

We must battle to eat of the Tree of Life once again, and remind one another to do it often. More on this in the next post.

Jesus Christ: The Tree of Life Series

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6

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Jesus Christ: The Tree of Life - 4

Now we have God no longer on the scene in Eden, at least not in the way He was at times directly communicating with Adam.

At that time, the serpent starts to communicate with Eve concerning the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Notice how there isn't anything mentioned about the Tree of Life again.

The entire purpose of the conversation was for Satan to get the attention of Eve solely on the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, in order that she wouldn't think of the Tree of Life.

Paul said in 2 Corinthians 11:3, that he was jealous over them with a godly jealousy, and promised them to one husband: Christ. He wanted to present them as a pure virgin to Christ, but now he was afraid that in the similar way Eve was deceived by the cunning of Satan, their minds would also be led astray from the sincere and pure devotion to Christ.

We get a glimpse into the tree of the knowledge of good and evil here, where it was the opposite of the Tree of Life. The tree of the knowledge of good and evil gets you away from simplicity and sincerity, and into mixture, as far as in relationship with Christ. It makes things complicated and heady. If your life is complicated, you may want to take a look at which tree you're eating from as well.

Jesus said this in a different way when Martha protested her sister not helping her because she sat at the feet of Jesus listening to Him teach. Jesus' response was that there was nothing else that really mattered, and He wouldn't take that away from Mary.

A people centered around Christ is all that matters. That's the battle that was going on from the first interaction between man and Satan, and it's still the same battle raging today. Satan is still tempting us to look to the tree of the knowledge of good and evil at the expense of Christ Himself.

Jesus Christ: The Tree of Life Series

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6

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Without Jesus, We can do Nothing

When Jesus said without Him we could do nothing, He wasn't just giving us an idea that He couldn't relate to, rather, He also said that without the Father, He could do nothing as well. He was speaking from a reality that He lived and experienced.

I've known a lot of people that take this the wrong way and feel guilty about their lacks because of this statement by Jesus. Instead it should be completely liberating to us as we then can know that we don't have to be or do anything but fellowship and love Him within us.

Out of that beautiful, organic experience, we can simply be with Him and share the love back to Him that he gives to us.

If anything more comes of it, great, but there's nothing that we can do through effort that will make it happen. Even the desire to want to will elude us if we think there is anything we can do outside of Christ.

It is from this that a truly living people can be born of God together as they share that live of Christ on a day-to-day basis together. There is nothing else that Jesus and the Father did before creation except to fellowship in that way.

Creation came forth because of the inability of God to keep something like that love to Himself. It had to be shared because God is love.

Let us not desire anything else but that love of the Father and Christ to share with one another in simplicity. But we can only ask the Lord to live that in us and through us. Why? Because without Him we can do nothing.