THE TREE OF LIFE

^{Gen. 2:8,9} “Then God planted a garden in Eden, in the east. He put the Man he had just made in it. God made all kinds of trees grow from the ground, trees beautiful to look at and good to eat.  The Tree-of-Life was in the middle of the garden, also the Tree-of-Knowledge-of-Good-and-Evil.”  MSG

1.  The Male Adam was made from the ground or dirt.  The trees God made that were beautiful to look at and good to eat were also from the ground or dirt.

2.  The Tree-of-Life was from heaven not the dirt.  Adam and Eve were allowed to eat it.  This was God’s provision for them to live forever.

3.  The Tree-of Knowledge-of-Good-and-Evil was also from heaven not from the dirt.  The “Knowledge” or better yet “Mature Wisdom” from this tree was not necessarily destructive.  James Jordon teaches that if Adam and Eve had remained close to God and continued loyalty and trust toward God they would have eventually matured to be able to handle the Wisdom of this tree.  They would have had the emotional capacity to see EVIL and not be shaken by it, not be hurt by the EVIL that is present.  As we age we should be maturing and operating in greater Godly wisdom (able to handle the Knowledge of Good and Evil and understand that we must act Godly.)

Eve was deceived but Adam sinned by remaining silent

and being compliant:

^{Gen. 3:22} God said, “The Man has become like one of us, capable of knowing everything, ranging from good to evil. What if he now should reach out and take fruit from the Tree-of-Life and eat, and live forever? Never—this cannot happen!”

Now they had been eating from The TREE OF LIFE up until this time.  They regularly ate from all the trees in the garden including the TREE OF LIFE. Then they slipped up and ate from the bad one.  If they had remained in the garden they could have continued to eat from the tree of life and lived forever.  It is bad enough living 80, 90 or 100 years here with the knowledge of Evil and seeing it happen everyday and not knowing how to handle it or deal with it.  What horror to live forever suffering seeing Evil and being hurt by it.

In verse :22 the word take…and eat (of the tree of Life) can mean to possess it, (“take a wife”) suggests a forever relationship or even ownership.

If there was a fountain of youth on top of Look out Mountain the whole world would swamp the place for a drink.  Or someone would want to posses it or own it and sell it to everybody else.

There is something more valuable than the Tree of Life, or a fountain of youth.  It is Jesus Christ and a real, genuine, daily, close and experiential relationship with Him.  He told us He came to:

John 10:10  “…My purpose is to give them a rich and satisfying life.”  NLT and, ” …I came so they can have real and eternal life, more and better life than they ever dreamed of.”  MSG

Give up your illusion of KNOWING what’s best, good or better.  Just simply Trust and follow Jesus, experience Him everyday and you’ll experience LIFE now and eternally.