The Two Trees

Have you ever diligently looked for something and could not find it? After a while did you give up? Maybe you discovered what you were looking for was concealed under something. But what if the thing you were looking for was a matter of life and death, would you continue looking for it?   

In reading God’s Word, He often reveals what we are looking for, and He always reveals the truth. Let’s take a walk back to the beginning. The Bible tells us that in the beginning, the earth was without form and void. There was nothing. But something was waiting to be revealed.

God spoke and what was not there before now was. Over six days, God spoke into existence His creation, both in the heavens and on the earth. On that sixth day, He created man. Out of man, He formed woman. He placed them in the garden called Eden and gave them life-or-death instructions. God said, “See I have given you every herb that yields seed which is on the face of the earth, and every tree whose fruit yields seed, for you it shall be for food.”

God planted a garden eastward in Eden and placed the man there, out of the ground God caused every tree that was good for food and pleasant to look at to grow. Also, in the Garden were the Tree of Life and The Tree of the Knowledge of good and evil

Then the Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to tend and keep it. And the Lord God commanded the man saying, “Of every tree of the garden you may freely eat; but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.

Enter the cunning serpent – You shall not surely die, he said to Eve, but your eyes will be opened and you will be like God – knowing good and evil.  Satan was concealing the truth that God had revealed to His creation.

In the beginning / God revealed Truth and unveiled His will for mankind. He is still doing that today through His Word.

Now we live in the in-between where satan conceals truth and keeps us veiled from the truth. But it does not have to be that way. We can search diligently for the truth and God will help us find it.

Have you wondered about the Tree of Life? Where it is? Genesis tells us that God sent Adam and Eve out of the Garden of Eden and put an angel with a flaming sword at the entrance to guard the Tree.

As time would have it we now live on the other side of the New Testament. We read over and over that Jesus is the Way, the Truth, and the Life. Paul gives us the fruit of the Spirit in Galatians 5. The writer of Hebrews reveals that those who seek God diligently will be rewarded.

Although the Tree of the knowledge of good and evil dwells in us at birth through our sinful nature caused by man’s fall through satan’s lies, when we realize who the evil one is and repent from our sins, we can live eating of the Tree of Life.

As we live in the in-between, here are 3 truths:

1.    But God has revealed them to us through His Spirit. For the Spirit searches all things, yes, the deep things of God….we have received the Spirit who is from God that we might know the things that have been freely given to us by God. (I Corinthians 2:10-12).

2.    Christ is in us – The Tree of Life – the hope of God’s glory (Colossians 1:27).

3.    However, when He, the Spirit of Truth has come He will guide you into all truth; for He will not speak on His own authority, but whatever He hears He will speak; and He will tell you things to come (John 16:13).

The Tree of Life that grew in the Garden of Eden now grows on the inside of us through the nature of Christ. This nature constantly reveals the Truth to us. As we walk out this life and get closer to the end, God will reveal all things as we read in Revelation which is the unveiling of the Risen Jesus Christ.

I urge you to stop eating from the tree of knowledge of good and evil. Period. Yet, in our culture, it can be confusing just exactly what that means. Our next blog will reveal some truths about that tree.

Until next time, Remember the matter of the heart is the heart of the matter!

Dr. Michele

July 28, 2024

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