Isaiah12.org

 

Let’s try and summarize.

The tree of the knowledge of good and evil is a very good gift from God. It’s the gift of freedom and choice to His children.

God is love. He is a lover. He loves you. He wants you to love Him but He gives you the choice. He lets you choose. He will keep on loving you regardless of how you choose. Isn’t that what love is all about? For there to be love, true love, there must also be situations and circumstances where love must soldier on against all odds, against rejection. Love never fails but it must be given the opportunity to.

God warned his children about eating from the tree because He loved them and knew they would be severely damaged if they ate. He also knew that when they did eat He would take it upon Himself to comfort, mend, and heal His broken children. He would give His life to give them back theirs.

The tree offers us the option to choose God or MAKE UP an alternative. There is actually, in reality, no alternative to God – He is all there is. There is no other place to go. There is no separation. There is only the alternative to turn and hide ourselves in an illusion of our own making within our own minds.

I’m reminded of how my children when they were small would play this silly hiding game. You’ve probably seen it. While standing in plain sight of everyone they would cover up their eyes and thinking they were invisible would ask us to search for them. We all do this – cover up our eyes and live in the darkness of our own minds.

Are you getting the picture?

 

 

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Okay more on the tree …

Did you notice the tree is NOT the tree OF good and evil? Rather, it’s the tree of the KNOWLEDGE of good and evil. Why is this important?

The tree represents an alternative way of thinking … of knowing. You mean there are alternative ways of thinking? Yes. We can think (know) about good (God) and all that IS (truth). Or we can think (know) about NOT God and all that IS NOT (illusion, fear, envy, etc.). There is much more to come on this but let’s look at a quick example.

Fear. Let’s say you are afraid you might lose your job and your insides are all worked up over it. You know how this goes – your mind races with images of you in desperation, hungry, homeless, mistreated, cold, and on and on. Are any of these images real? Do they exist? Do they represent reality, truth? Perhaps your mind is venturing into the KNOWLEDGE of evil – into the realm of things that are NOT God and the result is fear.

 

1 John 4:8 (ESV)
⁸ Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love.

1 John 4:18 (ESV)
¹⁸ There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear. For fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not been perfected in love.

 

Did you see that? A mind that is focusing on WHAT IS (love) is a mind that casts out fear. Fear is evidence of a mind that is focusing on WHAT IS NOT God.

 Are your thoughts going down the WHAT IS (good) path or the WHAT IS NOT (evil) path?

Are you thinking about what you’re thinking about?

It’s your choice.

 

 

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This tree has to be one of the most interesting and most misunderstood concepts in the Bible.

It is essential for you to get a proper understanding of what this tree is all about. If you miss it you will miss most everything else in the Bible.

It’s complicated and will therefore take a few posts. We’ll work through it by asking questions.

Is the tree good?

Yes. God created it and so from this we know it must be good.

Why is it good?

This my friend is where the misunderstandings begin. The tree is a gift. It’s God’s gift of free choice to mankind. It’s God giving man the ability to choose God (good) or NOT God (evil).

Hmmm. You mean it wasn’t a test of obedience? Wasn’t God testing Adam to see if he would obey?

No. It was a gift – an extremely loving but dangerous gift to the man and woman that God loved. Freedom is a dangerous thing. Just ask any parent of a driving teenager. I love my teenagers and one day I turned over the car keys to them for their first solo run. I could have said no you can’t drive by yourself because you might get hurt or hurt someone else. But I wanted them to have the gift of freedom and with it came the potential for great harm. You get the picture?

Didn’t God punish Adam for eating from the tree?

No. Man punished himself – shot himself in the foot, ate the poison, used his freedom to wreck the car.

Well why did God warn Adam not to eat from the tree?

For the same reason you would tell a child not to touch the stove - because you love them and don’t want them to get hurt.

That’s enough for one post. There is a bunch here so take some time and chew on it.

 

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You’re familiar with this tree right – the one first presented in Genesis 2?

What is this tree and why is it in the garden of Eden?

First we must ask this: “what is life?” Well, there’s not much mystery here.

 

John 1:4 (ESV)
⁴ In him (the son) was life, and the life was the light of men.

John 5:26 (ESV)
²⁶ For as the Father has life in himself, so he has granted the Son also to have life in himself.

 

God has life in himself. God is alive. He is all that is alive. He is living. He is all that is living.

Life is in God and nowhere else since God is all there is.

You are alive because God is alive and you exist in Him.

Your life is not your life - it’s God’s life and you are a part of God’s life because you are in Him.

The tree of life in the garden which God said could be eaten of freely is an illustration of this concept. Do you get it?

 

One more thing. Death. What is it? Is it the opposite of life? Are they ontological opposites?

No. Death is not a thing. It doesn’t exist. It’s the absence of a thing – life. We lose our life. Right?

 

 

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