TREE OF LIFE

(I wrote this piece as I am going through a serious health crisis and as my family and I mourn the anniversary of our infant daughter who passed away. Take courage friends.)

The night Azusa died the Lord was so close.  I don’t think I’ve ever experienced the love of God so intensely, I have never been more convinced of His love for me.

As He ministered to my heart I shared bits and pieces of thoughts that were flooding my mind.  I wrote a few simple notes a few days later and have dwelled on them for the last year, especially as I would come to the Lord to have fellowship with Him.

This sudden sickness I have experienced at the one year anniversary of the most defining moment of my life tried to challenge these thoughts, but reinforced the great truth Jesus conveys to me in the midst of His suffering on the cross- I HAVE LOVED YOU WITH AN UNFAILING LOVE.

On September 30 2024, as I held the body of my infant daughter who had passed into glory, the Lord showed me a picture of the Tree of Life and the tree of knowledge.  

As I looked at the tree of knowledge of good and  evil I could feel the broken heart of God.  “I never wanted you to eat from here.” 

I had never experienced the pain I was experiencing in those moments.  I had eaten from the tree of knowledge.  Now I knew something I did not previously know.

When Adam and Eve chose to eat from this tree the die was cast for us.  Instead of life forevermore we inherit pain.

Some of it is earned, we undeniably court the tree of knowledge by our idolatry and insistence of being our own god.  We sow destruction and are bewildered when we reap destruction.

Some of it is the consequence of the fallen world we live in.  In this instance it was hard to understand why this was the cup placed in front of me. I did not desire this. I could sense that Jesus was there with me, holding and weeping over me.  Was this what He desired?

I have had well meaning people explain to me every scenario of what was actually happening.  This is the will of God, this is a demonic attack, this is demonic in nature but God is using it for His purposes.  I don’t fully understand, neither does anyone else who claims to understand.  Why court the tree of knowledge?

I refuse to land in a place that I could understand, I fully reject the concept of it.  The desire to obtain this kind of understanding is the temptation Eve was faced with.  It gives birth to death, it is not from God.

James 1:13-15 13 Let no one say when he is tempted, “I am being tempted by God”; for God cannot be tempted by evil, and He Himself does not tempt anyone. 

(God is not inviting us to carry the understanding He has, to pursue it is not from Him.)

14 But each one is tempted when he is carried away and enticed by his own lust. 

(The desire to be like God. To judge, to execute, to rule.) 

15 Then when lust has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and when sin is accomplished, it brings forth death.

(The taste of this fruit is addicting, the god it becomes demands life.)

It was clear that the desire to understnad, the need for things to make sense, even eventually, was a fruit that had to be rejected wholesale. 

Even still, questions remained.  Lord, what happens next?

As I held my precious Azusa my heart was overwhelmed.  

Psalm 42:7 Deep calls to deep at the sound of Your waterfalls; All Your breakers and Your waves have rolled over me.

I knew then as I have known in every dark night I have experienced- I need Jesus.  My soul could only receive from Him, it was all I desired.

C.S. Lewis remarks, towards the end of A Grief Observed something that helped me.

“I need Christ, not something that resembles Him”

He is talking about looking at pictures of his deceased wife, and how it doesn’t actually truly represent her.

He correlates it to how we try to imagine God and think we truly behold Him.  What a foolish notion, what an idolatrous ideal.

“My idea of God is not a divine idea. It has to be shattered time after time. He shatters it Himself. He is the great iconoclast.”

No amount of imagination of what God might say to me or what I hoped He would say matters.  I didn’t need to find scriptures to justify what was happening in my life, I needed and continue to need Jesus.  I need His presence, I need Him to speak.  This is the Tree of Life.

In John 5 Jesus points out to men who thought they had obtained knowledge of the Holy.

John 5:39-40 39 You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; it is these that testify about Me; 40 and you are unwilling to come to Me so that you may have life.

There is nothing wrong with having a systematic theology, the problem lies in making it the god you serve.  Jesus cannot be contained in your viewpoint, the very thought of making Him crawl into what you can understand is vile.  Is He King or is He your statue?

The more I thought about eating from the tree of knowledge the more of an anathema it became.  

I could hear the Lord so clear that night in the hospital.  “COME TO ME FOR LIFE”.  I knew what was happening was beyond my control and could only surrender to the One who was in control.

In John 6 Jesus is revealing Himself as the Tree of Life.  “Eat my flesh, drink My blood, live forever.”  This is incredibly offensive to anyone who is striving to find life in something other than Christ, even today.  

I am convinced our churches are full of people who are bound for hell unless they surrender and come to Jesus for life.  It is never to late for the pew warmer, they can abandon the tree they eat from and come to LIFE.

John 6:63-64 63 It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh profits nothing; the words that I have spoken to you are spirit and are life. 64 But there are some of you who do not believe.

My response to the Lord that night was not in fear and trembling, uncertain of what might happen next; it was a response of a broken man who was lovesick for his Savior.  It’s what Peter said to Jesus when so many others walked away.

Lord, to whom shall we go? You have words of eternal life. (John 6:68)

I will never be afforded answers for most of life’s questions.  When I am, it is a gift of revelation, usually given to be used for the common good of others.  That is more than fine.  

I don’t ever want to consciously eat from the tree of knowledge; and when I find that what I have deceived myself into eating, from this tree that brings death, I want to quickly obtain mercy.

I want the rest of the time I have on earth to be found living in the shadow of the Tree of Life.  Healing is in it’s leaves, it bears an abundance of  fruit in every season, it is life forevermore.