The tree of life

The tree of life is the total happiness for which man was designed by creation before man sinned. Any references to the tree of life are confined generally to three books in the Bible, the first and the last, Genesis and Revelation, and some interesting references in Proverbs. Full capacity for eternal blessing and happiness is related to the tree of life and as we have it in this passage (Rev. 2:7) it is a special reward that belongs only to a few.

The tree of life of course is related to immortality, for capacity for blessing and happiness; it is perpetuated without any act of volition. In eternity there will be no volitional tests whereby we can lose salvation or anything related to salvation. In other words, in eternity man will not be able in his resurrection body to repeat the fall of our original parents in the Garden. The tree of life is related to immortality under the status of eternal happiness; there are degrees of happiness in heaven. The losers and the winners are the two categories of believers in heaven, in eternity. The winners are those who cracked the maturity barrier, advancing from gate four to gate eight in the divine dynasphere. The losers are the believers who lived out their lives in the cosmic system. The losers or cosmic believers have a resurrection body but they do not have the privilege of eating at the tree of life.

“in the midst of the paradise of God,” en plus the locative of paradeisoj, a transliteration from the Persian word which came through the Hebrew, pardes — a place where you had a great time. It was a place where the Persian kings threw their parties and therefore it is associated with happiness. In eternity, in heaven, there is a special park, the Paradise belonging to God, where stands the tree of life. Access is open to everyone in Paradise but the privilege of eating from the tree of life belongs only to the winners, believers who live inside the divine dynasphere and advance to maturity.

There are four categories of trees in the garden of Eden, Genesis 2:9. First category: every tree being desirable to the sight; second category: and those good for food; third category: and the tree of life in the middle of the garden; category four: and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

Category one is a category designed for the prosperity of the soul. All happiness in mankind must relate to man’s soul: to his self-consciousness, to his frontal lobes, the emotion (which by itself is a disaster) which was designed to be responsive to thought in the soul, the volition which is not an issue in eternity but is an issue in time. All happiness is related to what you think, and if doctrine is resident in your soul then you have happiness. If you have in the soul capacity for happiness from doctrine, then what you are doing, no matter what it is, is the expression of that happiness. Circumstances make no difference. The first tree in the garden relates to the principle of happiness of soul. Man was created in an environment of happiness for the soul. The woman was taken from man and created in an environment of happiness for the soul. Category one, then, was designed for man’s pleasure of soul, for his capacity for happiness. Man in his original state then derived great pleasure from the observation of category one trees, the trees being desirable to the sight. As created from God, then, man had perfect capacity for happiness. Therefore the state of innocence in the garden was the epitome of great happiness. Man reaped what God sowed, and even though man moved into a state of sin the principle of happiness never changed. The trees were gone but the principle remains: happiness is a state of soul; misery is a state of soul. In the original creation man was created to be a creature of happiness. When man left the garden of his own volition he also walked out on perfect happiness.

Category two trees, mentioned in Genesis 2:9 — “and those good for food.” Fun and happiness has always been associated with eating, and the reason for that is that God designed the taste buds. Then taste buds are not the soul, they are related to the body. And the fact is that man in the garden had happiness of soul and happiness of body. Food was designed to express happiness, to satisfy, to stimulate, to perpetuate health in the human body. Again, the grace principle of blessing: Adam in innocence reaped what God sowed. Stimulation of the taste buds was a reminder of God’s grace before sin, just as eating the bread of the communion table is reminder of exactly the same thing. In our soul, if we have doctrine and when we eat the bread of the communion table it is a reminder of God’s grace after man sinned. The body is the home of the soul. Therefore the first two categories of trees in the garden provided blessing for both body and soul.

Category three tree is the tree of life. The tree of life was both the capacity for happiness plus blessing - total appreciation of God’s grace. Hence the tree of life is the total happiness of man designed by God when He created Adam. By creation, man was created to be happy. He had a perfect soul in a perfect body. Therefore he had perfect origin of happiness, perfect expression of happiness. The temptation came not to Adam but to the woman. And the woman became unhappy. Why? Because she thought God had put one over on her! She thought that God had forbidden the tree of the knowledge of good and evil for one reason: because God was afraid that if the woman, arrogant woman, ate from that tree she would be as smart as God!

By creation man was designed for happiness, blessing, prosperity, which was perpetuated indefinitely unless he used his own free will to reject it all. The only way man could be unhappy was to use his own free will to disobey God and eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, only negative volition toward the plan of God. Man was perpetuated in happiness in the garden indefinitely, there was no termination on the contract unless man terminated it. Only disobedience could destroy the perfect happiness and the perfect capacity for happiness which existed in the garden. The tree of life combined immortality with perfect happiness and could only be lost through Adam’s disobedience. The first sin in life was not a sin related to morality. The greatest sins are never related to morality, they are related to the plan of God. And man’s first sin was simply to eat from a tree on which the fruit was forbidden. Therefore, the first sin and the greatest sin involved no morality at all. What it involved was rejecting perfect happiness provided by God; it was rejecting perfect prosperity provided by God; it was rejecting perfect environment provided by God. In other words, the tree of life would be useless to man in a state of spiritual death from sin, which is his state today. Obviously then the tree of life was provided for man as the ruler of this world. A ruler ought to be happy. If a ruler is happy it filters down. The tree of life would be useless to man in the status of spiritual death. Why? It is impossible to be a sinner and to be happy. Sin destroys happiness. That is why you cannot sin inside the divine dynasphere, and you have to make a decision to get out. This tree was man’s use, then, of positive volition toward the plan of God which made man the ruler of planet earth. And the tree of life is God’s grace provision for man as the ruler of this world. Man was created to resolve the angelic conflict and for an indefinite period of time man had perfect happiness and continued to use positive signals toward divine prohibition. Man was created, however, with free will in order to resolve Satan’s appeal of his sentence to go to the lake of fire, Matthew 25:41. Therefore the tree of life was the expression of man’s positive volition toward God’s provision: perfect happiness, perfect environment. The tree of life was provided under the principle of grace. Man didn’t earn it; man didn’t deserve it.

When man sinned and went into negative volition toward the divine prohibition toward the fourth tree he was driven out of the garden of Eden and cut off from the tree of life — Genesis 3:24. In other words, the tree of life represents two things: perfect happiness and perfect happiness perpetuated. It was cut off so that perfect happiness cannot exist in the human race through the tree of life. As close as you can come to perfect happiness is the status quo of maturity at gate 8. And just as eating at the tree of life meant happiness, so (eating - taking in the Word of God) doctrine in the soul is as close as you can come to the perfect happiness of the garden. There is no other way. And you can destroy that perfect happiness the same way that Adam did: by the use of your own volition. We are the products of our own volition. If man in the status of spiritual death had eaten from the tree of life his human volition or free will would no longer be the means of solving the angelic conflict. Immortality in that status of spiritual death would condemn the human race to the lake of fire with Satan. So in Genesis 3:22-24. You can’t have an old sin nature and eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. That is a contradiction of destruction. You can’t have perfect happiness and sin. You cannot choose simultaneously both the plan of God and the cosmic system of Satan because they are mutually exclusive. Man would have no free will after the fall if he had been permitted to eat of the tree of life, and therefore the tree of life was put out of his reach so that his own free will would determine where he spends eternity — that’s faith in Christ at the cross — and his own free will would determine whether he would be happy or miserable in life. By expelling man from the garden the eating the tree of life was no longer the issue, but the eating of another tree, the cross. Eating is an illustration of faith; it is a non-meritorious function.

The tree of life is total happiness for which man was designed by creation before man sinned. When Adam was created by the Lord he was absolutely perfect and he was designed with a soul and a body to enjoy perfect happiness. Full capacity for eternal blessing and happiness is related to the tree of life as we have it in this passage. It is a special reward for happiness, the highest form of happiness that can exist in a resurrection body. In other words, in eternity man in his resurrection body will not be able in his resurrection body to repeat the fall of the original man. He will not be in a position to use his free will to deny the perfect happiness and to reject it as he had it in the garden. The tree of life is related to immortality under the status of perfect eternal happiness and environment. There are degrees of happiness in heaven just as there are degrees of happiness on earth.

By creation man was designed for happiness and blessing and prosperity which was to be perpetuated indefinitely, and as long as man was positive toward God’s plan that is what happened in the perfect environment of the garden. The prohibition to not eat from the fourth tree was the only thing necessary, he only had to obey this one command. Only disobedience to this one command could destroy his happiness and his relationship with God. Only negative volition, then, toward the plan of God as it was then expressed and revealed was all that could destroy that perfect happiness. The tree of life, of course, combined capacity for happiness with immortality [perfect happiness and immortality go together] and could only be lost by a negative action on the part of the man and the woman. In other words the tree of life would be useless to man in the spiritual status of death. And since man died spiritually when he ate of the tree it was absolutely necessary that the tree of life be closed down until a future time, i.e. eternity. Obviously then the tree of life was provided for man as the ruler of this world. The tree, then, was man’s use of positive volition toward the plan of God. And it should be remembered that the soul is not only the source of great happiness but that happiness is never divorced form virtue. Motivating virtue is virtue directed toward God, worship is a motivating virtue, it has its counterpart in a functional virtue, morality toward man. Then there is personal love for God, which is a virtue, and impersonal love which is directed toward man is a virtue. Confidence in God is a virtue; courage toward man and circumstances is a virtue. Obviously then the tree of life was provided for man to demonstrate as the ruler of this world in perfect environment, both virtue and happiness. Since both are related to the soul and the content of doctrine in the soul they obviously stand or fall together. Man was created with a free will in order that he might continue to choose God’s perfect provision or to reject it.

The tree of life, then, was provided by God’s grace to be associated with man’s positive volition expressed in his free will for the plan of God, while he functions as the ruler of this world from his headquarters in the garden of Eden. And when man sinned or went on negative volition toward the divine provision and the plan of God for perfect environment on planet earth — perfect happiness and perfect virtue — he lost the rulership of this world and he was removed from the garden, the Paradise, Genesis 3:24. The tree of life was forbidden. No longer can man have happiness simply by partaking of the tree of life, and therefore, of course, a new tree had to be selected in order for happiness to exist. The principle is quite obvious: you cannot choose simultaneously both the plan of God and the cosmic system of Satan for they are mutually exclusive. Man would have no free will after the fall if he had been permitted to eat of then tree of life. Happiness in a state of sin is totally incompatible with God’s plan and therefore they cannot coexist, and the tree of life was closed down. And, therefore, by expelling man from the garden the eating from the tree of life was no longer an issue. There is no way that God is going to permit sin to coexist with happiness. Virtue is what coexists with perfect happiness.

Category four tree in the garden: the tree of the knowledge of good and evil

After man had eaten from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil he was spiritually dead. If man in spiritual death possessed the sin nature of Adam and eats from the tree of life, then you have the coexistence of happiness with sin. Human life is imputed to man immediately after birth and it is imputed to his human soul, because that means that God, even after the fall of man, has designed a system whereby man can have happiness in time and far greater happiness in eternity. So the soul still exists and there is the human life being imputed to the soul. Human life will always exist in the soul whether the individual goes to heaven or to hell. At the same time Adam’s original sin was imputed to the genetically-formed old sin nature in the body. The imputation of Adam’s sin means that we have been born physically alive and spiritually dead. But it also means that if anyone dies before reaching the age of accountability he has automatic eternal salvation without going through the usual route by personal faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.

Note that we are condemned at birth before we are able to use our volition to commit our first sin. Eventually as an expression of our old sin nature we do so, and therefore we accumulate in our lifetime personal sins. All of these personal sins were sent to another tree; this time the tree is the cross, not the tree of life. This is the tree of eternal life. When our Lord Jesus Christ was hanging on the cross all of our personal sins were imputed to Him and judged. Therefore we have the way of salvation: “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved.”

After the fall the purpose of the creation of man could only be perpetuated by cutting mankind of from the tree of life, and providing a new tree of life which is the cross and eternal salvation. In this area we have the use of the fourth tree, the knowledge of good and evil. “Good” is one of the two words for the plan of God. Good in the sense of absolute good is a)gathoj: X+Y+Z = a)gaqoj. The other is dunamij, where we get our power sphere, the divine dynasphere. By remaining in the garden in status quo spiritual death man would have been immortal with unhappiness. Therefore, God in His wisdom shut down any possibility of the tree of life.

Now we have the issue of the fourth tree, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. The first three categories of trees in the garden should be summarised. They should be noted because there is a great principle that comes out of this related to our subject of historical trends. Category one trees, the trees that provided happiness in the soul — prosperity and blessing — and made the soul the seat of human happiness, first of all existed in the garden in perfect status. The trees were perfect, the one who ate from the trees or looked at the trees was perfect, and the result was perfect happiness. Perfect happiness excludes boredom, therefore the reason why man sinned or rejected all of this was not boredom. Category one tree relates to capacity for happiness in the soul, a capacity that keeps you from boredom. Category two trees provided prosperity and happiness for the human body. The human body became the recipient of happiness overflowing from the soul. Therefore the principle: All capacity for happiness must reside in the soul and without that soul capacity there cannot exist that basic prosperity of capacity for life, love, and happiness. Category three tree is the tree of life which perpetuates happiness and prosperity in both the human soul and body in perfect environment in the garden. But the tree of life is only good and only fulfils its purpose in perfect environment. So the first three categories of trees are related to the plan of God for man in innocence and for the believer in resurrection body in eternity. The use of all three categories of trees is tantamount to positive volition toward the plan of God in status quo innocence. As long as man made good decisions of eating from the proper trees in the garden and refusing to eat from category four he perpetuated his options for more decisions, greater decisions, which perpetuated his happiness, his blessing, and his prosperity from God.

There is only one category of tree, of course, which man was to use and to demonstrate his volition in a negative way: category four, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Eating from this tree destroyed man’s original prosperity and happiness. Man actually stood there and had his choice between the woman and unhappiness outside the garden and the perpetuation of perfect happiness inside of the garden. Man has been making those choices ever since. Man has the propensity with his old sin nature of choosing, making decisions, whereby he makes himself miserable. Once man ate from the forbidden tree the immortality of eternal life must be attained in some other way: the tree of eternal life, the cross, where our Lord Jesus Christ bore our sins in His own body on the tree. As long as man continued in the garden without sin or that state of innocence he did not need the fruit of that fourth tree. Man did not need to know good and evil. It was unnecessary as long as he had the first three categories of trees. In spiritual death the options of free will and the function of man’s decisions are then related to good and evil. Good is the plan of God while evil is the policy of Satan as the ruler of this world.

Remember that good is the plan of God: X is human life imputed at birth plus Adam’s original sin = the first potential: salvation. Plus the pertinent doctrine, the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ = hope1 (absolute confidence that when we believe in Christ we have eternal life), plus the moment we believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and possess eternal life. Now we are immature believers in Y radical. Here we have a judicial imputation. Judicial imputation number one took place at birth: Adam’s original sin was imputed to us. Our personal sins were imputed to Christ on the cross. Plus judicial imputation number two: the imputation of divine righteousness to us at the moment we believed. That leads to a second potential replacing the first: the potential of great blessing in time, for all blessing is imputed to the indwelling righteousness of God. Plus the pertinent doctrine = hope² — absolute confidence that when we persist in perception of doctrine — gate four of the divine dynasphere — we reach gate eight, maturity. Plus maturity adjustment to the justice of God. Z radical brings us very close to the tree of life, for in Z radical we have the imputation of eternal life at salvation, plus the imputation of great blessing in time from advancing to gate eight = the third potential, the potential for great blessing and reward in eternity. Plus the pertinent doctrine = hope³, absolute confidence that after the Rapture of the Church at the judgment seat of Christ we are going to receive the imputation of great reward and blessing for advance in time. This equals “the good,” all things working together for good — a)gaqoj. And the means of execution of this is also provided by God as the prototype was provided for the humanity of Christ, and that is the divine dynasphere with its eight gates. You cannot accomplish X+Y+Z except inside the divine dynasphere. That is why only inside the divine dynasphere, at the eight gates, you have degrees of happiness, something that is comparable to the tree of life in the garden. The believer must choose constantly between residence in the divine dynasphere and living in the cosmic system. All uptrends and downtrends of history are related to the decisions of believers in choosing life either in the divine dynasphere or in the cosmic system. In the garden of Eden man was the ruler of this world, but outside the garden Satan is the ruler of this world. Inside the garden man could only sin by eating from one tree, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Inside the garden neither good not evil were issues because of the first three categories of trees. In innocence man did not have to understand good and evil to have a relationship with God. Only in sinfulness and spiritual death must man understand good and evil and make the choice, first at salvation and, afterward the divine dynasphere versus the cosmic system.

Proverbs 3:13-18

What is the issue in the book of Proverbs with regard to the book of life? It is the issue of happiness in relationship with God, happiness in relationship to what God has provided as a substitute for the first three categories of trees in the garden.