CHAPTER FIVE

THE FRUIT OF THE TREE OF LIFE

Scripture Reading: John 6:35, 57, 63; 7:37; 8:12; 9:5; 11:25; 1 Cor. 15:45

CHRIST AS THE TREE OF LIFE
AND THE LAMB OF GOD

The first picture in the entire Bible is that God offered Himself to man as the tree of life in the form of food, that man may take Him in, eat Him, and have Him as his life. After this, man fell. But immediately after the fall of man, God provided him a lamb. If you read the Scriptures with a heavenly view, you will see who this lamb is. After the fall of man, God not only provided a lamb for fallen man but also offered a lamb for him (Gen. 3:21; 4:4). Adam became fallen, yet due to his enjoyment of the lamb as his covering, his clothing, he could still live. Abel, Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and all of their descendants, the sons of Israel, also enjoyed the lamb (v. 4; 8:20; 12:7; 26:25; 35:7; Exo. 12:3-10).

The passover feast was a new beginning for the children of Israel (v. 2). Their history began with a lamb. The lamb was slain, the blood was shed for redemption (vv. 3, 7; 13:13, 15), and the meat of the lamb was eaten (12:8-10). In the Bible, first there is the tree of life and then the lamb. In John 1:29 John the Baptist declared that Christ was the Lamb of God. Christ as the Lamb of God is the Word, who is God incarnated to be a man (vv. 1, 14). Christ is the complete God and the perfect man, the God-man.

After creation, before the fall of man, God offered Himself to man as the tree of life (Gen. 2:9, 16). After the fall of man, God offered Himself as a lamb (3:21; 4:4) because there was the need of redemption. With the tree of life before the fall, there was no need of redemption because there was no sin. With the fall sin came in (Rom. 5:12); thus, redemption is required. After the fall the tree of life alone is not sufficient to meet man’s need. After the fall man needs redemption (Heb. 9:22), and with the lamb, there is [114] redemption. Before the fall God ordained that man should eat only vegetables (Gen. 1:29), not animals. After the fall and its development, God changed His ordination, giving man not only vegetables but also animals to eat (9:3).

The tree of life is a matter of nourishment, and the lamb is a matter of redemption. Yet even with the lamb there is something for nourishment. The Lord’s word in John 6 is difficult for many readers to understand. Even many of the Lord’s disciples at that time stumbled at His word. They said, “This word is hard; who can hear it?” (v. 60b). The Lord said that He was the bread of life (v. 35) and that His blood was true drink (v. 55). It is not possible for physical bread to have blood. Yet the Lord Jesus as the bread of life said, “My flesh is true food, and My blood is true drink” (v. 55). The Lord Jesus as the bread of life indicated that He was a continuation of the tree of life for man’s nourishment. The blood and the flesh are two items indicating that Christ is the Lamb of God (1:29).

After the fall of man, if Christ were not the Lamb, He could never be the bread. Without redemption, He could never be our nourishment. Redemption is not the goal, the aim, but the procedure to reach the goal. The Lord Jesus shed His blood for redemption so that we might eat His flesh for our nourishment. In a similar way, the passover lamb was slain, the blood of the lamb was sprinkled upon the doors, and in the house under the covering of the sprinkled blood, the children of Israel rested and enjoyed the meat of the lamb (Exo. 12:3-11).

CHRIST AS THE TEMPLE

First, God presented Himself as the tree of life. Then after the fall God presented Himself as the lamb, and through the lamb His redeemed people began to enjoy God. The Old Testament saints continued to enjoy God in many aspects, and eventually, they enjoyed God to the fullest extent as the temple. At the end of the Old Testament the temple is the product of the enjoyment of God and is the fullest enjoyment of God.

In the New Testament Jesus came as the very God. The Gospel of John says, “In the beginning was the Word…and the Word was God” (1:1). This very God one day was incarnated as a man to be a God-man, who is the Lamb of God (v. 29). In John 2 the Lord Jesus, the God-man, told us that He was the temple (vv. 19-21). His [115] forerunner, John the Baptist, declared that He was the Lamb, and the Lord Himself declared that He was the temple. His forerunner told us the first item, and Jesus Himself told us the last item. In between these two items, there are many items of Christ in the Gospel of John.

THE ITEMS OF CHRIST IN THE GOSPEL OF JOHN
FOR OUR ENJOYMENT

In John 1 He is the Word who is God (v. 1). In Him is life, and this life is the light of men (v. 4). He is the One who is received by His believers and gives them the authority to be the children of God (v. 12). He is the One incarnated as a man, the Word who became flesh who is full of grace and reality (v. 14). He is the One who is declared and testified to us to be the very Lamb of God (v. 29). Ultimately, He is the heavenly ladder who joins earth to heaven and who brings heaven to earth (v. 51).

In John 2 He is not only the temple (vv. 19, 21) but also the wine (v. 10). Wine is a real enjoyment. In this portion of the Word, wine, the life-juice of the grape, signifies life. Water signifies death (Gen. 1:2, 6; Exo. 14:21; Matt. 3:16a). The Lord changed water into wine, which means that the Lord swallowed up death, changing death into life (John 2:9).

In John 3 there are several items of Christ for our enjoyment. First, Christ is the bronze serpent. As Moses lifted up the bronze serpent on the pole, even so Christ as the Son of Man was lifted up on the cross. God told Moses to lift up a bronze serpent on behalf of the children of Israel for God’s judgment. Whoever looked upon the bronze serpent would live. In John 3:14 the Lord Jesus applied this type to Himself, showing that He was in “the likeness of the flesh of sin” (Rom. 8:3). The bronze serpent had the likeness, the form, of the serpent but without the poison. Christ was made in “the likeness of the flesh of sin,” but He had no participation in the sin of the flesh (2 Cor. 5:21; Heb. 4:15). After the serpent in John 3, there is Christ as the Bridegroom (v. 29).

In chapter 4 there is not only the living water but also a fountain (v. 14). This fountain, which replaces Jacob’s well (v. 6), is the eternal fountain, the heavenly fountain, and within this fountain, there is the living water (vv. 11, 14). The living water is the content of the fountain. Also in chapter 4 there is the harvest (v. 35). In chapter 5 [116] the Lord Jesus is the very substitution, the replacement, for any kind of religion. In this chapter the law-keeping religion, the Jewish religion with its pool and angels, is replaced by the Lord Jesus as the substitution of all things. He is much better than the angels (Heb. 1:4). He is the substitution for the law-keeping of any kind of religion. If we have Him, we do not need religion.