This tree enables man to receive God as life. How can we prove this? The following books of the Bible reveal that God is life. Therefore, the tree of life in the garden was the indicator that God intends to be our life in the form of food. One day, according to the Gospel of John, God came in the flesh (John 1:1, 14). In Him was life (John 1:4). The life displayed by the tree of life in Genesis 2 was the life incarnated in Jesus, God in the flesh. Jesus told us that He Himself is life (John 14:6). Furthermore, John 15 tells us that Christ is a tree, the vine tree. On the one hand, He is a tree; on the other hand, He is life. When we put together all these portions from John, we see that Jesus is the tree of life. Jesus said that He is the bread of life, meaning that He has come to us as the tree of life in the form of food.
It is not easy to understand the Bible. Let me ask you a question: how tall was the tree of life? If you turn the question to me, I will answer that it was not taller than I. I answer this way because Adam, who had been placed before the tree of life, probably was not much taller than I. If the tree of life had been of a great height, its fruit would have been out of reach. Adam and Eve had no ladder or other instrument to use in plucking the fruit of this tree. Therefore, I believe the tree of life was not very tall.
As the Almighty God, Jesus is high, but when He came to us as food He was lowly. He was a loaf of bread. He was even the crumbs under the table (Matt. 15:21-27). The very Jesus who came to us as life in the form of food was not tall and great; He was small and lowly. Anything we eat must be smaller than we are; if it is not, we cannot take it into us. Even if our food is larger than we are, it must be cut into pieces small enough to eat. Thus, Jesus came to us as life in the form of food. He said, "I am the bread of life," and, "He who eats Me shall also live because of Me." God in the Son is the tree of life that is good for food. Day after day we can feed on Him. We can eat Him.
The tree of life typifies Christ who imparts life to man and who pleases and satisfies man (cf. John 15:1; Exo. 15:25). Christ imparts divine life into us, pleases us, and satisfies us. Many of us can testify of this. We can say, "Hallelujah! Jesus has imparted life to me. He satisfies me all the time." This is the tree of life.
Along with the tree there is a river (Gen. 2:10). Since the tree is a tree of life, the river must also be related to life. At the end of the Bible we also see a river of life flowing and a tree of life growing (Rev. 22:1-2). At the beginning and the end of the Bible we find the tree of life and a river flowing with living water. In the Scriptures the concept of the river is also crucial. When the Scripture mentions man, both in the beginning and at the end, it also mentions the river. For man to receive God as life, to enjoy the fatness of God, to quench thirst, to be watered, to grow, and to rejoice, all depends on the river (cf. Psa. 36:8-9; 46:4; 65:9; Exo. 17:1-7; Joel 3:18; Zech. 14:8; John 4:14; 7:37-38; Rev. 22:1-2).
If you take in the Lord Jesus, you immediately have the deep sensation of something watering you from within. Something is flowing within you. Have you not had such an experience? Whenever you say, "Lord Jesus, I love You," or whenever you pray to the Lord—this means that you receive Him into you once again—you sense something flowing within you. Every morning you should take Christ as your breakfast, every noon you should take Him as your lunch, and every evening you should eat Him as your dinner. You need to feed on Christ at least three times a day. If you do this, the water of life will water you inwardly. You will never be dry. Perhaps you work at an office all day and arrive home from work tired and worn, feeling quite dry. If you take Jesus as your dinner, living water will flow within you. "A river went out of Eden to water the garden." This flow will discharge many old things out of your being. Both our experience and the divine record in the Bible tell us that this river is necessary.
Although Genesis 2 appears to be a record of creation, it was actually written according to the experience of life. The tree of life and the flowing river indicate this: whenever we take Jesus into us as food, that food will impart divine life, a life that is a watering and flowing life. In Revelation 22:1-2 we see that the river of life with the tree of life growing in it proceeds out of the throne of God. This picture is a further proof that the tree of life and the river of life represent the genuine experience of life. Whenever we take God in Christ as our life, we will have this river flowing within us to water us and work many things within us.