Topic:
Symbols and Realities of the Matured Church and the Tree of Life Part 1
Greetings:
We were
first introduced to the tree of life in the book of Genesis and now here in the
book of Revelation we see the tree of life again. Let me start with this Scripture:
Revelation
22:1,2: And he shewed me a pure river of
water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding out of the throne of God and of the
Lamb. In the midst of the street of it,
and on either side of the river, was there the tree of life, which bare twelve
manner of fruits and yielded her fruit every month: and the leaves of the tree
were for the healing of the nations.
This is a
very loaded set of Scriptures but we must dissect it and get an understanding
of what this means. We already discussed
that what John was seeing and recording was symbolic so we need the Spirit to
give the reality of what John was seeing.
We saw in the previous message that the sons of God is the New
Jerusalem. Let’s deal with each item and
I promise you will be amazed.
Street
Why the
street? Well if you have been around for
a while you have heard that Heaven’s streets are paved with gold. The Scripture says this:
Revelation
21:21: There are twelve gates were twelve pearls; every several gate was of one
pearl: and the street of the city was pure gold, as it were transparent
glass.
May I say
to you there are no streets in Heaven.
This is symbolic but notice that the Scripture says “street” as in singular. So there is one street in the
city. This is a picture of Christ
because Jesus made the declaration that He is THE WAY. The street represents a way, a path and the
fact that it is pure gold is a picture of the divinity of God. His path, His way is pure and Holy because He
is Holy. Remember the story of the
transfiguration. In Matthew 17:1-13 we
see that Jesus takes Peter, James and John up into a high mountain and Jesus
was transfigured. Then appeared Moses
and Elijah. Peter thought in himself he
would build 3 tabernacles, one for each.
Before he did, the Father came over and said these words:
Matthew
17:5: While he yet spake, behold, a
bright cloud overshadowed them: and
behold a voice out of the cloud, which said, This is my beloved Son in whom I
am well pleased; hear ye Him.
So the
Father corrects the mindset that Peter have because Moses and Elijah were held
in high places in the minds of the children of Israel but the Father shows us
that the Law (Moses) and the Prophets (Elijah) was fulfilled in Christ. So the street of the city is Christ.
Water of Life
Well to
know what the water is you can look at the next word which is life. Life in the Greek is Zoe so this is eternal
water. Water is a picture of the Holy
Spirit and the Word of God. You cannot
go anywhere without the Word of God leading you. We know the Holy Spirit and the Word of God
is Zoe.
Proceeding
Proceeding
is a unique but very powerful word in Scripture. It means always flowing out. In Revelation 22:1 it says that the pure
river of the water of life is proceeding out of the Throne of God and the
Lamb. This means that the Word of God,
the Spirit of God is consistently flowing out from the throne of God and the
Lamb. When we think of a river, it is
always proceeding, it is always fresh and new and as the sons of God we should
always be seeking a fresh word from the Throne.
When you think of the children of Israel in the wilderness, the manna
they received from Heaven was fresh daily!
So fresh that God told them do not hoard or store but for one day which
included the Sabbath. So every day they
got new bread. The water that flowed
from the rock that Moses struck, every atom of water was new, nothing
regurgitated or stale. We need the
proceeding word from the Throne. The
wisdom that originates from the earth, is carnal, sensual and devilish and
produces death.
For the
sake of information and time we will talk about the tree of life in the next
message.
Peace and
Grace,
Calvin
Calhoun Jr.
