One of the best known bible stories is the one about Adam and Eve and the Apple that got them kicked out of paradise. Although the Bible doesn’t actually say it’s an apple it was the inspiration of the naming of the Adam’s Apple that legend says got stuck partway down when he ate it. Someone told me recently that it was not the apple up on the tree that was the problem though, … It was the pear on the ground…. Years ago I remember hearing many sermons featuring the two trees in the Garden. In his later years, Mr. Armstrong would often speak of them and lament the choice that this world has made starting with Adam and Eve and persisting to this day. Although the Tree of life was there, no one chose it. Now we live in a world on a collision course with the Judgment of God and still people do not choose life. Growing up in the church I remember so many sermons on this topic and often times I would here people complain about the subject matter because they had heard it so many times. It is easy to judge others, especially when we don’t have a complete understanding for what others are all about. Mr. Armstrong spent most of his adult life preaching the kingdom of God and trying to prepare a people to assist Jesus Christ in bringing that kingdom to this earth. It was his principle concern and so why did he preach about the two trees so often? People would complain that the point was so simplistic as he would say there are two paths in this world, that promoted by Satan and the other Promoted by God. Would we live by God’s rules or would we choose Satan’s. As we were members of the church, many would ask why he would teach this to us, over and over again. Hadn’t we already chosen to answer the calling of God? Hadn’t we already made the right choice? Why should be hear this again and again. Many began to assume that Mr. Armstrong just wasn’t that deep and did not realize that we had chosen the right path. But then again, it was Mr. Armstrong that questioned the conversion of as many as half the members and he turned out to be right there didn’t he. So were these sermons only because He knew many would choose to give up their calling to go back into the world? I was able to attending the memorial service for Mr. Luker. After the service I spoke to some people about a similar phenomenon with some of the messages that Mr. Luker covered in his ministry. How some would comment on his frequent use of the subject of Love. If you listened to a number of his messages you would find love mentioned often. Some people would even complain and the comments were very similar to those made of Mr. Armstrong. I remember one comment though that I will always remember. It was, “maybe Mr. Luker always talked about Love because he was not hearing the topic from others?” That got me to thinking back to the many sermons from Mr. Armstrong on the two trees and I wondered if he also spoke so often on the subject because he was not hearing others speak on it. Furthermore I wondered if the two could be related. What if the point to Mr. Armstrong’s message and Mr. Luker’s was the same? Mr. Luker’s message seems to be pretty straight forward, God is love, and if we are to be like Him, we would have to learn to Love the way God loves. But is that what Mr. Armstrong was getting at when talking about the Two Trees? The title of the Sermon today is: Choosing the right Tree I am going to talk about the two trees of the garden today to glean what we can from a very familiar message that we may not have heard for a while and see if there is a correlation to the many sermons given by Mr. Luker. Let’s review first of all the scriptures surrounding the two trees. Turn over to Gen 3. Genesis 3:1-19 NKJ Genesis 3:1 Now the serpent was more cunning than any beast of the field which the LORD God had made. And he said to the woman, "Has God indeed said, 'You shall not eat of every tree of the garden'?" 2 And the woman said to the serpent, "We may eat the fruit of the trees of the garden; 3 "but of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden, God has said, 'You shall not eat it, nor shall you touch it, lest you die.' " 4 Then the serpent said to the woman, "You will not surely die. 5 "For God knows that in the day you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil." 6 So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree desirable to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate. She also gave to her husband with her, and he ate. 7 Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they knew that they were naked; and they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves coverings. 8 And they heard the sound of the LORD God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and Adam and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the LORD God among the trees of the garden. 9 Then the LORD God called to Adam and said to him, "Where are you?" 10 So he said, "I heard Your voice in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; and I hid myself." 11 And He said, "Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree of which I commanded you that you should not eat?" 12 Then the man said, "The woman whom You gave to be with me, she gave me of the tree, and I ate." 13 And the LORD God said to the woman, "What is this you have done?" The woman said, "The serpent deceived me, and I ate." 14 So the LORD God said to the serpent: "Because you have done this, You are cursed more than all cattle, And more than every beast of the field; On your belly you shall go, And you shall eat dust All the days of your life. 15 And I will put enmity Between you and the woman, And between your seed and her Seed; He shall bruise your head, And you shall bruise His heel." 16 To the woman He said: "I will greatly multiply your sorrow and your conception; In pain you shall bring forth children; Your desire shall be for your husband, And he shall rule over you." 17 Then to Adam He said, "Because you have heeded the voice of your wife, and have eaten from the tree of which I commanded you, saying, 'You shall not eat of it': "Cursed is the ground for your sake; In toil you shall eat of it All the days of your life. 18 Both thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you, And you shall eat the herb of the field. 19 In the sweat of your face you shall eat bread Till you return to the ground, For out of it you were taken; For dust you are, And to dust you shall return." Moving down to verse :22 22 Then the LORD God said, "Behold, the man has become like one of Us, to know good and evil. And now, lest he put out his hand and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and live forever" -- 23 therefore the LORD God sent him out of the garden of Eden to till the ground from which he was taken. 24 So He drove out the man; and He placed cherubim at the east of the garden of Eden, and a flaming sword which turned every way, to guard the way to the tree of life. So there is so much to look at here. 1. The two trees were real. After they sinned they were expelled from the garden in part to prevent them from having access to it. 2. The curses of this life are a result from choosing this tree over the tree of life. We live a life of toil trying to make a living and I doubt any woman would say childbirth is a piece of cake. 3. Satan promised two things, first, they would not surely die, and second they would become as God, knowing good from evil. a. Now you have to ask yourself, what does that mean knowing good from evil? Don’t we want to know the difference? b. Secondly, they were not immediately put to death as they might have thought so in that Satan was right again, wasn’t he? So after reading this passage I ask myself two questions, first, what would life have been like if they chose the proper tree? Second, why didn’t they choose the right tree? If you were placed in the garden and told you can eat of any tree except this one and one of the trees you can choose from is the tree of life, why wouldn’t that have been their first meal? On the first question, there is no way that Adam and Eve could have lived sin free because we have carnal nature and that is why we read that the plan for Christ’s sacrifice came before Adam and Eve ever looked at either tree. Revelation 13:8 8 All who dwell on the earth will worship him, whose names have not been written in the Book of Life of the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world. 1 Peter 1:18-20 18 knowing that you were not redeemed with corruptible things, like silver or gold, from your aimless conduct received by tradition from your fathers, 19 but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot. 20 He indeed was foreordained before the foundation of the world, but was manifest in these last times for you God knew that man could not live a perfect existence. We were designed to learn and grow from mistakes. We have short memories for what is good when we are tempted and God purposely let Satan, the ultimate tempter run loose on the earth. So why do we even have the story that gives the reader the idea that if only Adam had chosen correctly we would not have had to go through the last 6000 years of history? It has to do with the reconciliation narrative that is throughout the bible. Each part telling a different part of the story leading to the ultimate conclusion of the physical life as God’s people are changed to spirit. This narrative speaks of a process that must be followed that we read about on Passover each year. Turn over to John 6 were we will read about gaining everlasting life. John 6:48-51 48 "I am the bread of life. 49 "Your fathers ate the manna in the wilderness, and are dead. 50 "This is the bread which comes down from heaven, that one may eat of it and not die. 51 "I am the living bread which came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever; and the bread that I shall give is My flesh, which I shall give for the life of the world." We see that the bread we eat is a symbol of the spiritual process of conversion. It is quite possible that the tree of life contained fruit that was a symbol of the same process of conversion which brings me to the second question. Why did they not eat of the right tree first thing? We may never know in this lifetime but we can guess that since real conversion is a process then Adam and Eve would have had to go through that same process when they were ready. Even though Eve tells the serpent that they may eat of any tree of the Garden except for the one that was forbidden, maybe the fruit on the tree of life did not yet have fruit on it. In the last sermon I gave I covered how Jesus was called the second Adam to succeed where the first had failed. And since God knew that man would not succeed without the sacrifice of Jesus Christ, we are brought back to the original question of asking why did we hear so many sermons on the two trees. As I was preparing this sermon I read a number of opinions on the reason for these sermons. Usually, the point being made by someone was that the choice made in the garden was between two government systems; one is God’s and the other is Satan’s. Now while there is a valid point here, so simply say this was a civic experiment misses the point that the choice to choose God and His way of life is not a one-time decision like eating this fruit or that. Some opinions I read tried to make the two tree message into a validation of what government structure the church has here on earth. As if it doesn’t matter how converted you are, if you attend a church that chose the wrong administrative structure, then that is the same as committing the unpardonable sin. Others simply said that it was Mr. Armstrong’s way of teaching the outside world that there is a choice to live God’s way or man’s way of life. The problem with this opinion is that Mr. Armstrong preached the two tree sermons to the members of the church and with more frequency when he got older. In this sermon was a message to the church that he wanted to get across and one that he felt was very important. It was a message that did not get preached in services enough and he kept driving the point home. Remember that he often wondered if even half the members really got it. Were truly converted. The two trees sermon was the most basic way he could get the point about conversion across to spiritually immature minds as the church was back then. We had obedience down, no question. You knew what to do, when to do it. But the reason why we did the things we did was where the problem was. He could see that depth of understanding that many had. As a church we seemed willing enough to follow God but how deep was that understanding? Jeremiah 31:33 33 "But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the LORD: I will put My law in their minds, and write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people. If God’s law was written on the hearts of the over 150,000 people that attended the feast in the late 80’s, then there would still be at least that many keeping the Feast today. But clearly, the conversion they had was not deep enough to help them resist the tempting of the Evil one. When given the chance to choose the tree representing God’s way of life, or the one followed by Adam and Eve and nearly everyone else since; they chose the worldly tree. You see, that is the reason that Mr. Armstrong preached that sermon over and over, we have to choose God’s way over and over. Satan will distract us and cause us to stumble and we have to pick ourselves up and chose to live God’s way again and again. The more we want it the easier the choice and the less often we will be made to stumble. He summed up these two trees in a number of ways. The most memorable to me was when he said the two trees were two choices that everyone of us has to make. One is the way of Give, and the other the way of get. The way of give is based on the love of God, the way of get is based on selfishness. Each of us has to make that decision of which tree we will eat from. Which tree will we choose in this lifetime. Will we choose the Love of God, or the selfishness of man. Connecting the dots So that brings me to the connection between those sermons and the ones so often given by Mr. Luker. Like Mr. Armstrong, he preached about a subject that he felt we needed more than any other; a point that we needed to understand if we are going to succeed in this life. Mr. Luker did not talk of trees, he spoke about love. And, like the criticism about the two tree messages, there was some about the sermons on love. Some tried to say that this was an attempt to follow the same path the church took back in the late 80’s and early 90’s toward mainstream Protestantism. That when Mr. Luker was saying we needed love, what he was secretly saying was that we didn’t need to follow the law of God. I have had the honor to get to know him over the years and even speak to him about this very topic. I have had many occasions to hear these messages. During his memorial service his lovely wife told us that he was an open book. That what you saw was the way he was. I can tell you that this is what I have come to know in him as well. Of all the people I have come to know in my life, he is counted among the most sincere and humble people I have ever known. I got to talk to him at the GCE last year about the fact that those detractors of UCG would complain when they hear subjects of Love and Jesus Christ. They would count how many times Christ was mentioned in a sermon verses passages that focused on the Father. After one of these conversations he spoke to the entire Ministry and reviewed the hierarchy of the Family of God with the Father being supreme and that the Church that Jesus was in charge of is named after God. Even though many never understood the reason for his focus on the role of Love in the church, he would always take time to try and help them understand. He often read from Matthew 22: about the relationship of Law, love and God. He understood that the choice was never between Law and Love, he understood that Law = Love Matthew 22:36-40 36 "Teacher, which is the great commandment in the law?" 37 Jesus said to him, " 'You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.' 38 "This is the first and great commandment. 39 "And the second is like it: 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.' 40 "On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets." Hear we see that the law, the prophets, everything contained in the bible can be summed up by love. Every commandment has its root in the Love of God. Which of the Commandment are not based on Love? Which of the Commandments were fulfilled by Christ so we don’t have to? Can we murder? Steel? Commit adultery? Lie? Can we have contempt for God? No, we have to do all these things as well as follow the example of Christ and live by every word of God which has as its core love. The reason love is in everything God does is found in 1 John 4: Mr. Luker often read from 1 John 4:8-12. 1 John 4:8-12 8 He who does not love does not know God, for God is love. 9 In this the love of God was manifested toward us, that God has sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through Him. Continuing on to verse 10 In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. 11 Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. 12 No one has seen God at any time. If we love one another, God abides in us, and His love has been perfected in us. What is the Opposite of Love? I spent some significant time on the Internet question and answer sites on this topic. If you survey most people and ask what the opposite of love you will get a dispute between those saying it is Hate and those saying apathy. People line up on both sides. But if the tree of life represents the Love of God for mankind, what does the other tree represent? Satan did not temp Eve with Hate, or apathy, But knowledge and choice; but not just any knowledge, the knowledge to decide the course of one’s own life. The other tree was about selfishly taking what you want first. Lucifer was jealous of God’s plan for mankind. It did not have him as the center of all things. It was selfishness that lead Lucifer toward rebellion. James chapter three talks about the wisdom of deciding for ourselves the direction of life. James 3:14-18 14 But if you harbor bitter envy and selfish ambition in your hearts, do not boast about it or deny the truth. 15 Such "wisdom" does not come down from heaven but is earthly, unspiritual, of the devil. 16 For where you have envy and selfish ambition, there you find disorder and every evil practice. 17 But the wisdom that comes from heaven is first of all pure; then peace-loving, considerate, submissive, full of mercy and good fruit, impartial and sincere. 18 Peacemakers who sow in peace raise a harvest of righteousness. This world is ruled by the selfish pursuits of man lead by the god of this world, the prince and power of the air that transmits his ideas in each of our heads night and day. It is selfishness that is the opposite of love and never brings happiness or fulfillment. PHILIPPIANS 2:3-4 NKJ 3 Let nothing be done through selfish ambition or conceit, but in lowliness of mind let each esteem others better than himself. 4 Let each of you look out not only for his own interests, but also for the interests of others. But every time something doesn’t go right, someone is usually coming up with something that we are lacking that would right the balance of life once again. Today, there are many in an out of the church that has a list of things that would solve all the problems in life. Mr. Luker would be the first to admit that we don’t know everything. That when Christ returns to right all the wrongs in this life our eyes will be opened to truths that maybe were only understood in part or even things that we never understood. When you spend any time trolling the web about why the Church of God is so fragmented you will see so many different ideas of what should be stressed so that God would finally bless the church with growth in the way He did during the days of the two tree sermons of Mr. Armstrong. But if you asked Mr. Luker (and I did), what one thing does the church need to develop more than any other what would he say? • What one thing would have prevented the schisms of the body of Christ? • What one thing would have kept such a multitude to leave the body of Christ over the last 30 years? • If we could grow in an area that would bring us closer to God and each other what would that be? The answer is one word. Love. It is God’s love that enables us to overcome the carnal nature in man and allow us to see each other with God’s eyes; to not offend one another and to not be so easily offended. Turn over to Matthew 23:23. At the beginning of Matthew 23 we find Jesus talking about the spiritual leaders of the people, (the Pharisees), that He said were sitting in Moses’ seat. That these people talk about all the deficiencies of the people. All the things they needed to do to be in God’s good graces. Matthew 23:23 23 "Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you pay tithe of mint and anise and cummin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy and faith. These you ought to have done, without leaving the others undone. What Jesus was saying here is that Justice, mercy and Faith, and we could substitute God’s Love here, that these do not replace the Law. Adding love does not take away the law written in our hearts. What Christ is teaching here is about emphasis. We need an emphasis on the Love of God in our lives. Not to replace the Sabbath or other commandments, but to give them meaning. We will someday know all things that can be known by the power of the spirit but the Love of God cannot be poured into our hearts. We have to choose it. We have to choose the tree of life and once we make that decision we need to take stock of our existence on this earth and ask ourselves, does God’s way of life mean more to us than the pulls of this flesh? Does God love supply our needs or do we want to go to the other tree and try to find our own happiness? It’s a choice that each of us have to make. Now that may seem like an overly simplistic approach to salvation but over my 37 years in the church I have been witness to many who felt that salvation was secured by their membership in the church and as long as they kept the commandments of God they have it made. But eternity is a long time and God does not want anyone there that does not really want it. We are working out our own salvation as it says in Philippians 2:12-13. But let’s not lose the process of love in this work. Philippians 2:12-13 12 Therefore, my beloved, as you have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling; 13 for it is God who works in you both to will and to do for His good pleasure. Notice the point being made here. Verse 13 in the New Living Translation puts it this way. NLT Philippians 2:13 13 For God is working in you, giving you the desire to obey him and the power to do what pleases him. It is the Love of God that would fix all the problems in this world. It is the love of God that would chose the Tree of Life over the other tree. It is His love that is not self-centered trying to take happiness in this life. That is the attitude of the other tree. If we try to take happiness we will never find it. Happiness is a gift to those who love the love that God first loved us with. Happiness will find those who love as God does. The love of God does not negate any of His commandments. The Sabbath is a sign between God and His people, but if we want others to recognize this then we must heed John 13:34-35 John 13:34-35 34 "A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another; as I have loved you, that you also love one another. 35 "By this all will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another." So let’s take another look at those two trees and ask ourselves what we really truly want from this life not just afterward. You can’t live a self-centered life now and expect to have God’s love in the next. You can’t live off the fruit of the wrong tree and expect to eat from the tree of life after this life is gone. We need to really want the life pictured by the Tree of Life. It is the body of Christ as we recently covered and we have to want it now, more than the other tree. Let us chose the right tree and choose love.