The tree of life is mentioned only three places in the Bible. The first and most prominent appearance of the tree of life is in Genesis. The tree of life appears in Proverbs (three times) and again in the Book of Revelation (on either side of the “river of the water of life… flowing from the throne of God….”[1])
The tree of life was there in the beginning, and it will be reappear in the end. In between, where we are now, between Genesis and Revelations, we are presently cut off from the tree of life.
The tree of life obviously figures into God’s ultimate plan and purpose. But how? Where is the tree of life between the Garden of Eden and standing beside the river of the water of life flowing from the throne of God? Let’s take a look.
It wasn’t in reading books, listening to my professor or considering what other people said about the Bible and God; it was reading the Bible myself that led me to my enlightenment.
I have reflected and written about the fact that I was enamored by Buddhism in college, especially after a world religion class my freshman year but Buddhism is not where I found my enlightenment. I found enlightenment in reading the Bible.
I didn’t find enlightenment in reading what other people said about the Bible. I found enlightenment in reading the Bible myself.
I have written about the facial similarities of Christianity, Buddhism and oneness. They both place some emphasis on losing or denying one’s self and achieving oneness, but that is where the similarities end. In Buddhism, oneness with the cosmic essence of the universe is something we achieve. In Christianity, oneness with God is achieved in us as we submit to God and allow Him to take His rightful place in the center of our lives.
Whereas, Buddhism encouraged me to ignore myself, look past myself and to escape myself and all of my feeling, ambitions and ego into a cosmic forgetfulness of self, the Bible confronted me with myself. Reading the Bible was like having a one-on-one soul-searching conversation with a stern but loving Father who knew me more intimately and fully than I knew myself.
And then I met Jesus in the Gospels. I can only describe him as divine love incarnate. He is a figure like no other. Bold, daring, fearless, loving, brotherly, piercing, healing. He is everything we would expect a God, a father, a brother, a friend to be. (It wasn’t right away that I was introduced to and experienced the person of the Holy Spirit.) Continue reading “Lured by Buddha but Taken by Christ”→
Moderns have issues with miracles, but ancients did not. Many ancient histories reference miracles, and we do not discount them as histories for that fact. The miraculous element of the accounts of Jesus, however, are a basis on which many contemporary thinkers reject the claims of Jesus and claims about Jesus a priori.
Miracles are consistent with and flow from the nature and character of who Jesus claimed to be and who his followers claimed he was. If Jesus was God in the flesh, miracles are to be expected. The apostle John says that Jesus was the Word; he was with God in the beginning; He was God; and all things that were made were made through Jesus, the Word. (John 1:1-3) If the universe was made by and through Jesus, miracles are no big deal, and the resurrection is more than just possible.
This was thrust of the Gospels. The authority of Jesus resonated in his message and was attested by the miracles. Many moderns reject the message largely on the basis of the miracle claims because miracles are not allowed in a naturalistic worldview that dominates academia today. We can’t accurately judge what Jesus said, though, without being willing to suspend that disbelief, even if only to reach some understanding.
Have you ever felt like nobody gets you? Have you ever felt that no one understands who you really are? Not even your family or your closest friends?
First of all, congratulations, because you are being honest. It’s uncomfortable to be that honest.
I could be wrong. Maybe it’s only me, but I think many of us would rather pretend people know us better than they really do. We connect on the surface. We connect the best we can, but there are parts of us few people know or understand… if we are honest.
I sometimes feel as if everyone else “gets it” (this thing we philosophically call life) but me. Perhaps, everyone else is connected in a way that I am not. Nothing feels more isolating or lonely than feeling disconnected and alone.
I don’t think I am alone in feeling this way, though. This is the human condition. If we are being brutally honest about it. This is reality.
If this is the reality, what do we do with it? How do we live with the brutal honesty of it? We yearn for connection deep down, but many of us feel utterly disconnected and isolated from others at the core of our being.
John Newton, who wrote Amazing Grace, said this about prayer in a letter to a friend:
Our ability to pray is so weak that, if we are sitting in a room trying to pray, we are over matched by the buzzing of a fly.
Tim Keller says that prayer is hard for us for a number of reasons, not the least of which is that we have “distance” from God is the due to the fact that we live in a physical world, while God does not. We are absorbed by the physicality of the world in such a way that is hard for us to contact to a non-physical God. What, then, is prayer that we can engage in it, engage God and overcome the obstacles that get in the way?
Navigating by Faith 