Trees of Life Planted in the Land of the Living

You can see the land of the living today, but the ultimate fulfillment will be in the life to come. One way to see God’s goodness in your life today, is through understanding scripture more deeply.

There is a tension we must walk with as we journey through life as followers of Jesus. On the one hand, this earth is not our home, so we hope for a future new heaven and new earth. On the other hand, we aren’t there yet, so God expects us to fulfill his earliest command to steward what we have been given today. I’m reminded of this dichotomy when reading scriptures like this in the Psalms:

I remain confident of this:
I will see the goodness of the Lord
in the land of the living.
Wait for the Lord;
be strong and take heart
and wait for the Lord.  -Psalms 27:13-14

I can see the land of the living in my life today, but the ultimate fulfillment will be in the life to come. Today, you can see God’s goodness in your life, and one way to see this is through learning from and understanding scripture.

This month, I hope to have done that for us by going through the symbols and themes found in just one chapter of Genesis. On the surface, the Book of Genesis is full of interesting (if not crazy) stories. This alone can lead us to the “land of the living,” but you'll find so much more if you dig deeper. “Trees” is the fifth of five symbols and themes I’m writing about this month, all found in Genesis 12. In this chapter, I identified five themes found throughout the Bible: Covenant | Faith | Promises, Egypt, Men + Women, See + Take, Trees. 

Word is Bond

Themes in Scripture: Egypt

The Depth of Scripture: Men vs Women

See + Take

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In the beginning…

Trees appear in the very beginning. Without going into too much detail, the authors of Genesis worked to tie together trees and humanity. Specifically, they connect two triads of days in the creation narrative. In the last of the first three days, God makes trees and vegetation to bear fruit of their own kind.¹ Three days later, God creates humanity and commands them to “be fruitful and multiply.”² In chapter three, we see that trees and humanity both have the potential to produce life or death from their fruit. This leads to the appearance of death in the world.

God expects us to produce fruit. God expects our fruit to lead to life.

Photo by Peter Keller on Unsplash

Fig Trees + Vineyards

Jesus made this clear in this parable he told about a man and his fig tree.

Then he told this parable: “A man had a fig tree growing in his vineyard, and he went to look for fruit on it but did not find any. So he said to the man who took care of the vineyard, ‘For three years now I’ve been coming to look for fruit on this fig tree and haven’t found any. Cut it down! Why should it use up the soil?’

“‘Sir,’ the man replied, ‘leave it alone for one more year, and I’ll dig around it and fertilize it. If it bears fruit next year, fine! If not, then cut it down.’”  -Luke 13:6-8

Jesus expects us to produce fruit, and if we don’t…well, I’ll let you determine what it means to be cut down. Scholars believe that Jesus is referencing Isaiah 5 when he tells this parable.

 I will sing for the one I love
a song about his vineyard:
My loved one had a vineyard
on a fertile hillside.
He dug it up and cleared it of stones
and planted it with the choicest vines.
He built a watchtower in it
and cut out a winepress as well.
Then he looked for a crop of good grapes,
but it yielded only bad fruit.  -Isaiah 5:1-2

What’s worse than producing no fruit? Producing bad fruit. 

This is to encourage you to pay attention when you see the reference to trees. It should tell you something important is about to happen, which brings me back to Genesis 12. 

The Oracle

As a reminder, God has called Abraham to leave his father’s home to a land that he would show Abraham only after he had arrived. In this call, God promises Abraham blessings, and specifically to make a great nation out of Abraham’s family. Abraham obediently sets out and travels to Canaan. This is how Genesis 12 puts it:

He took his wife, Sarai, his nephew Lot, and all his wealth—his livestock and all the people he had taken into his household at Haran—and headed for the land of Canaan. When they arrived in Canaan, Abram traveled through the land as far as Shechem. There he set up camp beside the oak of Moreh. At that time, the area was inhabited by Canaanites.  -Genesis 12:5-6

Moreh means ‘teacher’ or ‘oracle’ in Hebrew and Aramaic, so it would seem something important is going to happen at this oak tree. These clues (tree and teacher/oracle) lead us to believe Abraham will learn or hear something of significance — leading toward life or death.

He does.

God appears and speaks an important message in the very next verse:

Then the Lord appeared to Abram and said, “I will give this land to your descendants.” And Abram built an altar there and dedicated it to the Lord, who had appeared to him.  -Genesis 12:7

I wanted to be clear on the meaning of oracle, so I looked up its definition. Here is how Oxford Languages defines this word: “a place at which divine advice or prophecy was sought.” I don’t know Abraham’s reason for stopping at this tree, but Abraham receives God’s ‘divine advice’ there. God ‘teaches’ Abraham about his future. — this is the land God promised to Abraham before he began his journey, so Abraham worships God in this place. 

What is Your Fruit?

So, what can we take away from the appearance of trees in Genesis and throughout the Bible? Here are two simple reminders:

1. Trees are a sign something significant could happen. Pay attention!

2. Usually, the significance is life or death. 

3. [BONUS] We produce fruit leading to life or death.

This last bonus point is what Paul tried to impress on the readers of his letter to the Galatian church. 

When you follow the desires of your sinful nature, the results are very clear: sexual immorality, impurity, lustful pleasures, idolatry, sorcery, hostility, quarreling, jealousy, outbursts of anger, selfish ambition, dissension, division, envy, drunkenness, wild parties, and other sins like these. Let me tell you again, as I have before, that anyone living that sort of life will not inherit the Kingdom of God.

But the Holy Spirit produces this kind of fruit in our lives: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. There is no law against these things!  -Galatians 5:19-23

We are like trees who can produce life or death. In the final few verses of Galatians 5³, Paul shows us how we produce life. This is the Andy Bondurant version of those verses (the ABV):

1. Say ‘no’ to yourself.

2. Say ‘yes’ to Jesus.

3. Walk with the Spirit.

Don’t wait to walk in the land of the living. I want you to see hope now, so I encourage you to be a tree planted near streams of living water.⁴ Say no to yourself, say yes to Jesus, and walk with the Spirit. 

Related Articles:

Last fall, I wrote a series of three posts on the tie between trees and humanity. Many of these same thoughts are included there. For more detail, I suggest you take a look at these three posts.

1. Genesis 1:9-13

2. Genesis 1:24-31

3. Galatians 5:24-26

4. Psalm 1