8T 288
(Testimonies for the Church Volume 8 288)
The fruit of the tree of life in the Garden of Eden possessed supernatural virtue. To eat of it was to live forever. Its fruit was the antidote of death. Its leaves were for the sustaining of life and immortality. But through man’s disobedience death entered the world. Adam ate of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, the fruit of which he had been forbidden to touch. His transgression opened the floodgates of woe upon our race. (8T 288.1) MC VC
After the entrance of sin the heavenly Husbandman transplanted the tree of life to the Paradise above; but its branches hang over the wall to the lower world. Through the redemption purchased by the blood of Christ, we may still eat of its life-giving fruit. (8T 288.2) MC VC
Of Christ it is written: “In Him was life; and the life was the light of men.” John 1:4. He is the Fountain of life. Obedience to Him is the life-giving power that gladdens the soul. (8T 288.3) MC VC
Christ declares: “I am the Bread of Life: he that cometh to Me shall never hunger; and he that believeth on Me shall never thirst.” “As the living Father hath sent Me, and I live by the Father: so he that eateth Me, even he shall live by Me.... It is the Spirit that quickeneth; the flesh profiteth nothing: the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life.” “To him that overcometh will I give to eat of the tree of life, which is in the midst of the Paradise of God.” John 6:35, 57-63; Revelation 2:7. (8T 288.4) MC VC