Good Friday: You Shall Surely Die

The Garden had become a place of death. Two cherubim with flaming swords were stationed at the east gate, ready to strike and put to death anyone who sought access to the Tree of Life in the midst of the Garden.

God never intended to keep man out of the Garden forever. God desired communion with man; for man to draw near to him with no veils in between. But man sinned and was cut off from this nearness to God.

From the time of the fall until the time of Christ Jesus, God made provisions to draw near to him through vicarious substitutes. Man enjoyed the benefits of temporary forgiveness and communion with God that was real but not enjoyed in its fullness.

Man was kept at a distance, separated by animals, veils, and various levels of holiness. None of these provisions was God’s full intention for man. They were types and shadows of things to come when God would grant full and free access to the Garden once again for man to eat with him at the Tree of Life and the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil.

The cherubim’s flaming presence indicated that the only access to the Garden and its trees was through death. Who could endure this death? Any man born after Adam was born in his fallen likeness, a sinner whose just condemnation is death without remedy; that is to say, without resurrection. If a sinner gains access to the Tree of Life and lives forever, his latter state will be worse than the first. This is why God kept Adam from the Tree of Life in the first place. It is God’s grace that keeps man in sin from the Tree of Life.

But if it is God’s intention for man to draw near to him there at the Tree and all men are born in sin, how will this ever be accomplished? There must be a new Adam who is sinless, representing all that the original Adam represented, who can bear the weight of the sin of the world and yet come through death into new life. He must be able to provide himself as an offering for the forgiveness of sins so that when man re-enters the Garden, he can eat from the Trees without fear, being confirmed in righteousness and given all he needs to accomplish his God-given mission. He must be able to pass through the flaming swords of the cherubim, enduring their judgment with the promise of resurrection, the declaration that sins have been forgiven.

On a hill called “The Skull” on the east side of the city of Jerusalem, a tree stands in the middle of two others. In a dark irony, the tree with the man hanging there with a “cherub” on either side is the Tree of Life, the place where God will commune with man through this broken body and shed blood. Through his sinless offering of himself, he provides the forgiveness of sins so that man may come to the Tree of Life to be confirmed in righteousness and live forever, feasting on the food that is his body and blood unto eternal life.

But this Tree and the one on it are not only the Tree of Life but the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. The Father refused to let the cup of wine made from the fruit of this tree pass from him. The only way for Jesus to provide the forgiveness of sins and be exalted over the angels was to eat the fruit of this tree. The only way for him to defeat the fallen angel, the serpent, and take back dominion of the creation was to eat of this tree and receive authority from his Father to do so. In order to move into a more glorious stage of kingship, he must eat from this tree.

He ate of this tree, and, as the Father promised, in the day he ate of it, he surely died. His Father gave it to him at the right time. He refused it from Satan’s hand early on in his ministry just after his baptism.

He was patient.

The Father granted him access to it, told him to eat of it, and promised him that this death would not be the end; that he would raise him from the dead, proclaiming to the world that forgiveness of sins, as well as all wisdom and authority, would be found in him.

The Son obeys in faith and waits for the promise of his Father.