Two Trees
When God created the Garden of Eden as Adam and Eve’s home, He placed in the garden two special trees, the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil (Gen. 2:9).
It is difficult to answer every question about these two trees, for Scripture gives us very little information. For example, did the fruit of the tree of life have power to give life to those who ate it? And if it did, did Adam and Eve need to eat of it only once, or repeatedly, in order to live forever? The fact that the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil would not itself have killed Adam and Eve like a poison (Gen. 3:6) seems to suggest that neither was the fruit of the tree of life automatically able to give life. Yet Genesis 3:22 appears to point in another direction. Still, if the tree of life did have power to sustain life or give Adam endless life, then it was very different from the tree of knowledge, which had no power in itself to destroy life.
Perhaps we cannot resolve all these questions, since Scripture says so little. But one thing seems plain about the two trees in the first paradise: they represented to Adam the antithesis of which we spoke in the last issue of the News. That antithesis is the separation and opposition between God and Satan, good and evil, the church and the world, believer and unbeliever.
For God’s people, the calling with respect to that antithesis is to say “Yes” to God and to His law, and “No” to the Devil and to sin. This is the essence of spiritual separation from the world of sin in which we live (II Cor. 6:14–18).
In the garden, the two trees set that same calling before Adam and Eve. By eating of the tree of life, they would be saying “Yes” to God. By refusing to eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, they would be saying “No” to the Devil, to sin and to disobedience. There was no other reason for them not to eat of that tree, for it was “good for food” and “pleasant to the eyes” (Gen. 3:6).
At that point Adam and Eve failed, ate and fell into sin. We continue in their sin whenever we say “Yes” to the Devil and “No” to God and to His law. Yet the calling set before them, pictured by those two trees, never changed. For that reason redemption could come only through our Lord Jesus Christ, whose whole life was a perfect “Yes” to God and to His law, and an equally decisive “No” to sin and to the Devil, beginning with His temptations in the wilderness. Thank God for the second Adam! Rev. Ron Hanko
Loving Our Enemies (8)
“Ye have heard that it hath been said, Thou shalt love thy neighbour, and hate thine enemy. But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you; that ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven: for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust. For if ye love them which love you, what reward have ye? do not even the publicans the same? And if ye salute your brethren only, what do ye more than others? do not even the publicans so? Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect” (Matt. 5:43-48).
In our detailed consideration of this important passage, one further question must be addressed: What does it mean to love? What does it mean that we are called to love God? And what is God’s love that we are commanded to imitate?
It is not easy to form a proper conception of love in the midst of the sloppy sentimentality of our day. Love is not romantic attraction. It is not sentimental affection or mere feeling. It is not shallow romanticism—certainly not in the kingdom of heaven of which Jesus is speaking. All such notions must be set aside.
Scripture itself must define love for us. Remarkably, it does so in a formal way. We find this definition in Colossians 3:14: “And above all these things put on charity [i.e., love], which is >the bond of perfectness.” According to God’s word, love is a bond—that is, fellowship, friendship and communion between two or more persons—and it is a bond of perfectness. Such a bond can exist only between holy persons who rejoice in one another’s holiness and moral perfection.
That definition must first be applied to God.
God loves Himself. We must begin there. God has fellowship with Himself in the bond of the Trinity, as the three holy persons of the sacred Trinity dwell together in perfect fellowship. This is possible because God is perfect. He is the altogether Holy One in whom there is not the least taint of imperfection.
God also loves His people. He establishes with them a bond of fellowship. But because this bond is characterized by perfectness, God cannot love His people as they are in themselves. He loves them in Christ, in whom all the elect are perfectly righteous and holy.
God’s love is sovereign. It is a love that saves. It is powerful and efficacious. It is irresistible. It draws the elect in Christ out of sin into perfect fellowship with the thrice-holy God. God knows His own and loves them, while He hates the wicked with a perfect hatred. Because love is always saving love, its objects can only be the elect. In love, God both seeks and actually accomplishes their salvation.
That love must be reflected in us, who have the love of God shed abroad in our hearts.
There are two things true of God’s love that can never be true of ours. First, God knows who His elect are; we do not. Second, our love can never be sovereignly efficacious. We cannot love in a way that saves. If we could, every covenant parent would save his or her wayward child.
Nevertheless, we are called to imitate God’s love.
First, when we love our neighbour, we must seek his salvation. We must certainly help him in his need, but that is never enough. We must seek his ultimate and final good, which is salvation. We must testify to him of the gospel, call him to repentance, show him the blessedness of salvation in the cross of Christ and speak of the great mercy God has shown to us. That is love.
Second, we must do this to all, for we do not know among our neighbours who are God’s elect.
Third, our love may not involve a full bond of fellowship. Our love is a one-way street. We may not attend his parties, socialize in his home or form friendships with him, for in doing so we become partakers of his sin (James 4:4).
Finally, this kind of love will always have its effect. If the person is one of God’s elect, God will use our witness to bring him to repentance, so that the full bond of fellowship may enrich both our lives. If he is not one of God’s elect, our witness will harden him in his sin. He will become angry because his sin is exposed and will eventually refuse even to hear our testimony.
Yet in all this we remain children of our Father in heaven. He does good to us far beyond anything we can imagine. How, then, can we do anything other than do good to others? Through it all, God accomplishes His own sovereign purpose. Prof. Herman Hanko
All Israel Shall Be Saved?
In our discussion of Israel’s future in God’s eternal plan, we have come to Romans 11:26: “And so all Israel shall be saved.” What does that verse mean?
Before we explain the meaning of the verse, one misconception must be cleared away. The verse does not say, “THEN all Israel shall be saved,” as though, after the fulness of the Gentiles is brought in, God would do something additional with Israel. The word “so” is not an adverb of time, but of manner. It does not mean “then,” but “in this way.”
Therefore there is no ground in Romans 11:26 for expecting a future work of God among the Jews that follows the gathering of the Gentiles. This is important. Romans 11:26 does not support the idea of a future Jewish millennial kingdom.
What, then, does Romans 11:26 mean? There are several possibilities, and they all depend on how the word “Israel” is understood.
1) If “Israel” refers to the true Israel of God, elect Jews and Gentiles together (cf. Gal. 6:16; Rom. 2:28–29; Phil. 3:3), then Romans 11:26 teaches that all the true Israel of God will have been saved when the fulness of the Gentiles has come in (Rom. 11:25).
2) If “Israel” refers to the elect descendants of Abraham from the nation of Israel, then the verse teaches that the elect Jews will be saved throughout the ages, concurrently with the bringing in of the fulness of the Gentiles. In that case the sense is something like this: hardening has happened to Israel in part, the rest of the Jews are continually being saved, this continues until the fulness of the Gentiles be come in, and so, that is, in this manner, all Israel, meaning all the elect Jews, shall be saved.
We prefer the second view for two reasons. First, the subject under discussion in Romans 11 is how the remnant according to election from the nation of Israel will be saved in fulfilment of God’s promise to them. Second, the use of the word “Israel” in the New Testament, and in Romans 11 in particular, ordinarily refers to Jews, elect or otherwise.
In any case, the verse is describing the manner in which salvation comes, either to the true Israel of God, Jews and Gentiles together, or to the elect Jews from the nation of Israel. There are no other options. “So” cannot be made to mean “then.”
But does this leave room for a great work of God among the Jews after the gathering of the Gentiles? Can one believe that God may yet work a mass conversion among the Jews without embracing a Jewish millennial kingdom? Many who reject an earthly Jewish millennial kingdom still believe such a work may come. We would not deny that it is possible. Yet, while we would not rule it out, and would even hope for it (Rom. 9:1–5, 10:1), we find no ground in Romans 11:26 for that expectation, whether “all Israel” is taken to mean all the elect Jews or the elect Jews and Gentiles together. Romans 11:26 is describing the manner in which all Israel is saved through the ages. Rev. Ron Hanko
