The theme for today’s daily devotional by Pastor Joseph Prince, July 30 2023 is ”Partake of the Tree of Life”
SCRIPTURE: Now it came to pass, as He sat at the table with them, that He took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them.-Luke 24:30
In Luke 24:30–31, the resurrected Christ partook of the holy Communion with the two disciples at the village of Emmaus. What a divine honor the Lord Jesus has put on the breaking of bread, on this wonderful sacrament He has given to the church.
This is why in my church, we receive the Communion every week. That’s what the early church did as well. The book of Acts tells us that the disciples “came together to break bread” on “the first day of the week” (Acts 20:7). Shouldn’t we emphasize what our Lord Jesus made central?
We know that God made Adam and Eve complete except for one thing: their spiritual eyes were not opened. God wanted their spiritual eyes to be opened by the Tree of Life, but instead they partook of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, and their eyes were opened to see their nakedness. Their eyes were opened to see their failures and shortcomings, their lack and their inadequacies, their sin and their shame.
But our Lord Jesus was restoring all that was lost in that garden. I believe when He broke bread for the two disciples, He was letting them eat from the Tree of Life, the tree that God had wanted man to eat from. Our Lord Jesus is the Tree of Life, and when we partake of His broken body, we are eating from the Tree of Life.
That is why the moment the two disciples took the bread, their eyes were opened, and they knew the Lord Jesus. The apostle Paul also prayed that our eyes may be opened, that we may see Jesus, that we may truly have a revelation of His love (Eph. 1:17–18, 3:18–19). I had been searching the Scriptures for years to find out more about the Tree of Life and was so excited when the Lord showed me this.
After the two disciples partook of the Tree of Life, I believe something happened to their bodies: they were infused and energized with the resurrection life of Christ. This was why they could rise up that very hour to walk back to Jerusalem (Luke 24:33), covering fourteen miles in one day (Luke 24:13). Today we can rejoice because that same resurrection life flows into our bodies each time we partake of the Lord’s Supper.
By the way, after Adam and Eve sinned, their hearts became cold with fear, and they hid themselves when they heard the voice of God in the garden (Gen. 3:10). But as the resurrected Christ walked with the two disciples on the road to Emmaus, their hearts burned with love for Jesus (Luke 24:32), and they wanted to stay longer in His presence (Luke 24:29).
Our Lord Jesus has restored the relationship with God that was fractured and lost when Adam and Eve fell, and today we don’t ever have to be afraid of the Lord. Whatever challenges come our way, we can have the confidence that He is for us (Rom. 8:31), and we can come boldly to His throne of grace (Heb. 4:16).
This devotional is taken from the book The Healing Power of the Holy Communion—A 90-Day Devotional.