Prayer

Lord God, thank you for the gift of life. We praise you and we thank you. You've made us. You knit us together in our mother's wombs. We have been fearfully and wonderfully made in your image. Lord, please help us to consider the gift of life today and help us that we may not take it for granted. We pray in Jesus' name. Amen.

Reading

Genesis 2:9.

“And out of the ground the Lord God made to spring up every tree that is pleasant to the sight and good for food. The tree of life was in the midst of the garden, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.”

Meditation

Life is a gift from God. We must never be mistaken into thinking that God’s grace was given to us only after the fall. There is a redemptive sense in which grace did come after the fall, because after the fall we needed forgiveness for our sins. Nevertheless, even if salvation wasn’t in the picture – life has always been a gift from God right from the beginning. Grace is a condition of life, because life is and always will be a gift. It’s not something we gave to ourselves or made for ourselves, we don’t innately deserve it, we’re not entitled to anything because everything belongs to God. Anything and everything that we receive is a pure gift.

The Tree of Life clearly teaches us this principle, it’s a symbol of grace, if you like. In the garden of Eden, man needed to eat from the tree of life in order to sustain his life – that’s why it’s called the tree of life. In Gen 3:22 we see this very clearly. One of the reasons God expelled Adam and Eve from the garden is so that they wouldn’t eat again from the tree of life and live forever.

Now what all this means is that life wasn’t something that Adam and Eve had in and of themselves, they needed to receive it as a gift. Life is, and always has been, sustained by God. Your life is a gracious gift from God.

Be ye doers of the word…

The plain application we ought to draw out from this principle is that we must treat life as a gift from God. We must not live with a sense of entitlement, we must not live our lives with the aim of fulfilling our own desires and purposes. We must treat life for what it really is: a gift from God. We are here at his good pleasure and for his good pleasure (Col 1:16). Jesus said: “Not my will, but yours be done.” We must have the same attitude. We’re not here to do our will and accomplish our desires, we’re here to serve and please God.

In addition to this, as it turns out, our greatest joy will also be found in the centre of the Father’s will. When we follow our own will, it leads us to one place: death. That’s what happened for Adam and Eve. When we do things our way, it tends to be destructive. Instead, we need to do things God’s way, because our life is a gift from him. SDG.

Prayer of Confession & Consecration

Our loving Heavenly Father, we do thank you for the gift of life and we pray that you would forgive us for the times when we have misused this gift and served ourselves. Lord, forgive us for our sins and please lead us by your strength, power, and wisdom. Help us to use life to serve and please you in every way. Lord, we pray for your help in this. It's not something we can do in and of ourselves. We need your grace and strength. And so we ask in Jesus' name, Amen.

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