WHEN LIFE-GIVING FOOD KILLS

And he showed me a pure river of water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding out of the throne of God and of the Lamb. In the midst of the street of it, and on either side of the river, was there the tree of life, which bare twelve manner of fruits, and yielded her fruit every month: and the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations. And there shall be no more curse: but the throne of God and of the Lamb shall be in it; and his servants shall serve him:
(Rev 22:1-3)

Blessed are they that do his commandments, that they may have right to the tree of life, and may enter in through the gates into the city. For without are dogs, and sorcerers, and whoremongers, and murderers, and idolaters, and whosoever loveth and maketh a lie.
(Rev 22:14-15)

Some enter in, but not all.

What happened between Genesis 3:22 and Revelation 21?

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JESUS!!!!

In order to understand the picture of the reason God disallowed man to enter to eat fruit of life, and later allowed others, but not all, we havbe to understand what SIN DOES.

Let's look at another aspect of this picture.

And they shall take of the blood, and strike it on the two side posts and on the upper door post of the houses, wherein they shall eat it. And they shall eat the flesh in that night, roast with fire, and unleavened bread; and with bitter herbs they shall eat it.
(Exo 12:7-8)

Ye shall eat nothing leavened; in all your habitations shall ye eat unleavened bread.
(Exo 12:20)

And the LORD said unto Moses and Aaron, This is the ordinance of the passover: There shall no stranger eat thereof: But every man's servant that is bought for money, when thou hast circumcised him, then shall he eat thereof. A foreigner and a hired servant shall not eat thereof.
(Exo 12:43-45)

Jesus was ready to die nt he cross, and the night before He had PASSOVER as all Israel celebrated the above scriptures.

But He changes the meaning of the PASSOVER and refers to Himself.

He actually did not change the meaning.
He was showing them that the PASSOVER was more than just a memorial of the Exodus night when God passed over the hebrews' houses and saved them from death.
There was going to be a SPIRITUAL exodus that would save from DEATH.
HELL and the GRAVE are associated with Death.
So something would save us from the very force of death, hell and the grave.
It was not a little lamb's death and blood and meat, but the LAMB OF GOD WHO TAKES THE SIN OF THE WORLD AWAY -- JESUS.

You can take the entire Exodus story and spiritually realize that it foreshadows the great deliverance from the bondage of sin that is sending mankind to hell.

He said that it was HIS FLESH that the lamb's meat represented.

IT WAS HIS BLOOD that the wine represented.

And earlier in his ministry He explained the message of the FLESH AND THE BLOOD.

Whoso eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, hath eternal life; and I will raise him up at the last day.
(John 6:54)

This is what the REAL PASSOVER from sin is all about!

Only the work of the cross dealt with sin, by Jesus getting the death penalty in all of our places.

So we can say we paid the penalty that we owed because of our sins, through God saying He'd give Jesus' death as our deaths, so we could be free from sin.

But uncircumcised people could not eat of the passover.

If passover foreshadows Jesus' death to save us from sin, what could the prohibition of uncircumcised people mean?
Paul shows us how, if we have spiritual eyes to see

When ye come together therefore into one place, this is not to eat the Lord's supper. For in eating every one taketh before other his own supper: and one is hungry, and another is drunken.
(1Cor 11:20-21)

And when he had given thanks, he broke it, and said, Take, eat: this is my body, which is broken for you: this do in remembrance of me. After the same manner also he took the cup, when he had supped, saying, This cup is the new testament in my blood: this do ye, as oft as ye drink it, in remembrance of me. For as often as ye eat this bread, and drink this cup, ye do show the Lord's death till he come. Wherefore whosoever shall eat this bread, and drink this cup of the Lord, unworthily, shall be guilty of the body and blood of the Lord.
(1Co 11:24-27)

For he that eateth and drinketh unworthily, eateth and drinketh damnation to himself, not discerning the Lord's body. For this cause many are weak and sickly among you, and many sleep. For if we would judge ourselves, we should not be judged.
(1Co 11:29-31)

Notice that Jesus said eating His flesh and drinking His blood causes us to have eternal life, and we will be raised at the last day.

And then Paul turns around and refers to this very same flesh and blood of Jesus in the bread and wine, and says it was killing some of the people.
The Passover gives a hint as to the picture.

No uncircumcised person can eat Passover.

Circumcision in Israel was the initiation rite of a male into the commonwealth and covenant with God.
And Paul said that a spiritual circumcision, not physical, circumcision must occur in our HEARTS.

In whom also ye are circumcised with the circumcision made without hands, in putting off the body of the sins of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ:
(Col 2:11)

The body of sins must be put off our lives.

sion If circumcision speaks of sins removed, then uncircumcision speaks of sins not removed.

Once you are physically circumcised, you cannot be uncircumcised.
But this can happen and does happen spiritually.

For circumcision verily profiteth, if thou keep the law: but if thou be a breaker of the law, thy circumcision is made uncircumcision.
(Rom 2:25)

Paul speaks of the heart.

Once the heart has been circumcised of all the sins of the flesh, if a person's heart indulges in sin again, as a dog returning to its vomit, the circumcision becomes uncircumcision.
One's heart is covered with the body of sins all over again!

As in the case of Adam, you cannot eat the fruit of life if you have sin.

God demands you stay out.

Colossians 2:11-12 continues and says that this spiritual circumcision is accomplished by the work of God when you are baptized.

Buried with him in baptism, wherein also ye are risen with him through the faith of the operation of God, who hath raised him from the dead.
(Col 2:12)

Its connected with Jesus Christ's resurrection from the dead.

The same God who raised Jesus from the dead, raises you from being dead in sins, through this circumcision of your heart.

Jesus died, and when someone dies, they are freed from sin.
Jesus took all our sins upon Himself.
That is the reason the Father forsook Him on the cross.
He could not stand the sin.

For he that is dead is freed from sin.
(Rom 6:7)

And our baptism unites us to Jesus' experience of death.

We enter into His death, so we can say that we died with Him.
It was not only Him who died on that cross that day.
We died with Him.
So if the ones who die are freed from sin, then we are freed from sin.
Sin is circumcised from our lives.
It's taken from us.

But you can walk right back into that sin again.

Passover foreshadows the Last Supper.

Jesus is the real lamb who rescues us from sin.
And we're circumcised in our hearts.
Sin is removed.
So eating the LAMB'S MEAT gives us life.

So the only conclusion we can come up with for the reason that something intended to give life (Lord's Supper) instead gives death is due to this uncircumcised issue.

Because uncircumcised hearts are hearts that have sin all over them.
So after Christ freed us from sin and we walk right back into it and shout Praise the Lord and enjoy the preaching, we will die.

Thou shalt die the deaths of the uncircumcised by the hand of strangers: for I have spoken it, saith the Lord GOD.
(Eze 28:10)

The people who ate the Lord's Supper with a spirit of division in their hearts, were uncircumcised in heart.

And death was the result.

God did not want Adam to eat of the fruit of life after he sinned.

Adam was not supposed to do this.
And Jesus is the life!
And many feast on the LIFE with sin in their hearts, and die.

Sin in the heart is not present by people who mistakenly sin and need to repent.

All of us experience mistaken sins, and must repent.
But the HEART that is uncircumcised is the heart that PURPOSES to sin and does not care about it.
Its the heart that does not care if it s wrong.
The ATTITUDE of rebellion is the uncircumcised heart.

Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that entereth not by the door into the sheepfold, but climbeth up some other way, the same is a thief and a robber.
(John 10:1)

I am the door: by me if any man enter in, he shall be saved, and shall go in and out, and find pasture.
(John 10:9)

Jesus is the door in the sense that we must go through the work of the cross in order to enter and be safe.

That is why there was lamb blood on the doors in Egypt when death was killing the firstborn everywhere outside.
In the house was life.
And you had to walk through the bloody doorway to escape death.
This is the reason Paul said the people eating the flesh of Jesus in the bread of communion, would die.

The death of Jesus CIRCUMCISES our hearts when we are baptized into it.

SInce the DOOR in Hebrew houses had blood, this speaks of the proper way to enter the SHEEPFOLD.
It's all symbolic and tells a message of the only ones who can get life from Jesus being the ones who were circumcised in their hearts.
Sins are only removed by our involvement in the death of Jesus.
You cannot think of Jesus' death on the cross as simply ONE WAY to find life, among many religions.
He is the way.
Not A way.

Circumcision sheds blood when it is performed.

So how can the lamb's blood on the doors represent circumcision of the people's hearts?

This is the whole basis of the Gospel.

You must believe that Jesus' death COUNTS AS YOUR DEATHS in God's eyes.
He shed the blood and the sins were removed off our lives.

People with sin cannot eat fruit of life.

And the LORD God said, Behold, the man is become as one of us, to know good and evil: and now, lest he put forth his hand, and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and live forever: Therefore the LORD God sent him forth from the garden of Eden, to till the ground from whence he was taken.
(Gen 3:22-23)

And the commandment, which was ordained to life, I found to be unto death.
(Rom 7:10)

For we know that the law is spiritual: but I am carnal, sold under sin.
(Rom 7:14)

Receiving Life is more than agreeing with the Bible.

It is what you can feast upon when your heart is freed from sin, and remains free.

Look at the city!

And the gates of it shall not be shut at all by day: for there shall be no night there. And they shall bring the glory and honor of the nations into it. And there shall in no wise enter into it any thing that defileth, neither whatsoever worketh abomination, or maketh a lie: but they which are written in the Lamb's book of life.
(Rev 21:25-27)