«　WEEK 6　DAY 3　»

　　Jer. 2:13 For My people have committed two evils: they have forsaken Me, the fountain of living waters, to hew out for themselves cisterns, broken cisterns, which hold no water.

　　Gen. 2:8-9 …And there He put the man….And out of the ground Jehovah God caused to grow every tree that is pleasant to the sight and good for food, as well as the tree of life in the middle of the garden…

　　In Jeremiah 2:13 Jehovah speaks concerning the two basic sins committed by the children of Israel. The first sin was forsaking Jehovah as the fountain, the source, of living waters; the second sin was hewing out for themselves broken cisterns that could not hold water. This second sin was a matter of not trusting in God but of trusting in themselves to do something for their own enjoyment. These two sins govern the entire book of Jeremiah.

　　The principle in the Bible is that God does not want His chosen people to take anything other than Himself as their source. After God created man, He placed him in front of the tree of life, which signifies God as life. By doing this God was indicating that He wanted man to partake of the tree of life, not anything else. To partake of the tree of life is to take God as our unique source, as our source of everything. (Life-study of Jeremiah, pp. 217-218)

　　Sin is a matter of leaving God and doing something by ourselves and for ourselves. This is exactly what the children of Israel did. They forsook God as the fountain of living waters for their supply, and, according to their opinion, they did whatever they could to work out something by themselves for their enjoyment ….Sin is to forsake God and to do something by ourselves and for ourselves. This is the principle throughout the Bible, and Jeremiah repeated this principle again and again so that we would be impressed.

　　Jeremiah 34—45 is a section of twelve chapters showing us the stubbornness of Israel in sinning against Jehovah. In these chapters one thing is made clear—that Israel has forsaken God as the source, the fountain, of living waters. Consider, for example, the situation with Gedaliah. Although he was faithful in caring for Jeremiah, God’s prophet (40:5-6), he did not seek the Lord’s word (vv. 13-14), because this was not his habit. He did not take God as his source to be one with Him and to receive whatever issued from Him. If he had been such a person, the first thing he would have done would have been to receive the word of God. (Life-study of Jeremiah, p. 218)

　　The principle of the tree of life is dependence. If you have the living God as your co-driver,…He will be your living map and your living guide. Actually, you will even cease being the driver and let Him drive. You may sit near Him and enjoy His driving, saying,”…Lord, You drive in my place.” We may apply this principle to the teaching about marriage in Ephesians 5. All Christian wives know the verse in Ephesians 5 which tells them to submit to their own husbands. All Christian husbands know the verse which tells them to love their wives. Nevertheless, wives and husbands fail to fulfill the requirements of these verses because they take Ephesians 5 as the tree of knowledge, not as the tree of life. Husbands and wives, you should not live according to the tree of knowledge. You must live by the tree of life. As a wife you should say, “Lord, I don’t know how to submit to my husband. Lord, even if I do know, I cannot do it. I will forget about it, Lord. I won’t use my effort or energy to fulfill this requirement. Lord Jesus, I simply stay in Your presence. I want to abide in You and enjoy You twenty-four hours a day.” If you do this, submission spontaneously will flow out of your inner being. It will be the overflow of your enjoyment of Christ as your inner life. This is dependence on the tree of life. (Life-study of Genesis, pp. 162, 164-165)

　　Further Reading: CWWL, 1993, vol. 2, “The Organic Union in God’s Relationship with Man,” chs. 1-2