The Tree in the Midst of the Garden Meaning?
1) Direct Answer
It means the two great choices God set in the very center: the Tree of Life (Christ, God’s own Life and Word) and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil (Satan’s reasoning). In the “midst” of the garden stood life by the Word or death by unbelief.
2) Scriptural Explanation
- The Bible says there were two trees in the midst: “The tree of life also in the midst of the garden, and the tree of knowledge of good and evil” (Genesis 2:9). Eve later refers to the forbidden one as “the tree which is in the midst of the garden” (Genesis 3:3).
- God’s command: “Of every tree… thou mayest freely eat: but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it” (Genesis 2:16–17). The issue was obedience to God’s Word.
- When they chose the wrong tree, “their eyes were opened,” shame entered, and death followed (Genesis 3:5–7; Romans 5:12).
- God then guarded the Tree of Life with cherubim and a flaming sword (Genesis 3:22–24), showing that life is now only by God’s appointed way.
- The Tree of Life is Christ. “In him was life” (John 1:4). He said, “I am the life” (John 14:6). Wisdom is called “a tree of life” (Proverbs 3:18), and Christ is the wisdom of God (1 Corinthians 1:24).
- Access to the Tree of Life is promised again to the overcomer: “To him that overcometh will I give to eat of the tree of life” (Revelation 2:7), and it appears in the New Jerusalem (Revelation 22:2,14).
3) Simple Clarifying Logic
- Now notice: it wasn’t an apple. Eating fruit doesn’t open spiritual eyes, bring moral shame, multiply sorrow in conception, or create two opposing seed lines. Yet Genesis 3:15 declares two seeds at enmity, and 1 John 3:12 says Cain “was of that wicked one.” That shows the forbidden “knowledge” was Satan’s corrupt approach to life and reproduction, not a harmless bite of produce.
- The serpent was cursed to go on his belly (Genesis 3:14), meaning he was different before the curse. Through that subtle beast Satan introduced a carnal, unbelieving union, and death followed. Adam and Eve were to live by every Word of God; instead, Eve received the serpent’s reasoning against the Word (2 Corinthians 11:3; 1 Timothy 2:14).
- So the “midst” marks the center of decision: Will man live by God’s revealed Word (Tree of Life), or by a mixture—good and evil together—offered by the serpent (tree of knowledge)?
4) Reinforcing Statement
You see, the question of the garden is still the question today. Choose Christ the Word and live, or mix the Word with human reasoning and die. The way back to the Tree of Life is opened through Jesus Christ, and the overcomer will eat of it again.
Ask a Follow-up Question
What did the Laodicean Church Age (our age) Angel (- messenger) Say about this?
Ranked passages from the local William Branham sermon and Church Age Book database. Relevance is relative, not a statement of doctrinal certainty.
The uncertain sound
62-0714 §58
Now, it was about a thousand years there, there was nothing but a stump. But you cannot, because the life of that tree's predestinated to bring forth a tree... Up come Luther, started it growing. What did it do? Organized. The husbandman pruned the branches. Come up into the Methodist. What did it do? Organized, just like the mother. Prune the branches, come on up into the Pentecostals. It's done the same thing, organized. God's pruned the branches. But that life in the heart of that tree has to live. God said, "I...
The true and false vines
56-0311A §20
A very beautiful type of today. When the church is hungry, God wants His children fed with the bread of life, not with some theory, but with the bread of life. Who---or what---is this bread of life? Jesus said, "I am the bread of life that came from God out of heaven." Said, "Your fathers ate manna in the wilderness." Hebrews ... or, John 6, "They ate manna in the wilderness, and they're every one dead. But I am the bread of life that come from God out of heaven. If any man eats this bread, he shall never die." Or,...
Investments
63-0803B §105
Oh, eternal God, come in mercy and speak to every heart here. And may today, as these hands went up, and maybe some who at that time when I asked didn't have the real feeling, but now has, may they sign with the blood of their own life, God, to ... from this day henceforth that they are making their investment of their entire life to Jesus Christ and to His Word. And that great tree, that great tree of life, when He come on earth they chopped it down by a Roman spear, and hung it on a Roman tree, a cruel, cursed tr...
Jehovah-Jireh, part 2
62-0706 §25
Christ, that tree that was in the garden of Eden! There were two trees in the garden of Eden! These two trees were set there for a birth purpose. And when Eve... She was the tree of death if she was touched. And Christ was the tree of life. Now by the woman comes death; by the man come life. Now when He stood here talking to the Jews, He said, "I..." They said, "Our fathers ate manna in the wilderness for forty years." He said, "And they're, every one, dead! But I am the bread of life, tree of life, that come from...
Convinced and then concerned
62-1125M §28
This day of falling away, and being that it is fallen to that, the people are losing concern. Remember, the tree is growing on just the same. As Joel said, "I will restore." Many of you that takes the tapes, I wish you'd get that bride tree message, see. Yet it was cut down. And the main tree, Christ, was cut down. He was the tree of life that come from the garden of Eden and was hung on a cruel, Roman-made tree. But that same tree of life that He was---that a man eats of this, and don't die---He was bringing up a...