THE MIND & THE TREE OF LIFE

"Let him who seeks continue seeking until he finds: and when he finds he will become troubled, and when he is troubled he will be astonished and he will reign over the all!" (Gospel of Thomas) In 1999, I both found and experienced something deeply troubling when I set my focus to understanding the truth in the Bible. I discovered manic depression and slipped into mania. At the time, I had no idea what manic depression was let alone mania and could in no way control the extreme high and lows I felt when in that state of mind. What I thought was purely a spiritual matter of the heart had become a psychological nightmare of the mind. A war ensued within me as I struggled to regain control of myself and my life. This took 7 years of being in and out of every psych ward in my city and multiple arrests before I finally got a grip on my illness.

Fast forward 15 years later and I have not had a manic episode sense. I have come close but each time through the strengthening of my will power I have been able to stop it dead in its tracks. And this is where the astonishing part of this story comes in. I have discovered something through this experience I never realized before that I want to share with you. Not only have I discovered the secret location of the tree of life, but I am getting very close to actually accessing it. But before we dive in I need to bring some verses into your mind from the Bible that will help you understand where my theory is coming from.

Jesus said in Matthew 13:44, "The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field. When a man found it he hid and in all his joy went out, sold all he had and bought that field." And later in Luke 17:21 kjv Jesus said, "The kingdom of heaven is within you." Furthermore the Bible says you are God's field (1 Cor. 3:9) and his spirit dwells in you (1 Cor. 3:16). So if the kingdom of heaven (the dwelling place of God's spirit) is within us and is likened unto treasure hidden in a field then where within us does this field and treasure reside but the mind, which is theorized by some to be an electromagnetic field? And this is where my theory starts to get interesting.

First of all, the human brain when taken out of the skull resembles the appearance of a tree split in two. My understanding is that there are two distinct parts of our minds, the conscious mind we use daily to think and the subconscious mind that makes our hearts beat or heals our bodies that we don't often use let alone have any idea how to control. In my theory I compare the conscious mind to the tree of the knowledge of good and evil and the subconscious mind to the tree of life. If we start to bring in the story of what happened to Adam and Eve and relate that story to what we all go through in life some remarkable insights arise.

The Bible says God knew us before we were born (Jeremiah 1:5) and that he knit us together (with garments of flesh (Genesis 3:21)) in our mothers womb (Psalms 139:13). This strongly suggests we all were with God in paradise at some point before we were born or in or around our childhood. Now hold that thought for a moment. It is my understanding that in the development of a child's mind the subconscious mind is developed first. How do I know this? Because without it controlling our heartbeat etc. we would all be dead. Anyways, when a child is very young their conscious mind has not developed yet. And as children we often didn't have a care in the world until one day, and it happened for all of us, we realized we were naked (Genesis 3:7). At that time life changes for us dramatically as we slip out of the subconscious mind into the newly developed conscious mind. At that time "The man has become like one of us knowing both good and evil. He mustn't be allowed to reach out his hand and grab also from the tree of life, eat and live forever. So, God banished man from the garden and put a flaming sword spinning every which way and Cherubim to guard the way to the tree of life" (Genesis 3:24). And of that way Jesus said "Few there be that find it" (Matthew 7:14)

But here is what I want to call your attention to now. The Bible doesn't say that no one finds it and notice carefully that the tree of life that promises eternal life is merely GUARDED. This means that it is not impossible to find and eat of. But if the tree of life is the human brain how then to we eat of it? By mentally grasping the truth!

That said, what I inadvertently had stumbled upon in 1999 through mania and bipolar disorder was that narrow path back to the tree of life w

hich resides in our subconscious mind. But the reason I could not take hold of it and mentally grasp all that was there for me was because I lost my will power to focus on one thing (eating of the tree of life) and excluding everything else. This is because when you are in that state of mind there is so much insight you just get swallowed up like a tiny wave in the ocean. Additionally, all this rush of insight and feelings of euphoria often lead people to feeling Christ-like. This is easily explainable in my theory because you are sitting in the seat of god in your own body (Psalms 82:6). But is that a bad thing? Is it antichrist? Nope. Remember Jesus prayed that we would be made one with the father as he and his father were one (John 17:22). All you are doing at that point is trying to take the divided house of your mind and make the two spheres one as they were when we were children. Jesus even said, "Unless we become like little children we will not enter the kingdom of heaven" (Matthew 18:3). Perhaps this theory is what he meant by that!

Okay, so you’re probably wondering what in the world this has to do with the Band With Us super PAC? All I can say to that is everything! The simple truth is all spiritual and political challenges we face are all interconnected. And showing that the tree of life that promises eternal life to all who find it is not some fruit bearing tree that resides in some distant kingdom we have no access to. It is right there within us. If we could only mentally grasp it, as well as, so many other elusive metaphors concealed in the Bible. Truth be told if we are all dying then what difference does it make how we resolve any of these issues. But if we can find eternal life then it makes all the difference in the world. If we would only put our swords down, stop trying to be right all the time and work together we could figure all this stuff out. And that is what the Band With Us platform is designed to do.