John 6:63
63 It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh profits nothing. The words that I speak to you are spirit, and they are life.

John 6:68
68 But Simon Peter answered Him, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life.

We have eaten from the wrong tree. It was a long time ago but it happened. God breathed into Adam the breath of life (see Gen 2:6-7). Man became a living soul. It still works that way. You can be a soul without the breath of God. Want to be a living soul? Want to know true life? It comes from the breath of God. There’s no other source of life than the Spirit.

The Hebrew word for “breath” is ruach. It can be translated as wind, breath, or spirit. Life comes from the Spirit of God. That’s how things started for humans – our intimate connection to God by the Spirit is what made us truly alive. But we ate from the wrong tree. It’s the one thing God told us not to do. He said if we ate from that tree, we would die. We would lose our life. We would lose our intimate connection to God through the Spirit.

We chose an alternative source. Instead of God’s Spirit being our source of Life, we became our own source. We chose independence. We chose pride. We chose self. We chose the Knowledge of Good and Evil. We died.

Jesus came to bring us life, to restore what we lost.

John 10:10
10 The thief does not come except to steal, and to kill, and to destroy. I have come that they may have life, and that they may have it more abundantly.

John 20:22-23
22 And when He had said this, He breathed on them, and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit.

Through Christ I am again inimately connected to the life of God, the breath of God, through the presence of the Holy Spirit. But often I settle for less than this in my day to day experience. I often fall into the old trap of living out of the knowledge of good & evil rather than choosing to live by his life. Instead of choosing life rather than death I try to choose good things and avoid bad things (Thanks Rick Joyner and Bob Hamp). I come to God’s Word expressed through scripture and instead of deeply inhaling his breath (that’s what “inspired” means: breathed out by God), I look for principles I can learn and apply. I look for rules and formulas. I look for right doctrine (nothing wrong with principles and doctrine at all, but they aren’t life). I come to scripture but I don’t come to Christ.

John 5:39-40
39 You search the Scriptures, for in them you think you have eternal life; and these are they which testify of Me.  40 But you are not willing to come to Me that you may have life.