[ShadowAce]

I don’t know if Adam ever ate from the tree of life, it doesn’t say. He didn’t live forever.

Correct. He did, however, live a VERY long time.

The tree of life is like a shadow, the image of Christ. It is one of many pictures of Christ scattered through scripture, each giving us a different perspective of Christ. If you put them all together you will have a pretty good 3D picture of him.

Understood. My understanding of Christ, though, is that I must work constantly to be like Him. I cannot just say one day that I repent, accept Him as my Savior, then continue on with the rest of my life like nothing happened. It's not a one-shot deal.

Like that image, the Tree of Life is not a one-shot deal.

Like I mentioned to Elsie earlier, this is not a salvation issue so our opinions on this are not as important as other issues. One can choose to believe what one wants and it will not affect salvation. It should not affect our attitudes towards others.

[Seven_0]

Eternal life is a one shot deal. If you have it, you live forever. If you don’t live forever, you don’t have it.

My understanding of Christ, though is that I must work constantly to be like him

Christ, the author and finisher of our faith will also work constantly toward the same goal. We have an obstacle to overcome, the natural man. We are created in Adam and we are created in Christ. The natural man will work against that goal.

Gal 5:17 For the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh: and these are contrary the one to the other: so that ye cannot do the things that ye would.

This is not a salvation issue so our opinions on this are not as important as other issues.

Caution here. Everything in scripture is there because the author thought it was important. Try not to rank issues by importance.