Vision - Thomas Jefferson And An Apple

I saw Thomas Jefferson’s face. It was very large and much like his image on Mount Rushmore.

Then I saw his entire person and he was standing dressed in a military uniform of the American Revolution. He was in an apple orchard and he slowly walked to one of the trees and reached up to touch a ripe apple. He just stood with his hand hovering over the fruit for a moment and then he picked it.

He then sat down on a round bench, built on the circumference of the tree trunk and leaned his elbows on his knees with the apple between his hands. He slowly turned the apple as if contemplating it very deeply and seriously.

The vision ended there.

Thomas Jefferson is only a symbol in this vision and in it he represents freedom and thought. Jefferson is famous, among other things, for being the principle author of the American Declaration of Independence as well as being a thinker/philosopher.

The freedom represented in this vision is that of anyone whose sins have been forgiven by Christ and is free from sin as well as free to obey God.

The military uniform is indicative of battle. The war waged is not with guns and canons but rather in the mind and will.

The apple is the classic symbol of temptation.

Here is portrayed a man of freedom waging a war of will in the face of temptation and it is the same war we face as Christians on a regular basis. We are free in Christ because He made us free with His death and resurrection. What Jefferson (the thinker) was doing as his hand hovered over the apple was what we do when we begin to have thoughts of sin.

As the apple was picked, the thoughts of sin have begun to turn toward actually committing the sin. The contemplation of the apple as Jefferson slowly turned it in his hands is a picture of the way we make a choice to sin or not. We premeditate very often before we actually commit to going all the way with whatever sin happens to be tempting us at the moment.


So since God’s grace has set us free from the law, does this mean we can go on sinning? Of course not! Don’t you realize that whatever you choose to obey becomes your master? You can choose sin, which leads to death, or you can choose to obey God and receive His approval. Thank God! Once you were slave of sin, but now you have obeyed with all your heart the new teaching God has given. Now you are FREE from sin, your old master, and you have become slaves to your new master, righteousness.
Romans 6