Here is today’s parable, straight from the heart of Jesus.
The Parable of a Tree and Its Fruit
In this parable, Jesus has a conversation with the Pharisees. They believe their empty religion and piety prove their salvation.
But their hearts proved that they had no true faith. No matter how hard they worked at their religion, it was not evidence of faith.
Every born-again believer knows that once we have given our hearts to Jesus, we can no longer easily just live like nothing has changed. “…the old is made new.” (2 Corinthians 5:17)
That is not to say that believers don’t get off the track. But if you are truly born again, you can’t comfortably live apart from Christ.
Jesus tells the Pharisees that their evil actions and hearts contradict their words about righteousness. They were liars. They spoke words about God and His moral law, but their hearts were filled with blasphemy and sin. They rejected Christ.
Jesus very plainly points to their vile hearts that were exposed despite all of their religious knowledge.
“Either make the tree good and its fruit good, or make the tree corrupt and its fruit corrupt; for the tree is known by its fruit. You offspring of vipers, how can you, being evil, speak good things?
Jesus used this word picture to show that the heart of a person is like a tree that either grows good fruit, or it grows briars of wickedness and sin. It can’t produce two different things.
Can people see Jesus in you?
What is the abundance of your heart? Is it filled with the fruit of the Spirit of God?
For out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks.
The good man out of his good treasure brings out good things, and the evil man out of his evil treasure brings out evil things.
I tell you that every idle word that men speak, they will give account of it in the day of judgment. For by your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned.”
Matthew 12:33-37
Only God’s true sons and daughters know that to show evidence of our salvation, we must fill our hearts and minds with Jesus. We must commune with the Spirit of God and bury His Word deeply in our hearts and minds. We must be intentional about our relationship with God.
And from out of the truest experience of knowing and loving Him, Christ will easily be seen in our thoughts, words, and deeds.
Does this story remind you of a Psalm?
Take a look:
Blessed is the man who doesn’t walk in the counsel of the wicked,
nor stand on the path of sinners,
nor sit in the seat of scoffers;
But his delight is in Yahweh’s law.
On his law, he meditates day and night.
He will be like a tree planted by the streams of water,
that produces its fruit in its season,
whose leaf also does not wither.
Whatever he does shall prosper.
The wicked are not so,
but are like the chaff which the wind drives away.
Therefore, the wicked shall not stand in the judgment,
nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous.
For Yahweh knows the way of the righteous,
but the way of the wicked shall perish.
Psalm 1
Let your life show evidence of the fruit of the Spirit. (Galatians 5:20-26)
Share the Good News in your world.
Isaiah 52:7
World English Bible (WEB)
by Public Domain. The name “World English Bible” is trademarked.
Getting the Seed out of the basket and into hungry hearts. Matthew 13 